Pre-Monday Mahler
While down South in the wild tundra of South Carolina, drinking barrel after bottle of booze, I discovered that my great Aunt is a huge classical music fan. In fact, the room I was staying in (which was dubbed Cinema 1 due to the presence of all the audiovisual type gadgetry, and furnishings for intake of their output) included amongst its eaves and soffits the entire DG-branded Ring cycle on VHS. Euggh VHS. Had it been on DVD I could have cunningly ripped it to my laptop, instead it’ll have to wait to be Netflixed.
The more stealable, cultural, classical materials were the collection of Mahler symphonies conducted by Bernstein. These bad boys. Apparently, everyone thinks they are fantastic recordings of the symphonies. I nabbed the 5th and 6th (based on recommendations from aforementioned great Aunt Laura, and Alex Ross)
Mahler is someone who I have wanted to get into for ages, mostly because Shostakovich is supposed to be sort of his heir. The problem I have had with his music up to this point is its Romantic tendencies, it’s always sounded a bit too sweeping, too rich. I haven’t really given it a fair chance though, to be honest, haven’t tried to let itself get all up in my head via repeat listens despite the difficulties. Tragically ignoring my own listening advice. That’s in the process of changing, with this recent theft.
The sixth seems to be more intriguing than anything else of his I’ve tried so far, the marchy beginning certainly kicks arse. Plus there’s a big hammer lurking in there somewhere. It’s also really cool how the start of the scherzo mirrors the start of the first movement. As you can probably tell, I haven’t had much time to absorb it yet. I’ll let you know how it goes.