Dayton Philharmonic - Mahler: The Visionary
Gustav Mahler marked the first movement of his Symphony No. 4 in G major moderately, not rushed.
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Dayton Philharmonic - Mahler: The Visionary
In the unique Connections format of first-half description and explanation and second-half performance, DPO Artistic Director Neal Gittleman analyzes each movement.
Gustav Mahler marked the first movement of his Symphony No. 4 in G major “moderately, not rushed.” Its sound makes it seem to have been written in a minor key rather than major, as many of his ten symphonies were. The second movement (“leisurely moving, without haste”) is reminiscent of a Lindler, a German/Austrian folk dance, and the interplay of various themes has the ability to lead one into daydreaming of earlier, perhaps happier times. The third movement (“peacefully, somewhat slowly”), the longest of the four, starts off very softly and gradually morphs into an idyllic passage. Then one long-held note signals a transformation to a rhapsodic theme with a clarinet’s three-note replication of the sound of a cuckoo that other sections repeat. The final movement, marked “very comfortably, strophic” (meaning that all verses or stanzas use the same music), opens with woodwinds underscoring a theme that mimics the sound of a bird, intercut with a driving, almost frenetic theme of winds and brass. This last movement calls up mental images of an aerial trip over the mountains, forests, and rivers of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
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