Mark Seeley ([log in to unmask]) wrote:

>I have usually linked Mahler's Ninth with Tchaikovsky's Sixth in that both
>end with feelings of utter despair and hopelessness.

Can't agree about M9. M6 yes. There are formal similarities between M9
and T6 though.

>...  What binds us together in this human fraternity is this powerful
>desire that our mini-deaths -- our grief, our pains, our hurts -- go away,
>and we have no power in and of ourselves to make a go of it.  Mahler's
>Ninth eloquently expresses this profound desire.

Woiuldn't disagree with this.

>I can't say if Mahler deals with death nobly or meanly, with courage or
>cowardice.  Certainly the idea of resignation comes through to me.

Resignation, acceptance yes.  But not despair.  (Well, OK hysterical
despair in the case of Bernstein's Concertgebouw recording, but that's
another story)

Deryk Barker
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