PROGRAM NOTES

• Mahler’s Jewish family heritage is also in play here. We hear many references to Jewish musical traditions. Even though Mahler converted to Christianity (probably to further his career), those welcome and interesting Jewish influences remain.

• In much of Mahler’s music there’s a sense of irony. As listeners we’re asked to believe in something, only to find that it is quickly transformed into something else with an entirely different emotional profile, and then into something else again. It’s a kind of musical kaleidoscope that keeps turning and changing the view.

• Mahler’s knowledge of the orchestra, and his willingness to pull out all the stops (and add some new ones) are characteristic strains. Like Maurice Ravel and Richard Strauss, the orchestra was for him a manageable instrument, and one that could always be advanced and used in new ways.

• And then there’s a certain straightforward and genuine religiosity that sometimes comes into play, a kind of optimistic and comforting redemption.

The fifth symphony is in five separate movements:

I Trauermarsch (funeral march) In gemessenem Schritt. Streng. Wie ein Kondukt. (In a measured pace. Strict. Like a cortege.)

Grief in many of its manifestations. Death was a constant reality in his life – 8 of his siblings died in childhood. There’s solemn ceremony (the opening trumpet call), there’s anger, there’s denial and memory and regret and sorrow and love and longing. It’s all there for us to feel. The recent movie Tár (2022) used this movement both at the beginning of the film and near the end of the film. At the conclusion of the movie the violence of the music’s grief led to actual violence on stage, an understandable Hollywood representation of the power of Mahler’s music. Very interesting that this movement has had such staying power.

II. Stürmisch bewegt. Mit grösster Vehemenz. (moving stormily, with the greatest vehemence)

The fantasy in music is usually understood to be a free-form piece often improvised by a keyboard player. The music moves dramatically between contrasting ideas and shows the players’ ability to portray different moods and styles, but somehow link them together into a coherent whole.

This movement is an orchestral fantasy, which one would think is impossible. With a symphony orchestra every detail must be carefully notated and rehearsed. But Mahler manages to make this movement sound like an improvised fantasy. It moves among many moods, textures, dynamic levels, instrumentation combinations, and tempi quite freely. In places it takes up pieces of the opening movement’s funeral march (Mahler tells us that the first two movements are connected, and should be played with only a brief pause); in another place there’s a triumphant brass chorale. There are also tender and heartfelt passages as well. Just about anything you can think of is in there. Don’t listen so much for coherence. Just be astonished and enjoy the ride.