Das klagende Lied

[waderice]

I did a search here at the Gustav Mahler Board, and most surprisingly, I find nothing whatsoever about Mahler's earliest major work, Das klagende Lied.  Everyone here seems to be obsessed with M7, M9, and DLvdE.  I'll speak for myself about being obsessed with M2.  I'd like to launch a discussion about the available recordings of the work.

The earliest recording I know of Das klagende Lied was that made by Mahler's cousin, Fritz Mahler, conducting the Hartford Symphony and Chorus, one of the famous Vanguard recordings.  This was of the two-movement version.  Are there earlier ones?

Of more modern recordings, most people I have encountered seem to prefer the Boulez Sony recording, made in the 1970's, the first complete one including the movement, Waldmarchen, which was later abandoned by Mahler when he went to organize a first performance of the work.  I still prefer Boulez' recording over most everyone else's.  I heard the work performed live here in Washington, DC, years ago, when Michael Tilson Thomas came here with the Buffalo Philharmonic to perform it, with a chorus I cannot remember.  The performance included the abandoned first movement.  As I recall, the performance was adequate, but not exceptional.  Also, I just got through listening to Thomas' recording made in the 1990's in San Francisco, which included Waldmarchen.  In comparison to Boulez' recording, Thomas' concept of the work seems to be more flowing in terms of tempo variation, and not bombastic, as some conductors might be wanting to take at the appropriate points in the score.  I also have Kent Nagano's recording, which I haven't listened to in quite some time, and should pull out again to give a listen.

Any comments by others?

Wade

[barry guerrero]

The Nagano recording is of the first version, and there are some significant differences. The most audible and immediately apparent difference is the series of huge tam-tam smashes near the start of Part III. But there's certainly more than just that. Some folks argue that "Waldmaerchen" shouldn't be included with the revised version. I understand their point, but I also think it's a tad pedantic.

I'm certainly guilty of not discussing "DKL" very much, and will fully admit that it's not my favorite Mahler. But certainly all the elements of mature Mahler are in place, except for maybe a Berlioz-like, lack of contrapuntal writing. For a Mahler work that has a lot of vocals, I prefer the 8th symphony. But that's just me. The Chailly recording of "DKL" is also very good (good vocalists).

[Leo K]

I've never heard it to be honest.  Silly me, but I've unrightly dismissed it because it's a cantata and I'm not a fan of that form.  I did hear a clip on the radio and was impressed...I better listen soon.

For searching the forum it appears more results come by searching "DKL".  Here's thread about recordings:

http://gustavmahlerboard.com/forum/index.php?topic=650.0


--Todd

[Freddy van Maurik]

I've never heard it to be honest.  Silly me, but I've unrightly dismissed it because it's a cantata and I'm not a fan of that form.  I did hear a clip on the radio and was impressed...I better listen soon.

For searching the forum it appears more results come by searching "DKL".  Here's thread about recordings:

http://gustavmahlerboard.com/forum/index.php?topic=650.0


--Todd

Yes, Todd, you really should listen to it soon. At least to get to know the piece. I love it, 'though it's not my favourite Mahler either.

My favourites are (and these are mentioned in the topic Todd has linked):

- Chailly and MTT for the Revised version with Walmärchen added.
- Haitink and Morris for the revised 2-part version, without Waldmärchen
- Jurowski and Van Zweden for the orignal 3-part version, and Nagano is good

Enjoy!
Freddy

[mahler09]

I have to admit (embarrassingly enough) that I haven't had the opportunity to hear it either but am interested in doing so now.  I know that it has a large instrumentation typical of Mahler and is a cantata but, stylistically, how different is it from his later works?  After all, it was started 6 years before the first symphony but he continued to revise it after the fact.  Can you pick out themes he'd explore later on and see his artistic growth?  And lastly: which version is recommended for somebody who is largely unfamiliar with the piece?  With Mahler's 150th birthday in a few days this is probably as good a time as ever to listen...

[waderice]

Silly me, but I've unrightly dismissed it because it's a cantata and I'm not a fan of that form.

Those of us haunted by the staid and traditional meaning of "cantata" (or oratorio) in the Bach and Handel tradition apparently haven't heard that there is a dramatic form of the genre.  The first one that comes to mind (though maybe not the earliest) is that by Berlioz, his La Damnation de Faust.  More specifically, it is a dramatic legend.  Though it might drag a bit in content, the climax (The Ride to the Abyss) certainly never fails to excite.  Mahler's Das klagende Lied certainly fits the dramatic idiom, and you can feel the tension build as the story reaches its own tragic climax.  Tragic, in the most literal sense of the word, for everyone involved in the story.  Here, the only real victor is Truth and Truth delivers overwhelming justice in its most cruel and excruciating form.

Wade

[waderice]

I know that it has a large instrumentation typical of Mahler and is a cantata but, stylistically, how different is it from his later works?  After all, it was started 6 years before the first symphony but he continued to revise it after the fact.  Can you pick out themes he'd explore later on and see his artistic growth?

I think the following quote from the notes accompanying the Tilson Thomas recording of the work that I just finished listening to puts it quite well, even if a bit nebulous, to give a "sort of" answer to what you ask.  After all, you will need to listen to the work to pick out the themes you yourself would believe he would explore later on:

"The cantata is most likely a conflation of tales by the nineteenth-century folklorist Ludwig Bechstein and the Brothers Grimm, plus Mahler's own imagination.  In the music we sense the ghost of other composers - Wagner most of all.  The grand scale of the original three-part Klagende Lied shows a fearless ambition that makes the twenty-year-old Mahler immediately recognizable.  Mahler's feeling for the orchestra is extraordinary; amazing for someone who had never heard a note of his own orchestration.  Mahler also commands a remarkable sense of atmosphere.  From the first moments of the prelude to Waldmärchen, we can believe that this is music by the composer who will go on to write the Last Trump with its picture of a desolate earth in the finale of his Second Symphony and the prelude to the mountain gorge scene in the Faust portion of his Eighth Symphony.  Mahler still had much to learn about pacing.  But there, too, he would become a master, and one of the many impressive things about Das Klagende Lied is how each of its parts is strikingly more assured and inventive than that which precedes it."

Wade

[mahler09]

Thanks, that was helpful waderice.  I am definitely going to listen to it soon.

[Leo K]

Thanks Wade!

Yeah, I wasn't aware of the dramatic form of the cantata, so I will also check out that Berlioz as well!

--Todd

[Zoltan]

It is indeed dramatic! There are some really great moments in the piece. Another example of the "feeling for orchestration" of the young Mahler might be the appearance of the off-stage brass band in several moments. He surely must have gotten the idea in an opera or were there orchestral works at the time that used that effect?
In some cases it will also have a deja vu effect for those intimate with M1 and M2. Not to be missed, even if only for curiosity.

[waderice]

It is indeed dramatic! There are some really great moments in the piece. Another example of the "feeling for orchestration" of the young Mahler might be the appearance of the off-stage brass band in several moments. He surely must have gotten the idea in an opera or were there orchestral works at the time that used that effect?  In some cases it will also have a deja vu effect for those intimate with M1 and M2. Not to be missed, even if only for curiosity.

Off-stage musical effects in an orchestral work by either an instrumental or vocal ensemble predate Mahler.  In Berlioz' Romeo & Juliet dramatic symphony, the movement, Fête of the Capulets, there is some offstage instrumental foreshadowing of themes from the fête, plus an offstage chorus of revelers at the fête itself.  Also, there is another instance where Berlioz later used an offstage vocal ensemble for his dramatic legend La Damnation de Faust, in the Peasants' Dance, found in the early portions of the work.

Barry, if you happen to read this, you may remember in our previous discussion about Berlioz' opera, Les Troyens, that you asked whether or not Mahler might have had any knowledge of this opera (Les Troyens does have offstage effects, especially in the Royal Hunt and Storm).  From these two Berlioz instances of use of offstage ensembles, Mahler had to have been acquainted with both the Romeo & Juliet Dramatic Symphony and La Damnation de Faust, even if he never performed these works.  I know that in Berlioz' travels throughout Europe, he made an impact with the latter work having been performed in Vienna, and I believe the former was also performed in Vienna.  Mahler's professors at the Vienna Conservatory were likely at the Berlioz performances from years before, and in Mahler's studies in composition and orchestration, he had to have been made acquainted with these two Berlioz works.

Keep in mind that Berlioz' Treatise on Instrumentation had an influence later on with both Richard Strauss (Mahler's contemporary) and Rimsky-Korsakov, the latter two of which wrote addenda to the original Berlioz document.  Mahler also had to have studied the Treatise while at the Vienna Conservatory.

Recommended to all interested in the genesis of Das Klagende Lied:  Give a listen to these two Berlioz works, if you don't mind listening to the sung French texts.  You'll gain a lot from hearing the influence Berlioz had on Mahler and Richard Strauss (at least as far as the offstage ensembles are concerned) later on when they composed their symphonies and tone poems.

Wade

[GL]

The Nagano recording is of the first version, and there are some significant differences. The most audible and immediately apparent difference is the series of huge tam-tam smashes near the start of Part III. But there's certainly more than just that. Some folks argue that "Waldmaerchen" shouldn't be included with the revised version. I understand their point, but I also think it's a tad pedantic.

I'm certainly guilty of not discussing "DKL" very much, and will fully admit that it's not my favorite Mahler. But certainly all the elements of mature Mahler are in place, except for maybe a Berlioz-like, lack of contrapuntal writing. For a Mahler work that has a lot of vocals, I prefer the 8th symphony. But that's just me. The Chailly recording of "DKL" is also very good (good vocalists).

The final version of DKL (1899/early 1900), in two movements, is one of the products of Mahler's masterful skills of his maturity we know very well. The original version is undoubtedly the creation of the bold imagination of a youth. Consider the orchestration: among the vocal soloists, he requires soprano, alto, tenore, baritono, child soprano, child alto (these last for the "speaking bone"-Chailly reinstates the child voice, this way hybridizing even more his version), moreover, he requires some intervents by singular member of the choir; among the orchestra on stage, he wants 6 (!) harps and 2 kontrabasstuba; among the 19 instruments of the Fernorchester, he calls for 4 fluegelhoerner in B (the posthorn we will find again in his Third).
The voices are not masterfully treated as in his later works, but the originality of DKL's writing for voices was never equalled, I mean specially in the passages concerning the "speaking bone".
In this original version, the fernorchester is used also in the second part and the passage is sensational: over a pedal F in the bass the C major of the off stage orchestra clashes  with the C flat major of the orchestra on stage. It's not surprising that DKL was not awarded a prize by Brahms and his fellow jurors of the Beethoven prize, in 1880!

The ones that reject the hybrid 3 movements version are not so pedantic as we can think. In 1893, in Hamburg, Mahler started revising the score, producing what we can name the "first version of the second version". While revising the first part, he decided to drop it. So, what is actually played in recordings such as the one by Tilson Thomas (which I consider my reference-recording) as Waldmaerchen is an hybrid that presents some parts of the original version mixed with not fully completed revisions.

For the ones interested in confronting the first version of Waldmaerchen with the half-revised one, the first has been published by Universal, the latter is available by Kalmus.

While the final version is masterful product of Mahler's maturity, I still consider the original version of this "first child of sorrow" very suggestive and fascinating and I regret no major orchestra have yet recorded it instead of the thousandth version of the First or the ten-thousandth of the Fourth.
Nagano's is cute, but it seems to have been recorded in an aquarium. Curiously, Jurowsky's (DVD) suffers something similar. The other version I know is the Geoffrey Simon's (North West Mahler Festival Orchestra) and Robert Olson's (Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra). I knew that van Zweden recorded the Hamburg version fo the First, but I never heard of a recording of the DKL's original version.

Regards,
Luca

[GL]

Off-stage musical effects in an orchestral work by either an instrumental or vocal ensemble predate Mahler.  In Berlioz' Romeo & Juliet dramatic symphony, the movement, Fête of the Capulets, there is some offstage instrumental foreshadowing of themes from the fête, plus an offstage chorus of revelers at the fête itself.  Also, there is another instance where Berlioz later used an offstage vocal ensemble for his dramatic legend La Damnation de Faust, in the Peasants' Dance, found in the early portions of the work.

Keep in mind that Berlioz' Treatise on Instrumentation had an influence later on with both Richard Strauss (Mahler's contemporary) and Rimsky-Korsakov, the latter two of which wrote addenda to the original Berlioz document.  Mahler also had to have studied the Treatise while at the Vienna Conservatory.

Wade

Off-stage musical effects primary source for Mahler and Berlioz were surely the ones in the field of Opera. Doubtless, the influence of Berlioz is undeniable. Berlioz, for example, was the first to use the E-flat clarinet (previously present mainly in musical bands) in a symphony orchestra (in the Fantastique). Mahler, in his First Symphony, was the second. Moreover, we know that Mahler was a supreme interpreter of the Fantastique (an exceptional witness of the tremendous impact of hsi interpretation was Rachmaninov). I think that the main connection between Mahler and Berlioz rests in the will of both to deploy and enact a drama through (mainly or purely) instrumental means.

I'm not sure that, in the very conservative Conservatory of Vienna, the Treatise wa textbook. What is sure is that Richard Strauss was a huge fan of Berlioz's Treatise: in fact, as Wade wrote, he was the promoter and the editor of the version published during his times.

Regards,
Luca

 

[barry guerrero]

Verdi has some offstage band parts here and there, doesn't he?  Frankly, I don't know my Verdi that well. Neither do I care to - I just don't care for his music until Aida (parts of it), Otello, and Fallstaff. . But I'm quite certain that I had read somewhere that Mahler did, indeed, conduct "Damnation Of Faust" someplace. I'll try to find reference to that.

[mahler09]

Well this is pretty logical- all composers learn(ed) by studying the works of others and emulating elements or techniques themselves, eventually finding their own style.  So regardless of whether or not Mahler read the treatsie, just his familiarity with "Symphonie Fantastique" et al. would have been enough. 

Also, I got a chance to listen to Haitnik's version of "Das Klagende Lied".  It's not going to become my favorite Mahler piece any time soon but I was glad to have had the opportunity to hear it.  You can definitely pick out influences of Berlioz and Wagner; moreover, it was interesting to hear Mahler in a different place compositionally.  With Mahler, he has already become a master of orchestration by the time of his first symphonies and seeing what happened beforehand (which is easier to do with composers whose earlier works have either survived or there were more of to begin with) was insightful.  Das Klagende Lied isn't very well known (not necessarily even by people who love Mahler) however.  Is this all based off of it being "immature" work or is this because of the confusion with versions/ the cantata form?  It does have its moments and maybe it would gain popularity if it were programmed more often.