GMG's Greatest Symphony Poll of 2017

[Jay F]

Mahler 6

Mahler 2

Mahler 3

Beethoven 9

Beethoven 7

Sibelius 2

Mahler 9

Mozart 40

Mozart 41

Tchaikovsky 6

[Autumn Leaves]

10 - Tchaikovsky: Symphony #6 In B Minor, Op. 74, "Pathétique"
09 - Mahler: Symphony #6 In A Minor, "Tragic"
08 - Shostakovich: Symphony #10 In E Minor, Op. 93
07 - Mahler: Symphony #9 In D
06 - Brahms: Symphony #4 In E Minor, Op. 98
05 - Shostakovich: Symphony #5 In D Minor, Op. 47
04 - Mahler: Symphony #2 In C Minor, "Resurrection"
03 - Sibelius: Symphony #6 In D Minor, Op. 104
02 - Mendelssohn: Symphony #3 In A Minor, Op. 56, "Scottish"
01 - Shostakovich: Symphony #7 In C, Op. 60, "Leningrad"

[SimonNZ]

Are we allowed to count Das Lied Von Der Erde as a Mahler symphony?

[Autumn Leaves]

Are we allowed to count Das Lied Von Der Erde as a Mahler symphony?

From Wikipedia:

Das Lied von der Erde ("The Song of the Earth") is a composition for two voices and orchestra written by the Austrian composer Gustav Mahler between 1908 and 1909. Described as a symphony when published, it comprises six songs for two singers who take turns singing the songs.

also:

On the centenary of Mahler's birth, the composer and known Mahler conductor Leonard Bernstein described Das Lied von der Erde as Mahler's "greatest symphony".

I'd agree it could be considered a Symphony but it's up to the OP to decide I guess..

[Parsifal]

From Wikipedia:

Das Lied von der Erde ("The Song of the Earth") is a composition for two voices and orchestra written by the Austrian composer Gustav Mahler between 1908 and 1909. Described as a symphony when published, it comprises six songs for two singers who take turns singing the songs.

also:

On the centenary of Mahler's birth, the composer and known Mahler conductor Leonard Bernstein described Das Lied von der Erde as Mahler's "greatest symphony".

I'd agree it could be considered a Symphony but it's up to the OP to decide I guess..

Described by who as a symphony? Mahler himself did not recognize that he had composed a symphony but we should take Leonard Bernstein's word for it?

[Autumn Leaves]

also:

I'd agree it could be considered a Symphony but it's up to the OP to decide I guess..


Described by who as a symphony? Mahler himself did not recognize that he had composed a symphony but we should take Leonard Bernstein's word for it?

Not a fan of Wikipedia? - OK...
Why don't you post a sources which confirms your bolded quote above?

[Parsifal]

Not a fan of Wikipedia? - OK...
Why don't you post a sources which confirms your bolded quote above?

The score does not contain the word "symphony" in the title. That's not sufficient to conclude Mahler did not consider it a symphony?

[Autumn Leaves]

The score does not contain the word "symphony" in the title. That's not sufficient to conclude Mahler did not consider it a symphony?

I know it's not among his numbered Symphonies and is not explicitly described as being one either - I remember reading that there were other people who thought it was though.
I'll have a dig around and see if I can find some decent references for my claim - may be a while as I have other stuff to do..
But I think GSMoeller has the final word on this as it's his thread - you'll have to suck it up if he agrees with me (regardless of whether it's "correct" or not).

[SimonNZ]

Didn't mean to start a fight. I thought there was a thing where he didn't call it his 9th symphony for superstitious reasons, but perhaps that's just a myth. And I think I've seen it on lists of favorite Mahler symphonies before.

[Parsifal]

It seems like the linear notes of every recording of DLvDE tells the story of how Mahler was too superstitious to call it a symphony since it would be his ninth. I think it goes back to an anecdote told by Bruno Walter. Makes no sense to me, since he called the next one the ninth and DLvDE wasn't the first orchestral song cycle he wrote.

There are lots of works that could be mistaken for symphonies, except the composers didn't call them symphonies. Sibelius' Tapiola comes to mind, which seem very similar in structure to the 7th symphony. It was different in the times of Beethoven and before, but it seems to me that at this point the only viable definition of "symphony" is a piece of music with "symphony" in the title.

[GioCar]

From the editor (Universal Edition) page:
Mahler himself wrote the title page found in the Stichvorlage (printer's manuscript), as follows: "Das Lied von der Erde" / Eine Symphonie / für eine Tenor- und eine Alt oder Baryton-Stimme / und Orchester / von / Gustav Mahler.

TD:

Trying to keep the spirit of the OP (greatest instead of favorite), here's my list, one for each composer:

10 Schubert's Unfinished Symphony

9 Beethoven 9

8 Mozart 41

7 Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique

6 Haydn 104

5 Webern's Symphony Op.21

4 Mahler 2

3 Berio's Sinfonia

2 Bruckner 9

1 Brahms 4 (or Shostakovich 4, or Nielsen 5, or Sibelius 7, or Mendelssohn 3, ...)

[Autumn Leaves]

Didn't mean to start a fight. I thought there was a thing where he didn't call it his 9th symphony for superstitious reasons, but perhaps that's just a myth. And I think I've seen it on lists of favorite Mahler symphonies before.

It's alright Simon, noones fighting - I thought the same as you about DLVDE (just remember reading on some forum(s) that it could be called a "Symphony" depending on your viewpoint).

Here's an article about DLVDE which I replicated from the LA Philharmonic Orchestra's website (I didn't dig around too deeply I guess as I'm not much of a "search master") but I bolded some parts which may be of interest:

No composer said farewell more eloquently, poignantly, and frequently than Gustav Mahler. The theme of death runs through Mahler's music like a current, at times swiftly, then gently, then again ferociously. For verification, pick any work, from any period in his output: from the early, bloody Songs of a Wayfarer and the First Symphony, where death is treated ironically; to the Second Symphony where death is the prelude to resurrection; from mid-career, the Fifth Symphony with its blaring funeral marches; and the last three, death-impregnated compositions: Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth), the Ninth Symphony, and the uncompleted Tenth.

These final works proceeded from events that took place in the year 1907, when, in quick succession Mahler suffered the death of his elder daughter, Anna Maria, and was forced as a consequence of various intrigues against him to resign his position as director of the Vienna Court Opera. And the final blow: He was diagnosed as having an incurable heart ailment. Mahler responded not by taking to his invalid's bed or the analyst's couch (although he did have a meeting with Sigmund Freud not long after), but by assuming the posts of principal conductor of both the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic.

"I have been going through so many experiences for the last year and half," Mahler wrote in 1909 to Bruno Walter, who would conduct the posthumous premiere of Das Lied von der Erde in 1911, "that I can hardly discuss them. How should I describe such a colossal crisis?... Yet I am thirstier than ever for life and I find the 'habit of living' sweeter than ever." These feelings are reflected in the old Chinese poems, in Hans Bethge's German paraphrases (published in 1907 as Die chinesische Flöte – The Chinese Flute), which were chosen for Das Lied.

Mahler called Das Lied von der Erde "a Symphony for Tenor, Contralto (or Baritone) and Orchestra," without assigning it a number; he firmly believed that no one should be allowed to surpass Beethoven's total of nine, and that in challenging fate he would be hastening his own end – as Bruckner did with his unfinished Ninth.

Immediately before setting to work on Das Lied, Mahler wrote the following wrenching letter, again to Bruno Walter, which tells us as much, and then some, as we might want to know about his state of mind:

"If I am to find my way back to myself, I have got to accept the horrors of loneliness. I speak in riddles, since you do not know what has gone on and is going on within. It is surely no hypochondriac fear of death, as you might suppose. I have long known that I must die... Without trying to explain or describe something for which there are probably no words, I simply say that at a single stroke I have lost any calm and peace of mind that I have ever achieved. I stand vis-à-vis de rien [face to face with nothingness], and now, at the end of my life, have to learn again to walk and stand." By these last words, he would seem to mean learning to find a meaning in life while facing death. This "facing of death" is most clearly expressed (since we have words to guide us) in Das Lied, wherein the singer-poet-composer finally takes leave of earthly delights, ending in quiet ecstasy and resignation:

My heart is still and awaits its hour.
The beloved earth everywhere blossoms and greens in springtime
Anew. Everywhere and forever the distances brighten blue!
Forever... forever...

The late Mahler expert Deryck Cooke parsed Das Lied von der Erde as a "symphony in the Mahlerian sense... first movement: conflict; four shorter movements bearing on the central idea; complex finale bringing a resolution; the whole composed of motives developed symphonically, if not in traditional forms." Then, in a reaction that has been repeated countless times, cool analysis is followed by total, uncritical capitulation to the sheer emotional pull of this music; Cooke adds: "The last, appalling tension in Mahler's spirit forced from him music of indescribable beauty and poignancy... In The Song of the Earth the sudden bitter awareness of imminent extinction is confronted and fused with a hedonistic delight in the beauty of nature and the ecstasy of living, both now possessed so briefly and precariously... It is as if the sudden taste of mortality had dissolved all solidity out of the world, leaving it sharply etched in thin lines and clear water-colors. These are, of course, appropriate to the Chinese atmosphere of the text... The Song of the Earth has a new, naked kind of harmonic texture and orchestration which, although sometimes prefigured in Mahler's earlier works and partly retained in his two later ones, really belongs to this work above all, and is like no other in music."

It would be foolish to attempt to better Cooke's rapturous summing-up. In conclusion, then, a brief characterization of the individual movements:

"The Drinking Song of Earth's Sorrow" shouts defiance of impending death, with a central section whose vision of earthly beauty prefigures the very end of the entire piece. But the bleak refrain, "Dark is life; dark is death," dominates. "The Lonely One in Autumn" is the symphony's slow movement, beginning in weary resignation, building to a tremendous climax of despair, then receding again into weariness, all passions – and hope – spent. The following movements, "Of Youth," "Of Beauty," "The Drunkard in Spring," comprise a wistful scherzo in three parts, recalling, with touches of irony, past joys.

"The Farewell," as long as the other five movements combined – and to many listeners Mahler's crowning achievement – is a marvel of orchestration, reflecting (and enhancing) the text's visions of crushing tragedy and bittersweet regret, achieved by using as many players as possible, and as few. A chronicle of the weariness of body and soul, an embracing of death, then, finally, an exquisitely lyrical outpouring of faith in life's renewal in a huge C-major coda, concluding with the previously-quoted passage, fading into the distance... "Everywhere, forever... forever and ever...."

[Autumn Leaves]

It seems like the linear notes of every recording of DLvDE tells the story of how Mahler was too superstitious to call it a symphony since it would be his ninth. I think it goes back to an anecdote told by Bruno Walter. Makes no sense to me, since he called the next one the ninth and DLvDE wasn't the first orchestral song cycle he wrote.

There are lots of works that could be mistaken for symphonies, except the composers didn't call them symphonies. Sibelius' Tapiola comes to mind, which seem very similar in structure to the 7th symphony. It was different in the times of Beethoven and before, but it seems to me that at this point the only viable definition of "symphony" is a piece of music with "symphony" in the title.

Lol - alright, your bolded text seems to match up with what was in my quote above.
Maybe member "Mahlerian" might be able to give us his thoughts (as he seems a bit more scholarly about Mahler than the average forumite).
Apologies to GSMoeller for the diversion - I'll desist my part in the conversation for now.

[TheGSMoeller]

I don't really mind if Das Lied is on someone's list, i believe there's a case for it both being considered a symphony, or not. Just as I wouldn't have a problem with Alpine Symphony being considered as well.

I hope that is alright with everyone else.

[Mahlerian]

Lol - alright, your bolded text seems to match up with what was in my quote above.
Maybe member "Mahlerian" might be able to give us his thoughts (as he seems a bit more scholarly about Mahler than the average forumite).
Apologies to GSMoeller for the diversion - I'll desist my part in the conversation for now.

Mahler did originally put IX. Symphonie on the title page of Das Lied von der Erde, but then crossed it out and left us with the title as it stands, which does include the phrase "a symphony" as quoted above.  We don't know exactly why he did this, other than hearsay and speculation about the Curse of the Ninth.  Mahler himself didn't leave an explanation, and neither Das Lied nor the work he eventually called his Ninth Symphony were performed during his lifetime.

If there's a good reason for not considering it a symphony, it's the fact that it's not in traditional symphonic form, lacking a sonata-allegro movement, unlike any of the symphonies Mahler gave numbers to.

Still, I already said "Symphony of Psalms," which also doesn't use sonata form anywhere, so I'm not going to criticize others for not using that as a requirement.

[Karl Henning]

Still, I already said "Symphony of Psalms," which also doesn't use sonata form anywhere [...]

And is, essentially, a choral work.  IIRC Stravinsky put Symphony in the title because Koussevitsky and the BSO commissioned him . . . for a symphony.  Which would make the explanation that "it is the Psalms which are symphonized" a kind of a Stravinskyan rationalization.

But, of course, a great, great piece, whether it is a symphony or not 

[Trout]

I selected 10 symphonies I personally consider the greatest, but I ordered them rather... strategically.

10 - Messiaen: Turangalîla-Symphonie
9 - Stravinsky: Symphony of Psalms
8 - Ives: Symphony No. 4
7 - Berio: Sinfonia
6 - Sibelius: Symphony No. 7
5 - Mahler: Symphony No. 9
4 - Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique
3 - Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 "Choral"
2 - Brahms: Symphony No. 4
1 - Mozart: Symphony No. 41 "Jupiter"

[Brian]

Boy is this a tough one.

10 - Beethoven: Symphony No 8
9 - Brahms: Symphony No 4
8 - Dvorak: Symphony No 8
7 - Haydn: Symphony No 92
6 - Bruckner: Symphony No 7
5 - Sibelius: Symphony No 7
4 - Beethoven: Symphony No 7
3 - Vaughan Williams: Symphony No 3
2 - Schubert: Symphony No 8 in C (a.k.a. "9")
1 - Haydn: Symphony No 80

I thought about throwing the bottom 3 to symphonies nobody else will vote for, just so that somebody voted for them. I did ultimately vote strategically (for instance, I thought Beethoven 3 was doing just fine and wanted to make sure 8 got some love).

[TheGSMoeller]

1 - Haydn: Symphony No 80

Nice, Brian. That's twice No. 80 has shown up.

[TheGSMoeller]

BTW, the leading symphony has a 21 pt lead. 

I'll wait at least through the week, maybe reveal scores on Saturday.