After four Zoom terms on Russian music, one apiece on Czech and Hungarian, then homing in on great symphonists Sibelius, Vaughan Williams and Nielsen, it's time for the Big One: Mahler, starting this summer (tomorrow - Thursday 20, to be precise) with the first half, Symphonies 1-5, Das klagende Lied and the songs, then continuing in September with 6-10 and Das Lied von der Erde.
Not that Nielsen has any less status in my eyes, now that I've spent 10 weeks with the great but modest Dane. His essential robustness kept me buoyant, along with the sheer joy and richesse of Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier, through those not-too-awful five weeks of radio- and chemotherapy.
As well as getting to know underrated piano masterpieces like the Chaconne and Theme with Variations, my admiration for Nielsen's consistently original but ever more extraordinary symphonic journey has gone through the roof. The second movement of the Fifth, unquestionably one of the 20th century's greatest symphonies, has long been my favourite finale, infinitely rich, but the continuation of the journey in the opening movement of the Sixth, so misleadingly (jokily?) named Sinfonia Semplice, takes us one step further. Passages from it were running through my head for weeks. Lucky that we have this superb performance from Paavo Järvi with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra on YouTube.
It seems beyond doubt, to me at least, that Nielsen's recent heart attack fed into the weirdnesses and frenzies here, no less than Mahler's arrythmia informs the peaks and troughs in the first movement of his Ninth Symphony. But I love equally the way Nielsen takes apart the machinery in the rest of the Sixth, making sure never to lose sight of the first movement's essence.
So there will be plenty to connect Nielsen and Mahler, even if the timeframes of their works are different. I must say that, still in the thick of Nielsenmania, I found it hard to adjust to the scale of Mahler's Third live at the Festival Hall with the Philharmonia - another Paavo performance, which might have been even more revelatory with one of his regular orchestras. But enough time has elapsed to return to Mahler's own very specific world - even though I'm lucky enough to be returning to Denmark, following the amazing time I had celebrating Nielsen's 150th anniversary, to hear performances of Hymnus Amoris (such an opportunity) and the Second Symphony, as well as to look at the new Carl Nielsen Museum in Odense.
Here are the full details (click to enlarge) for the coming Mahler term - still time to sign up if you're interested. And you can get the videos if you can't attend on the day.
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9 comments:
I bumped into Professor Ian Campbell on the bus and he informed me that two of our tutors had died, professor Alistair Fowler and Peter Keating, the cockney Dickens, Carlyle expert. Remember them in your prayers
I don't pray, but I wouldn't for Prof Fowler, much the most dispiriting of the Eng Lit lecturers with his droning insistence on secondary sources. Peter Keating I liked a lot; who didn't? That's a sad surprise. Meanwhile, long live Roger Savage.
You can email me, you know.
Hoping scan was ok
Thanks for asking, Liam. I got the good news from my surgeon this morning: 'the cancer seems to have gone'. Due a few more checks but that does mean I'm in the clear.
JOHN Graham glad to hear about your medical news. How did they spot the tumours in the first place ? Was it through an MRI scan
Colonoscopy after I sent a sample (on request of Bowel Cancer Screening Unit), knowing something was wrong because of blood in stools. Then CT scans and other tests. Surgeon was poised to do a big op, which would have meant plastic surgery and a stoma, but recommended trying radio/chemotherapy for five weeks. Which, following an MRI scan after eight weeks, seems to have done the trick! I never had to stop working or going to things; I was lucky.
Dear David, I am glad you got better, I hope it never comes back. I lost several good friends due to cancer.
I am enjoying reading your articles. All the very best.
Sincerely
Airat Ichmouratov
Many thanks, Airat. I too have lost good friends to cancer. But I did feel it was important to put my experience out there, because I was lucky mine was caught at an early stage, and then the whole process need not be so frightening.
sad to hear of the death of radio 3 announcer Peter Barker, a lovely warm bass voice, witty apercus and observations which were never cleverdick or smarmy, a good knowledge of the works being played. He was made redundandant in the night of the long knives in 1992 and the whitterers started to come in slowly thereafter, culminating in the giggling, Alanna-Partridge witless, know-nothing Katie Derham on In Tune when Sean is away.written by John Graham
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