Yesterday evening, Michael Tilson Thomas led the San Francisco Symphony in the first of two concerts at Carnegie Hall in a performance of the Seventh Symphony (1904-1905) by Gustav Mahler. This was the third Mahler symphony I'd heard at the hall in the past month after having recently attended performances by the Met Orchestra (#9) and the Philadelphia Orchestra (#2). Listening to these three works in so short a period of time gave enabled me to better appreciate the composer's intentions and creative processes not only in this work but over but over a broad sample of his oeuvre. Afterwards, I found I could more easily understand the connections that exist among his symphonies.
The Seventh is one of the composer's lesser known symphonies, its gestation overshadowed perhaps by the tumultuous events that occurred in the composer's life almost immediately after he had completed the orchestration in 1906. In the following year, after having been targeted by a series of anti-Semitic attacks, he was forced to resign as conductor (Kapellmeister) of the Vienna Hofoper even though he had gone so far as to convert to Roman Catholicism in 1897 in order to secure the post. In that same year Mahler's young daughter died of scarlet fever and he himself was diagnosed with a terminal heart condition.
The manner in which the work was composed may also have been a factor that led to its lack of appreciation. It was one of those episodes in Mahler's career that would later provide so much material to psychologists studying his biography. He had already completed the two Nachtmusik movements in 1904 when he was forced to leave off work on the symphony in order to return to his conducting duties. When he again took up the symphony the following summer, he experienced a creative block that was only overcome while he was being rowed across the lake near his summer home. The sound of the oars in the water immediately freed his imagination and allowed him to formulate the theme that introduces the first movement.
Still, there can be no doubt that the Seventh is an important work that deserves a close listening. The blurb contained in the evening's Program Notes put it very succinctly:
"Mahler’s Symphony No. 7 is one of the composer’s most fanciful works. It’s a magical five-movement masterpiece that’s mysterious, nostalgic, and humorous in its boisterous finale. Scored for a massive orchestra that includes cowbells, mandolin, and guitar, Mahler’s symphony takes the listener on one of the great orchestral journeys."
Beyond that the work is of interest to musicologists in that Mahler here resumed his experimentation with "progressive tonality," a concept that Wagner had first explored in Tristan und Isolde as early as 1859. Mahler took the idea even further in this symphony by demonstrating a progression not only through the length of the entire symphony itself (E minor to C major) but in individual movements as well (B minor to E major in the opening Langsam).
Though there were unfortunately many empty seats at yesterday's performance, this was a major event for anyone with an interest in Mahler's work. I had heard Levine conduct the same symphony with the Met Orchestra last season and thought it interesting to compare that with the rendition given here by Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. Though too much time had elapsed for me to make a point by point comparison, I considered the latter's performance well articulated and fully engaging. Tilson Thomas is an excellent conductor and I had very much enjoyed the performance he led last season with this same orchestra of Mahler's Ninth. I am already looking forward to the orchestra's return next year when it will hopefully perform another of this composer's symphonies.
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