Transcript
With the elimination of the Blumine Movement, a second fast movement follows the first. Mahler may have considered the problem of juxtaposing two fast movements when he initially inserted roominess between them. Although an early version places Blumine after this scared so moving, between the first two movements is established from the outset, in that the second begins on a descending fourth, the primary model of the symphony that connects each of the movements. In fact, this interval appears repeatedly not only in the opening measures but throughout the scared so section, establishing a foot stomping landler rhythm and cellos and spring basis.
The use of a landler countrified walls popular in Austria and Germany during the 18th and 19th centuries, is not original with Mahler. Numerous piano compositions were based upon this dance for them before molars time, including symphonic movements by both Schubert and Haydn. Mahler also used it earlier in Eugen’s side song Hansel and Gretel are shining when mind where as in the first Symphony skirts or movement, it provides the rhythmic underpinning for the entire piece. In that song has here the lender is more rustic and less refined than it appears in Hyden or Schubert.
Mahler was more interested in emphasizing the rough peasant character of the dance, and in stylizing it to suit cosmopolitan tastes. A quintessential rhythmic element of this triple meter dance is the skip of a beat or slight hesitation on the upbeat, giving it a light airy quality that confounds the evenness of the steady three beat rhythm which usually accompanies thus creating a clumsy bumpkin like effect like upward octave leaps in high strings, anticipated in the first movement, open the skirt so movement over repeating rhythmic coupling, beginning on a trochaic or long short rhythm, followed by three short notes, each couplet containing two falling fourths.
By contrast, the first landler thing forcefully asserted by woodwinds begins on an ascending fourth and is played to the continuous accompaniment of the landlord rhythm and bass strings. The juxtaposition of rising and falling fourths is characteristic of Mahler’s treatment of ln Luthy a stepwise ascending figure in this theme, and eighth note string figuration that follows it relates the landler to the main theme of the first movement. A hint of the excise Blumine Movements main theme, appears in a two-bar extension of the lender theme.
In writing this theme, Mahler may have been influenced by the lender melody from the scared soul of the symphony and he majored written in 1878 by his fellow student at the Vienna Conservatory, Hong’s rot. Mahler obtained a copy of the score of that Symphony, which made an enormous impression upon him. Rock’s tragic death from tuberculosis at the age of 26, was considered by Mahler to be an inestimable loss to the world of music.
Several years later, in 1900, Mahler set of rocks Symphony, that it soars to such heights of genius that it makes him without exaggeration, the founder of the new Symphony as I understand, a few passages in Mahler’s first Symphony do pair a striking resemblance to passages in rock Symphony. For example, here is the landler theme from Mahler’s skirt so movement again, and here is the main theme of the squared so movement from rock Symphony and E major, again Mahler directs that the first section of the scan so be repeated, then Mahler adds a triplet to the first measure of string figuration.that then becomes the basic rhythm of the following segment. b
Bassoons and horns keep the lender rhythm going, and then other woodwinds take their turn. muted horns play rapid repeating staccato eighths, adding zest to the festive mood. Mahler directs the wings to play with their bells raised Hi, giving the impression of hunting horns.
As the principal theme and its accompany men jockey back and forth among various sections of the orchestra. The excitement increases and soon spills over with the same joyous exuberance and rough and tumble gaiety that made the first movement so youthful and lighthearted.
This is one of Mahler’s most joyful and high spirited movements while or even rights vilde wild over the swirling string figuration that keeps shifting keys and worrying about with frenzied vigor and unrestrained playfulness.
The scared so section reaches a climax on a forceful and expanded version of the opening yodels in flute and strings, punctuated by the rapid fires to kado eighths on the horns heard earlier. The Blumine of fragment and string figuration descend to the lower strings in what appears to be the close of the scared so section that would be expected to lead to the trio. staccato string figuration becomes a repeating pattern that reintroduces the whooping octave leaps with which the movement began, but now they enter softly, as if for the sly grin to usher in the lender themes return in woodwinds.
As the original string figuration takes over, once again, still quietly churning out his perpetual motion rhythm, it would seem that we have reached the end of the scopes are subject and are about to proceed to the trio, but would Mahler in this lighthearted dance music so softly? Certainly not. Instead, he jolts the listener back to the scared soul’s wild raucous dance by shifting to a rapid tempo, in which the strings pounce forcefully on a rising variant of their figuration.
The lender theme then sails forth, as the original title suggested, in horns and trumpets, against the old like whooping figure in woodwinds, and the couple of rhythms that first accompanied it in the bass. A long sustained trill carries the music back again to the main theme, now played by woodwinds and horns.
Music presses forward intently, accelerating on a repeating rising scale from the third bar the landler theme against a chromatic descending phrase and horns and lower strings that begins in syncopated rhythm. At the height of the dance, the notes seem to meld together as the tempo presses forward.
They virtually merge into a rapid trill and woodwinds, over sputtering triplets and muted trumpets, before the orchestra is abruptly cut off with a sudden grace note and stroke.
Good day Hear, Mahler offers a simple and brief transition to the trio section of four bar solo for the horn. With it, he changes both the mood and the tempo and refers to the dotted rhythm of the landler theme as an afterthought. The trio section in F major is set at a leisurely pace. It opens with a new triple meter dance to its delicate building charm, contrasting markedly with the rough and robust landler theme of the scared so section. Yet, this new theme is derived from that linear theme.
The new theme contains a skipping rhythmic figure and an occasional first big triplet that both appear in the scan so his main theme, unlike that theme, the contour of the trios principal melody is more downward than upward, and its pizzicato string accompaniment on even beats contrasts with the scared souls Lindley rhythm.
Mahler utilizes several musical elements from the scared so subject in the trio to provide both dramatic continuity and connection with the skirts. Notice also the appearance of string figuration from the skirt, so in single measure complements, and inverted yodel, followed by a triplet figure in the clarinet and the blue mean and figure from the landler theme.
With the appearance of this new slower lender melody, Mahler evokes the relaxed atmosphere of a Moravian field in summer, with delicate lilting phrases. A particularly lovely example of Molly’s special brand of Viennese sentimentality that is implied in his direction grammatically easily. The trio’s first part closes in somewhat the same way as the first part of the scared so section and then the music stops. Silence prepares the way for a new lyrical theme of exquisite beauty, played by first violins and cellos over basically the same three node pizzicato accompaniment that provided the rhythmic underpinning for the trio’s first theme.
This romantic melody, principally in D major, begins with an amorous rising chromatic phrase, and contains two primary elements from the landler theme, to a Blumine a figure and a step wise ascending scale. Notice how the tonality shifts to the minor for a moment, and then immediately returns to the major a device typical of Mahler, as if to reflect upon the beauty of the surroundings. The music becomes lively or on the Blumine of figure and trumpets, to which woodwinds respond with a fragment from the skirt so section and other variation of the new theme is then played with tender sentiment by the cellos in their high register.
A brief development section begins here, combining the Skipping dance rhythm of the scared soul’s landler with string figuration variants, and thematic fragments from the first trio theme, the trio closes with an expansion of the sequentially falling string figuration that ended the scared so section.
The Return of the solo horn from the bridge passage the trio is another marvelous touch time the horn plays the principal to bar lender rhythm from the scared so as a transition to its reprise without changing tempo. As might be expected, the lender starts up again in full tilt on its thumping knee slapping rhythm.
Mahler follows basically the same format as before, in an abbreviated version without any repeats characteristically, he changes the orchestration somewhat, while retaining the principal thematic material essentially intact. The pace never slackens, so the music is not given a chance to catch its breath. The movement closes as did the opening scared so the section in a continuously accelerating temple on the ascending eighth-note figure from the landler theme that gives way to a to measure trill with trumpets joining woodwinds, instead of playing repeated staccato eighths as before, the trill is cut off abruptly by the same sharp grace note and stroke that ended the first scan so section.
As with the first movement, the second closes in joyful spirits with a youthful, energetic romp.
By Lew Smoley