130 years ago today (November 20, 1889), Gustav Mahler’s titanic Symphony No. 1 had its premiere in Budapest.

Symphony No. 1 “Titan” (includes “Blumine”)

(Listen along while you read the note below:)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtvcSz23_sA

Symphony No. 1 in D-Major, “Titan”

1. Langsam, schleppend – Immer sehr gem?chlich [Slow, held back – Always very leisurely]

~ Blumine: Andante ~

2. Kr?ftig bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell – Trio: Recht gem?chlich [Moving strongly, but not too fast – Trio: Rather leisurely]

3. Feierlich und gemessen, ohne zu schleppen – Sehr einfach und schlicht wie eine Volksweise [Solemn and measured, without dragging – Simple, like a folk melody]

4. Stürmisch bewegt – Sehr gesangvoll [Tempestuously – Very melodious]

-Gustav Mahler

(Born in Bohemia (now Jihlava, Czech Republic) in 1860; died in Vienna in 1911)

In the spring of 1888, the 28-year old Mahler served as the assistant conductor of the Leipzig Opera and was a frequent visitor at the home of Captain von Weber, the grandson of the late German Romantic composer, Carl Maria von Weber. While there Mahler was asked to work on finishing a forgotten opera by the beloved Weber called The Three Pintos and during that project he fell in love with Captain von Weber’s wife, Marion, mother of three. Although the brief affair led to nothing more, it was fortunate for Mahler’s inspiration. During an earlier visit Mahler had borrowed one of the children’s books, Das Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn) and it inspired some ideas for his first song cycle (Songs of a Wayfarer) and his First Symphony (in fact, both works share several themes). Mahler was soon writing the first movement. As he told his colleagues, “I can’t help it, I just have to compose. Everything in and around me is in the state of becoming.” 

At the time, Mahler’s whole world seemed to be beginning anew, and the first chord of his Symphony translates that into music – from a deep silence, sound emerges at a whisper (ppp), in a unison pitch of A spanning 7 octaves, emanating from the low basses and climbing all the way up through the orchestra to the piccolo and shimmering harmonics of the violins.  In program notes that Mahler later provided about the Symphony, this was the awakening of the Earth in springtime. In his heart, it represented a connection with the very hum of an unfolding universe, the beginning of everything. And it is one of the most breathtaking openings of any symphony.

As the movement progresses, we hear a theme of descending fourths begin to form out of the expanse, followed by new motives in fairly quick succession: a subdued fanfare in the woodwinds; horn calls; a militaresque fanfare of offstage brass; sounds of nature, especially the cuckoo, singing out – all against the hushed awe of that expansive, quietly throbbing ‘A’ churning beneath. As that backdrop fades, the creative forces take root, and Mahler begins the first movement proper with an easy paced theme as bright and clear as the morning sun. And though there are hints of menace and irony, and some moments of full fanfares bordering on mania, a jocular and bracing atmosphere prevails to the end.

The Scherzo which nowadays follows as the Symphony’s second movement did not always do so. For its premiere on November 20, 1889 in Budapest, Hungary, Mahler had originally conceived of this Symphony in five movements with the second movement being a pastorale of sorts – a sweet Spring-ish offering titled “Blumine” (Flower Piece), which was then followed by the Scherzo as the third movement. After only two performances, however, Mahler discarded the five-movement concept and its “Blumine” as being “too sentimental,” and moved the Scherzo forward. The Scherzo certainly carries on the good cheer of the first movement, and is probably one of Mahler’s most straightforward compositions – an Austrian L?ndler, or peasant dance, that is robust, even rowdy. Its trio is a lovely interlude and marks the first time Mahler uses the “portamenti” technique in an orchestral setting (a technique of sliding between pitches) which will become a trademark of his later Symphonies.

Despite all those feelings of happiness in his life at the time, however, Mahler also sensed an undercurrent of Irony – after all, he had fallen in love with a married woman, and was pinning his first hopes at fame as a composer on completing someone else’s opera (Weber’s Three Pintos). The third movement, then, explores life’s ironies in some depth. Mahler maintained that this movement was inspired by a well-known woodcut called “The Hunter’s Funeral Procession” which portrayed woodland animals carrying the coffin of a hunter, showing mock grief. But this can hardly prepare one for the ingeniousness of Mahler’s translation of that into music. First introduced by muffled timpani as funeral drums, Mahler then uses the familiar tune of Frère Jacques, or as he would have known it, Bruder Martin, and recasts it in a minor key. Even more inventive is that the first instrument to play the altered tune is a double bass. With quiet eeriness, other instruments join in the oddly flippant musical round, like a gathering of masked strangers. The irony continues when “street band” instruments awkwardly join in the procession with klezmer-like music. It’s interesting to note that Mahler’s instructions in the score here are to play “with parody.” It may be one of the most fascinating movements in symphonic literature, but it found no fans amongst the conservative Budapest audience at its premiere in 1889.

The finale catches us off guard as it shrieks into being with a cymbal crash and blaring dissonance just as the funeral march has receded into the distance. As Mahler described it, this was the “flash of lightning from a dark cloud. It is simply the cry of a wounded heart” – emotional chaos. Musically, too, it’s setting the stage for a gigantic struggle – from the darkness alluded to in the third movement to the overflowing joy that the ensuing bars will give voice to. Although that struggle will become increasingly darker in his later Symphonies, in this First, Mahler understands that joy and grief co-exist, and for now the optimism of joy ultimately reigns. Indeed, with the final bars of this Symphony, Mahler instructs the horns to stand up and drown out the trumpets, and presents a finale that bursts with the exuberant energy of the Springtime of Life.

Despite the happy conditions in which the Symphony had its origins, his First Symphony was booed at its Budapest premiere and found little sympathy for many years. One critic in Budapest called it an “incomprehensible and disagreeable cacophony.” To combat confusions, Mahler quickly supplied a larger literary program to the Symphony, calling it the “Titan,” depicting a universal Greek tale of a hero facing struggle and ultimately triumphing. But in his heart, he knew that the meanings behind his music were much more intimate, and he soon abandoned that particular descriptive program, although, the subtitle “Titan” has stuck. Mahler’s own struggle to have his music well received, however, took almost two more decades to achieve. After one performance conducting this First Symphony in 1903, Mahler wrote to his new wife, Alma, saying, “Sometimes it sent shivers down my spine. Damn it all, where do people keep their ears and their hearts if they can’t hear that?” These days the shivers come guaranteed as we hear one of the great symphonies written in modern times.

? Max Derrickson