Falling for Mahler

[Karafan]

I'd be interested to know of fellow Mahlerians' initial introduction to Mahler.

What were the circumstances?
How old were you?
Did someone else introduce you to his soundworld?
Did you like everything to begin with (or did some symphonies/songs repel you?)
Does your favorite Mahler change over the years?

For me, I first heard the 9th (BPO/Barbirolli) when I was first really getting into classical music - my musical diet was almost solely Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven at the time and the Mahler repelled me.  I tried again much later on with the 5th, through my good friend Akiralx (from this board) and had my eyes and ears opened and the voyage began.

The 8th is the only symphony I can honestly say I don't really "get".  I have tried but am tempted to perservere again with perhaps the MTT new SACD.

Best wishes

Karafan

[ChrisH]

I had my first experience with Mahler when I was 15. I had just come back from touring Europe with a symphonic band, and was heading up to the Interlochen Academy of the Arts for high school. A good friend of mine who is an orchestral bassoonist gave me a copy of Mahler 3 with Levine and the Chicago Symphony.  I loved it immediately. It was the first classical music that I'd heard that really had great parts for my instrument, the trumpet. In the beginning I only enjoyed 2,3,5 and 7. All of those recordings were by the New York Philharmonic, I had to listen to Phil Smith, their lead trumpet player or the CSO. I was pretty selective you could say. Now I really enjoy all of them. As I've gotten older my favs have changed a bit. I still love the 7th, but now I really like to listen to the 6th too, Das Lied, 1st, Klagende Lied are always in heavy rotation at my house.

[barry guerrero]

The Bernstein/LSO recording of Mahler 8 was the one that made me "get" the work. I had been exposed to the Solti one numerous times before, and it did absolutely nothing for me. It just struck me as being excessively loud, and unmusical in its attempt to be expressive - much adu about nothing, I'd say. I pretty much still feel that way - it's loud without much dynamic range.

[John Kim]

It was Mahler Fourth that had me fall in love with this composer.

When I first heard the music I couldn't make anything out of it; certain parts sounded very classical while others sounded too modern. Up to that point, I was listening to Brahms, Beethoven, and Dvorak, most of my time. But when I heard it again a few days later, all of sudden everything made a perfect sense. Then came M1st and so on. The rest is a history.

The first Mahler recordings I owned include Solti/RCO/Decca M4, Solti/LSO/Decca M1, Solti/CSO/Decca M8, Giulini/CSO/DG M9, Bernstein/NYPO/CBS M2, all on LPs. I got the M8 & M9 from an American worker living in Korea who kindly ordered the discs from the States for me.

John,

[sbugala]

Two things had drawn me to Mahler's 2nd when I was in college: First, I'd see the St. Louis Symphony's recording under Slatkin at the library all the time.  The cover was beautiful, and almost celestial.  I finally resolved to check it out when I heard an excerpt of the work (Stokowski's LSO/RCA version) in the Carl Sagan show Cosmos.  Then I moved to others.  I quickly gravitated to the 7th because of its tenor horn part, since the American equivalent is the euphonium, my instrument.  Pretty soon, I was trying to belt out the opening bars when warming up in practice. The 9th was always special for me. Although I'm still not a huge fan of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, I initially liked the Giullini version because of the LP cover. 

I despised Karajan's way with Mahler, but it has since grown on me.  In fact, I picked up his M6 today on vinyl.  We'll see how that one goes. 

Bernstein was an early favorite Mahler conductor, but I learned many other great versions down the road. 

One of the hardest for me to like was the 3rd, although there were many moments I loved.  Lately, I've been thinking it's his greatest work. It's just so unusual.  But when I was younger, I found the first movement very hard to take because of those guttural sounds in the low brass. 



 

[mahlerei]

I first heard Mahler (the Solti recording if the 8th) when I was 19. I remember being particularly impressed by the box photograph (!) and it all went on from there. Bernstein's LSO Mahler 2 and 8 followed and then I started collecting the Tennstedt recordings as each was issued. I was also profoundly impressed by Mahler's 10th, conducted by a charismatic young fellow called Simon Rattle. Other early highlights were the Mehta Mahler 2,the Levine Mahler 3, the Mehta Mahler 4 and Karajan's Mahler 5. Curiously, I came to 6, 7, 9 and Das Lied much later.

[stillivor]

On a visit to my brother's, heard the last 3 movements on disc 2 of 7 under Scherchen. For a while my memory was of a great chunky tune at the start of the finale. That was the one time when someone else was involved.

Then wonderful Saga records brought out 3 and 6 under Adler. Quickly, the 6th rose to top spot.

Then 4 under Karel Sejna, a gentle perfomance of a gentle work. And I was away.

6 has tended to stay top. The next 8 are all in a bunch, with minor movement - 4 falling a little;10 rising a little. 8 is tenth. tho each hearing as I go round and round the cycle takes 8 to the coat-tails of the rest.

What keeps them all together for me is that they're all wonderful and very different from one another.


    Ivor