The Symphony No. 3 in D minor by Gustav Mahler was written in sketch beginning in 1893, composed primarily in 1895,[1] and took final form in 1896.[2] Consisting of six movements, it is Mahler's longest composition and is the longest symphony in the standard repertoire, with a typical performance lasting around 95 to 110 minutes. It was voted one of the ten greatest symphonies of all time in a survey of conductors carried out by the BBC Music Magazine.[3]
Sehr langsam—Misterioso (Very slowly, mysteriously) D major
Lustig im Tempo und keck im Ausdruck (Cheerful in tempo and cheeky in expression) F major
Langsam—Ruhevoll—Empfunden (Slowly, tranquil, deeply felt) D major
The first movement alone, with a normal duration of a little more than thirty minutes, sometimes forty, forms Part One of the symphony. Part Two consists of the other five movements and has a duration of about sixty to seventy minutes.
As with each of his first four symphonies, Mahler originally provided a programme of sorts to explain the narrative of the piece. He did not reveal the structure and content to the public. But, at different times, he shared evolving versions of a program for the third symphony with various friends, including: Max Marschalk, a music critic; violist Natalie Bauer-Lechner, a close friend and confidante; and Anna von Mildenburg, the dramatic soprano and Mahler's lover during the summer of 1896 when he was completing the symphony. Bauer-Lechner wrote in her private journal that Mahler said, "You can't imagine how it will sound!"[4]
In its simplest form, the program consists of a title for each of the six movements:
Mahler, however, elaborated on this basic scheme in various letters. In an 1896 letter to Max Marschalk, he called the whole "A Summer's Midday Dream", and within Part One, distinguished two sections, "Introduction: Pan awakes" and "I. Summer marches in (Bacchic procession)".[5] In a June 1896 letter to Anna von Mildenburg, Mahler reaffirmed that he conceived the first movement in two sections: I. What the stony mountains tell me; II. Summer marches in.[6] In another letter to Mildenburg from Summer 1896, he said that "Pan" seemed to him the best overall title (Gesamttitel) for the symphony, emphasizing that he was intrigued by Pan's two meanings, a Greek god and a Greek word meaning "all."[7]
All these titles were dropped before publication in 1898.[8]
Mahler originally envisioned a seventh movement, "Heavenly Life" (alternatively, "What the Child Tells Me"), but he eventually dropped this, using it instead as the last movement of the Symphony No. 4.[9] Indeed, several musical motifs taken from "Heavenly Life" appear in the fifth (choral) movement of the Third Symphony.[10]
The symphony, particularly due to the extensive number of movements and their marked differences in character and construction, is a unique work. The opening movement, colossal in its conception (much like the symphony itself), roughly takes the shape of sonata form, insofar as there is an alternating presentation of two theme groups; however, the themes are varied and developed with each presentation, and the typical harmonic logic of the sonata form movement—particularly the tonic statement of second theme group material in the recapitulation—is changed.[clarification needed] The symphony starts with a modified theme, stated by an 8-French horn choir, from the fourth movement of Brahms' first symphony with the same rhythm, but many of the notes are changed.
The opening gathers itself slowly into a rousing orchestral march. A solo tenor trombone passage states a bold (secondary) melody that is developed and transformed in its recurrences.
At the apparent conclusion of the development, several solo snare drums "offstage" play a rhythmic passage lasting about thirty seconds and the opening passage by eight horns is repeated almost exactly.
As described above, Mahler dedicated the second movement to "the flowers on the meadow". In contrast to the violent forces of the first movement, it starts as a graceful menuet, but also features stormier episodes.
The third movement, a scherzo, with alternating sections in 2 4 and 6 8 meter, quotes extensively from Mahler's early song "Ablösung im Sommer" (Relief in Summer).[11]
In the trio section, the mood change from playful to contemplative occurs with an off-stage post horn (or flugelhorn) solo.
This posthorn episode closely resembles standardised posthorn signals in Austria and Prussia of the time.[12][13] The posthorn melody is suddenly interrupted (in measure 345) by a trumpet fanfare representing a literal quotation of the Austrian military signal for falling out (Abblasen).[14][15] Another important quotation in the movement is a Spanish folk melody of jota aragonesa used by Mikhail Glinka in Caprice brillante and by Franz Liszt in Rhapsodie espagnole. Most probably it borrowed here from Ferruccio Busoni's transcription of the Rhapsodie for piano and orchestra, as the harmonies are almost identical and passages are equally almost similar.[16][17] Busoni himself was the first to remark on this quotation in 1910.[18]
The reprise of the scherzo music is unusual, as it is interrupted several times by the post-horn melody.
At this point, in the sparsely instrumentated fourth movement, we hear an alto solo singing a setting of Friedrich Nietzsche's "Midnight Song" ("Zarathustra's roundelay") from Also sprach Zarathustra ("O Mensch! Gib acht!" ("O man! Take heed!")), with thematic material from the first movement woven into it.[19] The movement is punctuated by oboe glissandi, representing the cry of a night bird.[20]
The cheerful fifth movement, "Es sungen drei Engel", is one of Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn songs, (whose text itself is loosely based on a 17th-century church hymn, which Paul Hindemith later used in its original form in his Symphony "Mathis der Maler") about the redemption of sins and comfort in belief.
Here, a children's choir imitating bells and a female chorus join the alto solo.
In the last movement, words are stilled—for what language can utter heavenly love more powerfully and forcefully than music itself? The Adagio, with its broad, solemn melodic line, is, as a whole—and despite passages of burning pain—eloquent of comfort and grace. It is a single sound of heartfelt and exalted feelings, in which the whole giant structure finds its culmination.[This quote needs a citation]
The movement begins very softly with a broad D-major chorale melody in the strings, which slowly builds to a loud and majestic conclusion culminating on repeated D major chords with bold statements on the timpani.
The last movement in particular had a triumphant critical success. The Swiss critic William Ritter, in his review of the premiere given in 1902, said of the last movement: "Perhaps the greatest Adagio written since Beethoven". Another anonymous critic writing in the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung wrote about the Adagio: "It rises to heights which situate this movement among the most sublime in all symphonic literature". Mahler was called back to the podium 12 times, and the local newspaper reported that “the thunderous ovation lasted no less than fifteen minutes.”[21]
Instrumentation
The symphony is scored for large orchestra, consisting of the following:
O Mensch! Gib Acht! Was spricht die tiefe Mitternacht? "Ich schlief, ich schlief —, aus tiefem Traum bin ich erwacht: — Die Welt ist tief, und tiefer als der Tag gedacht. Tief ist ihr Weh —, Lust — tiefer noch als Herzeleid. Weh spricht: Vergeh! Doch all' Lust will Ewigkeit —, — will tiefe, tiefe Ewigkeit!"
O Man! Take heed! What says the deep midnight? "I slept, I slept —, from a deep dream have I awoken: — the world is deep, and deeper than the day has thought. Deep is its pain —, joy — deeper still than heartache. Pain says: Pass away! But all joy seeks eternity —, — seeks deep, deep eternity!"
Es sungen drei Engel einen süßen Gesang, mit Freuden es selig in dem Himmel klang. Sie jauchzten fröhlich auch dabei: daß Petrus sei von Sünden frei!
Und als der Herr Jesus zu Tische saß, mit seinen zwölf Jüngern das Abendmahl aß, da sprach der Herr Jesus: "Was stehst du denn hier? Wenn ich dich anseh', so weinest du mir!"
"Und sollt' ich nicht weinen, du gütiger Gott? Ich hab' übertreten die zehn Gebot! Ich gehe und weine ja bitterlich! Ach komm und erbarme dich über mich!"
"Hast du denn übertreten die zehen Gebot, so fall auf die Knie und bete zu Gott! Liebe nur Gott in alle Zeit! So wirst du erlangen die himmlische Freud'."
Die himmlische Freud' ist eine selige Stadt, die himmlische Freud', die kein Ende mehr hat! Die himmlische Freude war Petro bereit't, durch Jesum und allen zur Seligkeit.
Three angels sang a sweet song, with blessed joy it rang in heaven. They shouted too for joy that Peter was free from sin!
And as Lord Jesus sat at the table with his twelve disciples and ate the evening meal, Lord Jesus said: "Why do you stand here? When I look at you, you are weeping!"
"And should I not weep, kind God? I have violated the ten commandments! I wander and weep bitterly! O come and take pity on me!"
"If you have violated the ten commandments, then fall on your knees and pray to God! Love only God for all time! So will you gain heavenly joy."
The heavenly joy is a blessed city, the heavenly joy that has no end! The heavenly joy was granted to Peter through Jesus, and to all mankind for eternal bliss.
Tonality
Peter Franklin from the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians represents the symphony's progressive tonal scheme as 'd/F—D'.[22] More casually it is described as being in D minor. The first movement certainly begins in this key but, by its end, has defined the relative F major as the tonic. The finale concludes in D major, the tonic major, which is not unusual for minor key, multi-movement works. Throughout the symphony, traditional tonality is employed in an enterprising manner with clear purpose [vague].
The piece is performed in concert less frequently than Mahler's other symphonies[citation needed], due in part to its great length and the huge forces required. Despite this, it is a popular work and has been recorded by most major orchestras and conductors.
When it is performed, a short interval is sometimes taken between the first movement (which alone lasts around half an hour) and the rest of the piece. This is in agreement with the manuscript copy of the full score (held in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York), where the end of the first movement carries the inscription Folgt eine lange Pause! ("there follows a long pause").[23] The inscription is not found in the score as published.
The Adagio movement was arranged by Yoon Jae Lee in 2011 for a smaller orchestra. This version was premiered by Ensemble 212 with Lee as conductor in New York on the eve of the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Subsequently, Lee arranged the five remaining movements for smaller orchestra as part of his Mahler Chamber Project. The orchestral reduction of the entire symphony was premiered in October 2015 by Ensemble 212, mezzo-soprano Hyona Kim, and the Young New Yorkers' Chorus Women's Ensemble.
The second movement was arranged by Benjamin Britten in 1941 for a smaller orchestra. This version was published by Boosey & Hawkes as What the Wild Flowers Tell Me in 1950.
The work is also referenced in the pop singer Prince's song "Good Love" ("Gustav Mahler #3 is jamming on the box") from his Crystal Ball album and the Bright Lights, Big City soundtrack.[25]
Premieres
First performance of the second movement: Nov. 9, 1896 Berlin, conducted by Artur Nikisch (repeated by him in Leipzig on Jan. 21, 1897).
Performance of second, third and sixth movements: March 9, 1897, Berlin, conducted by Felix Weingartner.
Premiere of the complete symphony: June 9, 1902, Krefeld, cond. by the composer. (Between 1902 and 1907 Mahler conducted his symphony 15 times, cf. "Mahler's Concerts", by Knud Martner, New York 2010, p.341).
British premiere: Nov. 29, 1947, BBC Symphony Orchestra in a broadcast cond. by Adrian Boult; this was not recorded by the BBC, but an off-air recording was made on acetate discs and transferred to CD in 2008: the earliest extant recording of the symphony.
First commercial recording: Apr. 27, 1952 Hilde Rössel-Majdan, choirs, Vienna Symphony Orchestra cond. by F. Charles Adler on the SPA label. It is available for streaming on Spotify.
First public performance in Britain: Feb. 28, 1961, St. Pancras Town Hall, cond. by Bryan Fairfax.
Related Research Articles
Gustav Mahler was an Austro-Bohemian Romantic composer, and one of the leading conductors of his generation. As a composer he acted as a bridge between the 19th-century Austro-German tradition and the modernism of the early 20th century. While in his lifetime his status as a conductor was established beyond question, his own music gained wide popularity only after periods of relative neglect, which included a ban on its performance in much of Europe during the Nazi era. After 1945 his compositions were rediscovered by a new generation of listeners; Mahler then became one of the most frequently performed and recorded of all composers, a position he has sustained into the 21st century.
The Symphony No. 5 by Gustav Mahler was composed in 1901 and 1902, mostly during the summer months at Mahler's holiday cottage at Maiernigg. Among its most distinctive features are the trumpet solo that opens the work with a rhythmic motif similar to the opening of Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, the horn solos in the third movement and the frequently performed Adagietto.
The Symphony No. 1 in D major by Gustav Mahler was mainly composed between late 1887 and March 1888, though it incorporates music Mahler had composed for previous works. It was composed while Mahler was second conductor at the Leipzig Opera in Germany. Although in his letters Mahler almost always referred to the work as a symphony, the first two performances described it as a symphonic poem and as a tone poem in symphonic form, respectively. The work was premièred at the Vigadó Concert Hall in Budapest, Hungary, in 1889, but was not well-received. Mahler made some major revisions for the second performance, given at Hamburg, Germany, in October 1893; further alterations were made in the years prior to the first publication, in late 1898. Some modern performances and recordings give the work the title Titan, despite the fact that Mahler only used this label for the second and third performances, and never after the work had reached its definitive four-movement form in 1896.
The Symphony No. 8 in E-flat major by Gustav Mahler is one of the largest-scale choral works in the classical concert repertoire. As it requires huge instrumental and vocal forces it is frequently called the "Symphony of a Thousand", although the work is normally presented with far fewer than a thousand performers and the composer disapproved of it. The work was composed in a single inspired burst at his Maiernigg villa in southern Austria in the summer of 1906. The last of Mahler's works that was premiered in his lifetime, the symphony was a critical and popular success when he conducted the Munich Philharmonic in its first performance, in Munich, on 12 September 1910.
The Symphony No. 4 in G major by Gustav Mahler was composed from 1899 to 1900, though it incorporates a song originally written in 1892. That song, "Das himmlische Leben", presents a child's vision of heaven and is sung by a soprano in the symphony's Finale. Both smaller in orchestration and shorter in length than Mahler's earlier symphonies, the Fourth Symphony was initially planned to be in six movements, alternating between three instrumental and three vocal movements. The symphony's final form—begun in July 1899 at Bad Aussee and completed in August 1900 at Maiernigg—retains only one vocal movement and is in four movements: Bedächtig, nicht eilen ; In gemächlicher Bewegung, ohne Hast ; Ruhevoll,poco adagio ; and Sehr behaglich.
The Symphony No. 2 in C minor by Gustav Mahler, known as the Resurrection Symphony, was written between 1888 and 1894, and first performed in 1895. This symphony was one of Mahler's most popular and successful works during his lifetime. It was his first major work that established his lifelong view of the beauty of afterlife and resurrection. In this large work, the composer further developed the creativity of "sound of the distance" and creating a "world of its own", aspects already seen in his First Symphony. The work has a duration of 80 to 90 minutes, and is conventionally labelled as being in the key of C minor; the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians labels the work's tonality as C minor–E♭ major. It was voted the fifth-greatest symphony of all time in a survey of conductors carried out by the BBC Music Magazine.
The Symphony No. 7 by Gustav Mahler was written in 1904–05, with repeated revisions to the scoring. It is sometimes referred to by the title Song of the Night, which Mahler never knew. Although the symphony is often described as being in the key of E minor, its tonal scheme is more complicated. The symphony's first movement moves from B minor (introduction) to E minor, and the work ends with a rondo finale in C major. Thus, as Dika Newlin has pointed out, "in this symphony Mahler returns to the ideal of 'progressive tonality' which he had abandoned in the Sixth". The complexity of the work's tonal scheme was analysed in terms of "interlocking structures" by Graham George.
The Symphony No. 6 in A minor by Gustav Mahler is a symphony in four movements, composed in 1903 and 1904, with revisions from 1906. It is sometimes nicknamed the Tragic ("Tragische"), though the origin of the name is unclear.
The Symphony No. 9 by Gustav Mahler was written between 1908 and 1909, and was the last symphony that he completed. A typical performance takes about 75 to 90 minutes. A survey of conductors voted Mahler's Symphony No. 9 the fourth greatest symphony of all time in a ballot conducted by BBC Music Magazine in 2016. As in the case of his earlier Das Lied von der Erde, Mahler did not live to see his Symphony No. 9 performed.
The Symphony No. 10 in F-sharp major by Gustav Mahler was written in the summer of 1910, and was his final composition. At the time of Mahler's death, the composition was substantially complete in the form of a continuous draft, but not fully elaborated or orchestrated, and thus not performable. Only the first movement is regarded as reasonably complete and performable as Mahler intended. Perhaps as a reflection of the inner turmoil he was undergoing at the time, the 10th Symphony is arguably his most dissonant work.
Das Lied von der Erde is an orchestral song cycle for two voices and orchestra written by Gustav Mahler between 1908 and 1909. Described as a symphony when published, it comprises six songs for two singers who alternate movements. Mahler specified that the two singers should be a tenor and an alto, or else a tenor and a baritone if an alto is not available.
Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen is a song cycle by Gustav Mahler on his own texts. The cycle of four lieder for medium voice was written around 1884–85 in the wake of Mahler's unhappy love for soprano Johanna Richter, whom he met as the conductor of the opera house in Kassel, Germany, and orchestrated and revised in the 1890s.
Kindertotenlieder is a song cycle (1904) for voice and orchestra by Gustav Mahler. The words of the songs are poems by Friedrich Rückert.
Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 8 in C minor, WAB 108, is the last symphony the composer completed. It exists in two major versions of 1887 and 1890. It was premiered under conductor Hans Richter in 1892 at the Musikverein, Vienna. It is dedicated to the Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria.
Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 3 in D minor, WAB 103, was dedicated to Richard Wagner and is sometimes known as his "Wagner Symphony". It was written in 1873, revised in 1877 and again in 1889.
The songs of Des Knaben Wunderhorn by Gustav Mahler are voice-and-piano and voice-and-orchestra settings of German folk poems chosen from a collection of the same name assembled by Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano and published by them, in heavily redacted form, between 1805 and 1808.
Sinfonia (Symphony) is a composition by the Italian composer Luciano Berio which was commissioned by the New York Philharmonic for its 125th anniversary. Composed in 1968–69 for orchestra and eight amplified voices, it incorporates musical quotations to represent an abstract and distorted history of culture. The eight voices are not incorporated classically but rather speak, whisper and shout excerpts from texts including Claude Lévi-Strauss' The Raw and the Cooked, Samuel Beckett's novel The Unnamable, instructions from the scores of Gustav Mahler and other writings.
Mahler Symphony No. 4 is a 57-minute studio album that the operatic mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade recorded with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of Claudio Abbado. It was released in 1978.
Mahler Symphony No. 4 is a 73-minute studio album on which Mahler's Fourth and his song cycle Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen are performed by Frederica von Stade and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Yoel Levi. The recording was released in 1999.
↑ Jens Malte Fischer[de], Gustav Mahler, English translation by Stewart Spencer, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011), 275.
↑ Franz Willnauer, ed, Gustav Mahler: 'Mein lieber Trotzkopf, meine suesse Mohnblume': Briefe an Anna von Mildenburg, (Vienna: Paul Zsolnay Verlag, 2006), 132. ISBN3-552-05389-1
↑ Franz Willnauer, ed, Gustav Mahler: Briefe an Anna von Mildenburg, 142.
↑ Hiller, Albert. Das große Buch vom Posthorn. Wilhelmshaven: Heinrichshofens Verlag, 1985. pp. 80–81
↑ Emil Rameis, Die österreichische Militärmusik—von ihren Anfängen bis 1918, rev. ed., ed. Eugen Brixel in Alta Musica 2 (Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 1976), 183, 188
↑ Jason Stephen Heilman, "O du mein Österreich: Patriotic Music and Multinational Identity in the AustroHungarian Empire" (PhD diss., Duke University, 2009), 198.
↑ Morten Solvik, "Biography and Musical Meaning in the Posthorn Solo of Mahler's Third Symphony", in Neue Mahleriana: Essays in Honour of Henry-Louis de La Grange on his Seventieth Birthday, ed. Günther Weiß (Bern: Peter Lang, 1997), 340–344, 356–359.
↑ Ferruccio Busoni, Von der Einheit der Musik: Von Dritteltönen und junger Klassizität, von Bühnen und anschliessenden Bezirken (Berlin: Max Hesse, 1922), 152.
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