Spiritualism in Late Mahler

[Luke]

I think Norrington is referring to the the German 'lebwohl' which means goodbye, and does fit that pattern. The motif is also a quotation from Beethoven's piano sonata les adieux, where it is also meant to suggest 'lebwohl'.

But in the Beethoven it's three syllables, lebewohl, fitting the three note 'horncall' motive that saturates the movement from the first:

[Sergeant Rock]

Thanks, Sarge. I don't have the LaGrange books, so I appreciate the info. So it's more of a farewell to love, nature, and youth?

Possibly. La Grange tends to convince me in these "the meaning of Mahler's music" debates. He does quote extensively from a wide range of sources so one gets a number of opinions, giving us plenty of counter-arguments to his own views. Very fair.

The four volumes are a good if exhausting read (practically a day by day account of his life) You'll have to acquire the books eventually.

Great post, Sarge. If the 9th is a farewell to love, what do you think the 10th is?

An attempt to get love back!    Seriously, those final pages are a heart-felt cry of love, directed at Alma.

Sarge

[Karl Henning]

Almschi!

[calyptorhynchus]

I've always thought that the last movement of the 9th was too warm for death.

[Cato]

Possibly. La Grange tends to convince me in these "the meaning of Mahler's music" debates. He does quote extensively from a wide range of sources so one gets a number of opinions, giving us plenty of counter-arguments to his own views. Very fair.

The four volumes are a good if exhausting read (practically a day by day account of his life) You'll have to acquire the books eventually.

An attempt to get love back!    Seriously, those final pages are a heart-felt cry of love, directed at Alma.

Sarge

MadAboutMahler: do you mean spiritualism or spirituality?  The topic threw me until I began reading the comments.

Yes, depending on what one wants to hear vs. what Mahler might have (secretly) been hearing in that "4-note motif," one could say that the four notes represent "Alma!  Alma!"  or "Alma, Gustav" or any other combination.

What a huge topic: a few quick comments from a 50+ year Mahlerian.  I will meditate further upon the topic later.

Certainly Mahler was spiritual in his own way, with or without Catholicism and Judaism.  One does not brew an Eighth Symphony using the Veni Creator Spiritus with the last scenes of Faust without an idiosyncratic sense of spirituality.

One can also hear in the "first Mahlerian" work, Das Klagende Lied that same kind of sighing motif on the words "Raben" (F to C) and "begraben" (Db - C) and "erschlagen" (G-F#) in Der Spielmann.  "Raben" is raven, here a bird of carrion.  "Begraben" means "buried" and refers to the body of a young knight killed by his own brother.  The soul of the brother of course comes through the bone-flute's music which offers similar sighing notes on "erschlagen" i.e. "murdered."

The Ninth Symphony on the first page is full of similar sighs in the harp (B-A) and in the repeated F#-E in the violins' opening melody.  What they might mean - resignation, wistful happiness, memories of the lost child, etc. etc. etc. - is (perhaps!) best answered by the non-answer: "They mean everything and nothing.  They mean whatever you might need them to mean at a specific point in your life."

For Mahler they meant something for him, whether both musical and something extra-musical, at specific points in his life, or perhaps they were devoid of extra-musical meaning completely or had only such meanings!

An example: one late winter day many years ago I decided to listen to Mahler's Tenth Symphony, a work I have known very well (I bought the Deryck Cooke score in the late 1960's for $5.00, which had to have been a misprint!) since its first recording with Cooke's first version of the score.  The music and score are in my brain, probably forever: the point is that I did not need to hear the CD in reality, because I have every note in my imagination.

By the time the last movement was over, I felt like I had been bulldozered!  Because what I had not realized at first, but did as the music reached the last 2 movements, was that my brain, soul, psyche, unconscious, whatever you would like to call it, was connecting this extremely well-known work to the death of my father 2 months earlier.  To be sure, I knew that the muffled drum toward the end was a reference to the funeral of a fireman which Mahler witnessed in New York City.  But that knowledge had never affected me before in this way.

So Mahler's Tenth Symphony at that moment absorbed a meaning for me that it never had earlier, and will never have again.  A singular experience!  So any "spirituality" in the polyphonic lines, in that ten-note chord in the First Movement, in Purgatorio, or elsewhere in the work, can always be kindled by something in the listener, but it is not something that will necessarily happen to everyone at every time.

And yet, buried in those sounds is the latent possibility of a spiritual experience for those who are ready.  Such is the mystery of music.

[ibanezmonster]

I've always thought that the last movement of the 9th was too warm for death.

What about death in a forest during the summer? 

[Karl Henning]

Gollum thinks that's too cool a death.

[Wanderer]

I agree with what Sarge (and Cato) so succinctly put. I don't agree with the utterly morbid interpretations. In my mind, the final movement of the Ninth can be seen in conjunction with the Tenth's Adagio in a similar way that the Todtenfeier movement of the Second can be seen as a continuation of the "Titan"'s finale.

[Cato]

MadAboutMahler: do you mean spiritualism or spirituality?  The topic threw me until I began reading the comments.

Yes, depending on what one wants to hear vs. what Mahler might have (secretly) been hearing in that "4-note motif," one could say that the four notes represent "Alma!  Alma!"  or "Alma, Gustav" or any other combination.

What a huge topic: a few quick comments from a 50+ year Mahlerian.  I will meditate further upon the topic later.

Certainly Mahler was spiritual in his own way, with or without Catholicism and Judaism.  One does not brew an Eighth Symphony using the Veni Creator Spiritus with the last scenes of Faust without an idiosyncratic sense of spirituality.

One can also hear in the "first Mahlerian" work, Das Klagende Lied that same kind of sighing motif on the words "Raben" (F to C) and "begraben" (Db - C) and "erschlagen" (G-F#) in Der Spielmann.  "Raben" is raven, here a bird of carrion.  "Begraben" means "buried" and refers to the body of a young knight killed by his own brother.  The soul of the brother of course comes through the bone-flute's music which offers similar sighing notes on "erschlagen" i.e. "murdered."

The Ninth Symphony on the first page is full of similar sighs in the harp (B-A) and in the repeated F#-E in the violins' opening melody.  What they might mean - resignation, wistful happiness, memories of the lost child, etc. etc. etc. - is (perhaps!) best answered by the non-answer: "They mean everything and nothing.  They mean whatever you might need them to mean at a specific point in your life."

For Mahler they meant something for him, whether both musical and something extra-musical, at specific points in his life, or perhaps they were devoid of extra-musical meaning completely or had only such meanings!

An example: one late winter day many years ago I decided to listen to Mahler's Tenth Symphony, a work I have known very well (I bought the Deryck Cooke score in the late 1960's for $5.00, which had to have been a misprint!) since its first recording with Cooke's first version of the score.  The music and score are in my brain, probably forever: the point is that I did not need to hear the CD in reality, because I have every note in my imagination.

By the time the last movement was over, I felt like I had been bulldozered!  Because what I had not realized at first, but did as the music reached the last 2 movements, was that my brain, soul, psyche, unconscious, whatever you would like to call it, was connecting this extremely well-known work to the death of my father 2 months earlier.  To be sure, I knew that the muffled drum toward the end was a reference to the funeral of a fireman which Mahler witnessed in New York City.  But that knowledge had never affected me before in this way.

So Mahler's Tenth Symphony at that moment absorbed a meaning for me that it never had earlier, and will never have again.  A singular experience!  So any "spirituality" in the polyphonic lines, in that ten-note chord in the First Movement, in Purgatorio, or elsewhere in the work, can always be kindled by something in the listener, but it is not something that will necessarily happen to everyone at every time.

And yet, buried in those sounds is the latent possibility of a spiritual experience for those who are ready.  Such is the mystery of music.

A few minutes for additional thoughts:

We know that Mahler was very much involved in considering the various philosophical schools in the 19th-century ether, from Brentano and other Romantics to Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.  This interest in philosophy may be the basis for part of the "searching feeling" one hears in the symphonies, especially the later ones.  The major ninth jump in the trumpets in the last page of the Eighth Symphony may not be particularly triumphant so much as a symbol of leaping directly into the other world of spirituality, after suffering the trials and trivialities and troglodytes of earthly existence.

Bruckner showed Mahler that symphonies were still possible despite Wagner.  I sense from my reading of Mahler biographies and his writings that the young Schoenberg may have also verified Mahler's compositional life simply by displaying the same searching, questing nature in e.g. the Chamber Symphony #1.  While the Ninth and Tenth are hardly "Kammersinfonien," certainly there are a good number of chamber-like sections of great interest. (In the Tenth, of course, these sections may reflect the unfinished nature of the work, although that is a subject of debate.)  Alma Mahler claims that her husband admitted not being able "to follow" Schoenberg's music all the time, but that the younger composer "may be right." 

Schoenberg's burning spiritual frustration  (rf. Die Jakobsleiter, Moses und Aron) has roots in Mahler's similar art.

[Cato]

MadAboutMahler: do you mean spiritualism or spirituality?  The topic threw me until I began reading the comments.

Yes, depending on what one wants to hear vs. what Mahler might have (secretly) been hearing in that "4-note motif," one could say that the four notes represent "Alma!  Alma!"  or "Alma, Gustav" or any other combination.

What a huge topic: a few quick comments from a 50+ year Mahlerian.  I will meditate further upon the topic later.

Certainly Mahler was spiritual in his own way, with or without Catholicism and Judaism.  One does not brew an Eighth Symphony using the Veni Creator Spiritus with the last scenes of Faust without an idiosyncratic sense of spirituality.

One can also hear in the "first Mahlerian" work, Das Klagende Lied that same kind of sighing motif on the words "Raben" (F to C) and "begraben" (Db - C) and "erschlagen" (G-F#) in Der Spielmann.  "Raben" is raven, here a bird of carrion.  "Begraben" means "buried" and refers to the body of a young knight killed by his own brother.  The soul of the brother of course comes through the bone-flute's music which offers similar sighing notes on "erschlagen" i.e. "murdered."

The Ninth Symphony on the first page is full of similar sighs in the harp (B-A) and in the repeated F#-E in the violins' opening melody.  What they might mean - resignation, wistful happiness, memories of the lost child, etc. etc. etc. - is (perhaps!) best answered by the non-answer: "They mean everything and nothing.  They mean whatever you might need them to mean at a specific point in your life."

For Mahler they meant something for him, whether both musical and something extra-musical, at specific points in his life, or perhaps they were devoid of extra-musical meaning completely or had only such meanings!

An example: one late winter day many years ago I decided to listen to Mahler's Tenth Symphony, a work I have known very well (I bought the Deryck Cooke score in the late 1960's for $5.00, which had to have been a misprint!) since its first recording with Cooke's first version of the score.  The music and score are in my brain, probably forever: the point is that I did not need to hear the CD in reality, because I have every note in my imagination.

By the time the last movement was over, I felt like I had been bulldozered!  Because what I had not realized at first, but did as the music reached the last 2 movements, was that my brain, soul, psyche, unconscious, whatever you would like to call it, was connecting this extremely well-known work to the death of my father 2 months earlier.  To be sure, I knew that the muffled drum toward the end was a reference to the funeral of a fireman which Mahler witnessed in New York City.  But that knowledge had never affected me before in this way.

So Mahler's Tenth Symphony at that moment absorbed a meaning for me that it never had earlier, and will never have again.  A singular experience!  So any "spirituality" in the polyphonic lines, in that ten-note chord in the First Movement, in Purgatorio, or elsewhere in the work, can always be kindled by something in the listener, but it is not something that will necessarily happen to everyone at every time.

And yet, buried in those sounds is the latent possibility of a spiritual experience for those who are ready.  Such is the mystery of music.

A few minutes for additional thoughts:

We know that Mahler was very much involved in considering the various philosophical schools in the 19th-century ether, from Brentano and other Romantics to Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.  This interest in philosophy may be the basis for part of the "searching feeling" one hears in the symphonies, especially the later ones.  The major ninth jump in the trumpets in the last page of the Eighth Symphony may not be particularly triumphant so much as a symbol of leaping directly into the other world of spirituality, after suffering the trials and trivialities and troglodytes of earthly existence.

Bruckner showed Mahler that symphonies were still possible despite Wagner.  I sense from my reading of Mahler biographies and his writings that the young Schoenberg may have also verified Mahler's compositional life simply by displaying the same searching, questing nature in e.g. the Chamber Symphony #1.  While the Ninth and Tenth are hardly "Kammersinfonien," certainly there are a good number of chamber-like sections of great interest. (In the Tenth, of course, these sections may reflect the unfinished nature of the work, although that is a subject of debate.)  Alma Mahler claims that her husband admitted not being able "to follow" Schoenberg's music all the time, but that the younger composer "may be right." 

Schoenberg's burning spiritual frustration  (rf. Die Jakobsleiter, Moses und Aron) has roots in Mahler's similar art.

"Bump" time!

[ibanezmonster]

Maybe we should say Mahler has the "bulldozer" effect from now on?
(at least to those that understand his music)...

[Cato]

Maybe we should say Mahler has the "bulldozer" effect from now on?
(at least to those that understand his music)...

Heh-heh!  I am reminded of a former student of mine after he had heard (while sitting in Row 1) Mahler's First Symphony at a Cleveland Orchestra concert with Vladimir Ashkenazy conducting:

"This is the greatest moment in my life!"

Bulldozered for life!  0:)

[madaboutmahler]

Thanks for the great post, Cato. I like the comment about the music being what you need it to be at a specific time. Mahler's music is certainly there for us loyally whenever we need it for spiritual revelation, or just to comfort us in our time of need. I think a great quote that links to this is from Lebrecht: 'the most we can expect from art is to help us live in peace with ourselves. This, at best, is Mahler's contribution to the modern world'. I personally consider Mahler a saviour and I feel like I need his music to, indeed, be at peace with myself.

[madaboutmahler]

And indeed, 'spirituality' is far better for what I intended to mean. Thanks!!

[Cato]

Thanks for the great post, Cato. I like the comment about the music being what you need it to be at a specific time. Mahler's music is certainly there for us loyally whenever we need it for spiritual revelation, or just to comfort us in our time of need. I think a great quote that links to this is from Lebrecht: 'the most we can expect from art is to help us live in peace with ourselves. This, at best, is Mahler's contribution to the modern world'. I personally consider Mahler a saviour and I feel like I need his music to, indeed, be at peace with myself.

That is a very nice sentiment from Mr. Lebrecht!   0:)

A great wonder, Music!  The organization of sounds with no apparent meaning* ....

.......until one listens!


* (e.g. What precisely does C # mean?)   

[ibanezmonster]

I personally consider Mahler a saviour and I feel like I need his music to, indeed, be at peace with myself.

Although I consider Mahler a saviour as well, over time I realized it creates the opposite of peace for me. Mahler is the music of an honest man who is trying to live a great, wonderful life of his dreams while continuously getting put down by things out of his control and eventually having to accept it. I interpret his message as the most bitter message in music: how bad things and bad lives often happen to good people.

What does create peace within me is my favorite metal band I always talk about, Meshuggah. Listening to them, you feel like the God of the universe. Pick up mountains and throw them. Punch space and create black holes. Then go to your alien home planet to see your 20 beautiful wives and later take them to ride across terrains of distant, strange planets, all with exploding volcanos in the background. It is liberating and just makes me happy. Peace can only really be attained through escapism, rather than confronting reality, because reality doesn't give a shit about you or how nice you are.

But, of course, don't get the wrong idea: nothing will ever beat Mahler for me. 

[EigenUser]

Although I consider Mahler a saviour as well, over time I realized it creates the opposite of peace for me. Mahler is the music of an honest man who is trying to live a great, wonderful life of his dreams while continuously getting put down by things out of his control and eventually having to accept it. I interpret his message as the most bitter message in music: how bad things and bad lives often happen to good people.

I like this interpretation. The last part/sentence is a little more negative than I look at it, but I pretty much have a similar feeling about Mahler.

[madaboutmahler]

That is a very nice sentiment from Mr. Lebrecht!   0:)

A great wonder, Music!  The organization of sounds with no apparent meaning* ....

.......until one listens!


* (e.g. What precisely does C # mean?)   

The leading note to what I consider to be Mahler's key of love! :p In my essay, I write about Mahler using D Major as a theme to represent new life, and the heroic feeling of love, using the last movement of 5 as an example (the release from the restraints of death, anger, forced jollity and finally the search for love after the love song Adagietto), but then how the first movement of 9, often considered the 'death of love' is also in D Major.... badly explained there (I'll post my essay at some point), but what do you think about this? Valid?! As I have a specific section in my detailed plan for my essay entitled 'my silly over the top points'!!

Although I consider Mahler a saviour as well, over time I realized it creates the opposite of peace for me. Mahler is the music of an honest man who is trying to live a great, wonderful life of his dreams while continuously getting put down by things out of his control and eventually having to accept it. I interpret his message as the most bitter message in music: how bad things and bad lives often happen to good people.

Absolutely FANTASTIC post, Greg. This is EXACTLY how I feel about the music of Schnittke. The brutal realism of it, but small escapes into beauty.. I find a bit more hope in Mahler's music. It definitely portrays the realism (funeral marches, hammer blows etc), but I can't see the finale of the 9th, for example, as anything less than hope for another, more idealistic world, where we are all treated with the same love we give to others..

[Cato]

The leading note to what I consider to be Mahler's key of love!  :p    In my essay, I write about Mahler using D Major as a theme to represent new life, and the heroic feeling of love, using the last movement of 5 as an example (the release from the restraints of death, anger, forced jollity and finally the search for love after the love song Adagietto), but then how the first movement of 9, often considered the 'death of love' is also in D Major.... badly explained there (I'll post my essay at some point), but what do you think about this? Valid?! As I have a specific section in my detailed plan for my essay entitled 'my silly over the top points'!!

Well, depending on your argumentation      it could be valid and valued!   0:)

Certainly the Third Symphony, in "D minor," ends in D major, and could be used as evidence for your case.  On the other hand, Mahler's "ultimate love music," the Alma - Movement in the Sixth Symphony, does not use D major anywhere: Eb and E major are the main ones.

So, let's see that essay!   

[ibanezmonster]

Absolutely FANTASTIC post, Greg. This is EXACTLY how I feel about the music of Schnittke. The brutal realism of it, but small escapes into beauty.. I find a bit more hope in Mahler's music. It definitely portrays the realism (funeral marches, hammer blows etc), but I can't see the finale of the 9th, for example, as anything less than hope for another, more idealistic world, where we are all treated with the same love we give to others..

I also believe there is hope in the 9th (actually, that it may be the music of hope itself), but I also believe that hope dies when the music fades to silence. And the ending bars are self conscious of itself soon to be fading away and struggling to live on (the clinging on to hope). So it confronted with being forced to accept its fate.

I may be contradicting myself here and not making sense, but oh well. 

And my last sentence really only applies to, say, the ending of 6, 9, and 10... you can't really say the same for 2, 3, 7, or 8, for example. Way too happy for that.