-----Original Message-----
From: John Smyth <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wednesday, February 02, 2000 11:49 AM
Subject: Re: Boulez Mahler 6 at the Barbican


John Smyth writes:
>
>So true.  I like Chailly's Mahler 7th very much, except that the cowbells
>in those grand chords of the finale are just too pronounced for my taste.
>I was wondering if anyone else demanded sublimity in their cowbell sound.
>
>Oh, the things we have to deal with....
>
I have bad cow memories, I am afraid.  Once during my farm days something
triggered an emotionally unstable cow or two and they started running.  Soon
all the others joined in.  If you have never been in the thick of a
stampede, even a stampede of dairy cows, you have no idea what it is like.
They take no notice of you.  If you are in front of them, the urge to dodge
you is not considered. They run without a goal; they run to run and you had
better damned well join in.

On the flip side, they can be damned stubborn.  Herding them back into their
stalls at the end of the day can be difficult.  Each cow has her own stall,
and the cows are herded in single file.  Generally things go well, but once
in a while a cow prefers a different stall.  The traffic jam that results is
unimagineable and trying to back cows out is not a test of patience but a
destroyer.

For me the most sublime cowbell is the one that does not ring.  Mahler was
never stampeded.  I know this.  I know this well.

Thomas Heilman
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>