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Sorry this is so late for something that might be considered Saturday Art at fdl. Mark from Ireland’s short yet stirring Saturday Chorale was fitting enough for reflection on last Friday’s grade school tragedy. But this work needs to be heard now.
One of Austrian composer Gustav Mahler’s most poignant creations is his song cycle based on poems of Friedrich Rückert, Kindertotenlieder. The five songs are set for mezzo-soprano or baritone voice and orchestra. Written between 1901 and 1904, they represent the essence of Mahler’s fascination with innocence vs. fate, with sorrowful longings interspersed with outbursts of anguish.
There are a number of notable performances of Kindertotenlieder on Youtube and elsewhere on the web, but these resonant renditions by Matthias Goerne, with the Gustav Mahler Yugenorchester, directed by Jonathan Nott, at the 2009 BBC Proms concerts, contain English subtitles.
Part One:
Part Two:
Part Three:
2 Comments
Symphony of Sorrowful Songs
Gustav Mahler died at the height of his popularity 3 months after my father was born. After his death, Mahler wasn’t very popular anywhere, but my father’s father was a Norwegian music critic, and taught him to appreciate and respect G.M., and my father passed some of that on to me.
My father’s perspective on this period of Mahler’s development was that Mahler had become an artistic rebel, and was rebelling in much the same way, and somewhat in the same freeing-from-convention ‘movement’ as Gertrude Stein’s poetry and Picasso’s painting.
Do you have any thoughts on this?