Do you love Mahler? Do you want to marry him and have his babies? Well it’s a bit late for that, but it’s not too late to participate in Deutsche Grammophon and Decca’s latest foray into the classical music social media scene. They’ve done a bang-up job arranging this one.

The idea is that they are putting together a new Mahler boxset. “But Ben! Those are a dime a dozen — well maybe a grand a dozen, but you can definitely buy 12″  I can hear you verbosely shouting at me through the internet. Well yes, but the difference here is that every symphony in the set is from a different conductor and orchestra, and it’s the voting public who get to decide which ones go in the set. “But Ben! I don’t own every single boxset, how will I compare renditions without shelling out thousands of dollars?” comes your next, sensibly thrifty proclamation.

Well that’s the best bit: you can stream — for free! — what appears to be their entire Mahler catalog, in order to confirm your decision.

So go get your Gustav on.

I have managed to find a bit of time to listen to music, mostly during the brief jaunts between home and lab. I’ll have tonnes more time over the next week. Here’s what’s been on the menu:

• Nielsen – I’ve been going through one of those rediscovery periods with Nielsen recently, where you listen to all these pieces that once got a lot of headphone time, and wonder why on earth you stopped listening to them. This time around I’ve been back to the last three symphonies, but also added two string quartets. The biggest rediscovery is probably the slow movements from the 4th symphony — I had either not noticed, or totally forgotten, how they have this deliciously slightly-broken Romantic sound. Like the little off-key chirrups in the 2nd movement, and the ominous timpani in the 3rd.
• Mahler – Yep, still working on him! The 9th symphony is working out really well, I’ve listened to the kick-arse 2nd movement infinity more times than I can count, and am starting to properly branch into the other movements. The rather awesome Ben Zander sent me a bunch of CDs this week (with his performances of the 1st, 5th and 9th) all of which also include a CD with him discussing the pieces. I am looking forward to listening to those while lounging around the living room in Maine.
• CPE Bach – The 5th symphony (sinfonia, whatever) totally rocks.

(Note: it isn’t this painful if you use one of the pretty graphical installers, but that takes all the fun out of it)

Well anyway, it turns out that I could have fixed my little umlaut problem in about five seconds, but I like my new system better anyway. We are all happy: me, Mahler, and my computer.

Yes Mahler. I tried listening to the 9th symphony today. The second movement rocks! There are weird wobbly bits of sarcasm and uncomfortable tonalities, all wrapped up in a snidely cheerful 3/4ish rhythm. I love all that. And since it’s Mahler it lasts about ten years. That bit is more difficult to love. It’s really freakin’ intimidating when a single piece lasts over an hour. *cough* Bruckner *cough*

This is one of my favorite bits in the first movement, the unexpected change in that descending sequence is ridiculously satisfying. So what’s going on here? My not terribly educated guess is the second version modulates to some related major key (such as C-major) instead of dropping all in A-minor. At least, I assume it’s in A-minor since that’s the tonic of the symphony and it’s the first theme.

Sometimes I really wish I had had a bunch of music lessons.

It’s been ages since I was in London last, really. I can’t remember all the essentials of what to do. We’re also shoving off to Holland for a few days, but that’s a little less overwhelming. maybe. Until I realistically start thinking about it.

ANYWAY… something musical, something musical… what’s been happening in my all-encompassing little world of classical music today? Well, more Mahler, really. I keep forgetting to move the Gielen version of the 6th symphony onto my MP3 player, so I’m stuck with the more uptempo but less intense Bernstein version. Not that it’s bad or anything, but the slower pacing of the former fits my taste better.

Well horror of horrors, there I am innocently strolling into lab an hour after the appropriate time… and I almost find myself enjoying that romantic theme in the first movement. Almost. Of all my previous classical experiences, the getting into Mahler’s 6th business is most reminiscent of the same process for Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3. Both sounded far too Romanticy on initial listens, and both subtly slid themselves under my skin when I wasn’t really looking.

But, BEDTIME! I have another 9:00 meeting with my supervisor tomorrow morning, even though we spoke for two hours in the corridor this morning. She’s vocally insatiable.

However, between all of the happenings and hijinx, I managed to bookmark a couple of quality, music-based links which I shall humbly lay at your feet and/or floor. Firstly, there is Ravinia U featuring a very nicely put together introductory guide to classical music. Secondly, there is musictheory.net, which has a bunch of flash based tutorials on basic musical theory, perfect for ignorati such as myself.

PS, The Mahler is better and better.

The piece I have chosen for my plunge into the darkest depths of Gustav is his symphony no. 6, the “Tragic” (after a suggestion, I have also flirted with No. 9, but only very briefly). This bad-boy is long. The first movement is over twenty minutes, the middle two about fifteen, and the last almost thirty. Eeek. So far I’ve probably listened to it all the way though twice, and listened to the first two movements about five or six times.

The first movement starts off with an aggressive, percussive, depressive march, this is definitely my kind of thing:

I love how the brass rudely drops off at the end.

But I get sidetracked by the romanticness of the second theme:

I have a hard time with the lushness of the romantics, my temperament is more acclimatized to the mechanical 20th century, and this kind of stuff grits my teeth. Can’t help it, sorry. I’m hoping that if I keep listening it’ll become more enjoyable, which’d be great as it would also open up certain other late 19th century avenues. Anyway, for now it’s not enough to stop me. Incidentally, I switched to a performance by Gielen instead of Bernstein after one of the previous commentors suggested that the latter plays up the romantic aspects, and I do like this version better.

Listening to this reminds me very much of how it felt when I first started with to classical music. It’s overwhelming. Small sections make sense: I can feel the themes mirrored all over the place, but there are huge glaciers of notes in between the in-place paragraphs, the ones that work with my head. Skeletal connections are shining below the surface, but the metaphorical water is making my eyes sting.

One thing I really like are the very quiet sections with pizzicato strings and wobbly tonality:

Actually there are lots of bits I like, far too many to cut out samples for each. Hopefully they will all seem far more connected after some more listening, instead of lying isolated, as they are now. There is a long way to go yet!

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.