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Editor note: This report was one I turned in for class this last semester. Enjoy, but please don't plagiarize.
Performance Report for Music Appreciation
By Samuel Guss
Gustav Mahler, 9th Symphony as performed by the Alabama Symphony Orchestra (ASO) on Saturday, April 9, 2011 at 8p.m., Justin Brown conducting.
I consider myself a Gustav Mahler fan. Having stated that, I must also confess I haven’t heard all of his symphonies yet and the 9th, only once the week before through a YouTube video. My sentiment towards Gustav Mahler has only increased since listening to this performance. The questions regarding what I found most and least satisfying can be summed up in whole, that I found the entire work satisfying and emotionally complex which I will explain below. Overall, this was a fabulous performance and deserved the 5 stars it received in my opinion.
The year before composing the 9th symphony, Gustav Mahler endured the hardship of losing his daughter Maria, age 4 in addition to losing his position at the Vienna Court Opera and being diagnosed with a serious heart condition. All of this leads many, including myself to feel that Mahler’s 9th is his way of expressing the feelings of loss, death and his way of saying goodbye, farewell. While the death of his daughter was tragic enough, the news of his own heart condition a constant reminder of his own time left, the loss of his position at the Vienna Court Opera was serious drama for himself as well. Back in 1907 when all of this went down, Gustav Mahler was not known for being a great composer, but rather a great conductor, his position at the Vienna Court Opera, ensuring that he was considered one of the best in his time. Since music was his life, the loss of this position must have weighed heavily upon him. This sets the stage for his 9th symphony written in 1908 and 1909.
Mahler’s 9th Symphony is about 75 minutes long and in 4 movements. I have included notes about each movement in this report.
Movement I: Andante comodo, or medium tempo (andante) with an unrestrained and easy mood (comodo).
From the very beginning theme, we are introduced to a fluttering heartbeat that is repeated throughout the symphony and ends it in a tragic and dramatic fashion. The second theme of the first movement is a light, joyful melody that gives way to frustration and anger, lifted by the harsh sounds of the brass section. It is here in this first movement that I feel is representative of the various stages of grief. The anger and frustration of the brass section gives way to a more accepting, mellow melody of the woodwinds, while the brass and strings play off each other in antecedent/consequent phrases. The first movement ends in almost a triumph melody, a brass fan fare before the true ending, back to our first theme of the heart beat.
The emotional gambit is gone through in the first movement of Mahler’s 9th symphony in a loose sonata form of three distinct themes: the irregular heartbeat that is played mostly by the deeper string instruments (cello and bass), the fanfare and panic which is a tempo and dynamic variance played by the brass and finally the mellow melody of life itself, played out by the woodwinds and strings (mostly violins and violas). The final note of the first movement is a single reverberating ping, to me signaling ‘the end’. We have a minute or two of pause and then move into the second movement.
Movement II: In Tempo eines gemachlichen Landlers. Etwas tappisch und sehr derb. I could not find a translation for the title of the second movement, but do know that the second movement is a Landler, a type of dance music.
While movement two is a Landler, or folks dance, Mahler distorts it in this movement. Life is a joyous occasion, reason to celebrate, unless you’ve lost everything or about to and know it. Then life is distorted with ones own emotions and this is the essence of the second movement in my opinion. Many people do not care for the second movement, finding it too abrasive and severely discordant. In this performance, the ASO smoothed it out some from the other recording I’ve heard and from discussion with other fans with more exposure than me to the piece.
It starts out light hearted with the heartbeat theme in the background and gives way to the Landler, which to me sounds similar to a Waltz. From there though, it becomes unpredictable, except for the underlying theme of the heartbeat and becomes even crazier and all over the place. For me, this expressed the manic moods of saying farewell to others and to ideals, the times we are not sure whether to be sad or happy, to reflect or surge ahead and all of those emotions are tied up inside of us at the same time. This is the sound that I personally hear during this movement, random acts of mania, coupled with severe sounds of denial. The movement ends in despair, an almost ‘why me’ quality to it.
Movement III: Rondo-Burleske: Allegro assai. Sehr trotzig. The Rondo form is multiple different sections, one of which keeps repeating and allegro, means fast.
The repeating section of the third movement’s rondo is the brass fanfare, which symbolizes in my mind, life will go on and I will triumph despite the odds. The other sections delve into expressing the other sides of this coin – the soft melody of acceptance and peace, along with the boisterous brass shouting to the world. Again, we get this emotional roller coaster that started and was driven home in the first movement; here we have it again at a different stage of the grief process. The high dramatic moment in this movement is when the softer and happier melody is played; it is rudely cut off by the braying of the brass section. Even that loud, rude sound gets cut off suddenly, like a quick death at the end of the movement.
Movement IV: Adagio – slowly.
Considered one of his best Adagio’s, I am glad to have heard it this way, at the end of such an amazing concert, versus by itself without the other movements in context. It is my personal belief that the strength of this Adagio is because of the emotional roller coaster we’ve experienced with this work, the various themes and rondo that just finished, this music simply soars within this context.
Right from the beginning of the movement, we are brought back to the initial theme of the heartbeat. The theme has been around since the first notes of the symphony itself. Only now it is deeper, slower, louder and definitely more dramatic. A solo trumpet plays softly and slowly, yet it somehow manages to emphasize the rest of the orchestra such as the strings which all now are playing the heartbeat theme in Ritardando tempo (progressively becoming slower). It is plain to see in my opinion, that this movement is saying ‘goodbye’. It is soft and measured, peaceful and accepting.
About half-way through the movement the kettle drums rumble announcing that the time is near and the bass and cello string instrument pass off the heartbeat to the violins and start taking up a sound like laboring breath, struggling and fading. In an almost antecedent/consequent phrase style, the goodbye is drawn out seemingly from the person being lost to the person nearby. I got the strange sensation of when you are at the deathbed of an older family member, not wanting to say goodbye, but knowing there is peace for them when they go. That push-pull effect your emotions have on you at that time.
Slowly, one instrument and then one section drops away, in the most awesome Ritardando tempo, all over the orchestra in between mini-finales of the entire orchestra playing, until just a few strings play the original heartbeat theme, slower and slower, softer and softer. One by one they stop as well. The conductor holds his arms up, as prepared for a down beat, the hall is hushed silence for a solid couple minutes, the very last echoes of the last violin’s notes gone and it is complete silence. Dramatic in such a fashion that you yourself have said farewell to the music itself.
That’s the end, and then applause.
So what did I learn from this experience? That Mahler is definitely on the liberal-romantic side of things. This entire symphony is one of dramatic themes and overtures and extreme highs and lows on the emotional scale. I learned more about Mahler himself from the conductor during the concert notes, such as how Mahler was more known for his conducting skills than his composing ones. The program did a great job of setting the stage of when and how the symphony was written and how and why it is considered to be expressing loss.
Overall it was an awesome concert and I will be back for more performances by the ASP in the future.
References:
Opus, program guide for ASO
Handwritten notes from concert notes and the symphony itself (available if you need)
Class notes, Jessica Kaufhold, Music Appreciation
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