Mahler 9
Usher Hall, 21/02/2025
Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Music Director, Thomas Søndergård
Gustav Mahler in 1908/09 was not in a hugely optimistic frame of mind. His marriage to Alma was beset by doubts about her fidelity (not without reason), his eldest daughter, Maria, had died the previous year, his contract as conductor of the Vienna Court Orchestra was coming to a messy end, and he had recently been diagnosed with a fatal heart disease. Consequently, his mood for composition was gloomy, and the symphony he wrote at this time, his 9th, was overlaid with existential angst.
And yet! What a mighty work came from this torn and devastated man, and how lucky were we on Friday night in the Usher Hall in Edinburgh to see and hear a performance of bleak passion and heart-rending beauty given by the RSNO and its Music Director, Thomas Søndergård. This was the second Mahler symphony this season, after the opening concert of Mahler 2, and another packed house filled the hall, bolstered by a fantastic number of young people. This has been one of the most heart-warming aspects of the last season or two with the RSNO, the transformation of the core audience from grey and bald heads to a very mixed group of music devotees, with a large cohort of under 30s in evidence. I don’t know exactly how the orchestra has done this, but it is very, very welcome. It was a knowledgeable audience too, as each movement ended with silence, and indeed one had the feeling throughout of a group of listeners who were really listening to the music. Some truly magical quiet sections were greeted by a sense of hushed anticipation, which I must say made for a stunning performance.
I have recently written in the EMR about compositions which their creators never heard, and this symphony was one of them. Mahler was aware of the so-called curse of the Ninth (Beethoven, Schubert and Bruckner never heard their 9th symphonies), and even his attempt to avoid the number by calling his potential ninth Das Lied von der Erde, didn’t work, as neither that masterpiece nor the 9th were performed in his lifetime – he died in 1911.
It would however be simplistic to describe the 9th Symphony as a premonition of death, or a summation of a life cut short by bitter fate. Somehow, Mahler managed to write sublimely beautiful music despite the awful situation he found himself in, and I was reminded of this during the concert, as his deeply moving and haunting refrains washed over us in the Usher Hall. People often say that, after the First World War, the concept of beauty in music was lost forever, as atonality and indeed cacophony became the norm. I’ve never bought into that thought process, although a certain harshness has crept into classical music since 1918, but it’s not as simple as one might think. The 19th century was riddled with wars and revolutions, but somehow the composers came up with the most emotionally beautiful and intense music. This is perhaps where I diverge from the contemporary urge to fill many opera productions with stagings which attempt to analyse the mental and emotional state of the composers, without actually listening to the music.
The first movement of the 9th seems to emerge from a primordial soup, as if the musical ideas are created out of a marshy landscape of nothingness. We hear snippets of melodies, vague undefined chords on obscure instruments, until gradually a sad, melancholy theme pushes itself into our consciousness. Over twenty five minutes, ideas and textures fight with each other for dominance, and solo themes come and go, as Mahler tries to make sense of his situation in life, and how he can deal with it.
One of the striking features of the 9th is the use Mahler made of muted brass, adding to the impression of otherworldliness, and visually, there is something wonderful about the sight of John Whitener, Principal Tuba, adding and removing the enormous mute to and from his instrument, like a wizard’s hat! At the other end of the spectrum, the combination of Katherine Bryan (flute) and Janet Richardson (piccolo) was superb all evening. Mahler employs all the principal players extensively throughout the symphony, and the contrast between the melancholy strains of the solo instruments and the full power of the orchestra was a running feature of the performance. We were honoured by some beautiful solo playing by Tom Dunn, principal viola, and guest principals, Tim Hugh (cello) and Igor Yuzefovich (leader).
The two inner movements of the symphony offer different insights into Mahler’s creative skills, as first we find ourselves in a ghostly world of rustic merriment and sophisticated court dances, and then are swept along in a savage Rondo-Burleske, tossed and turned by the counterpoint of a storm at sea! The RSNO and Søndergård were thrillingly at ease in this very tricky music, David Hubbard (bassoon) and Paolo Dutto (contrabassoon) precise in the Wunderhorn world of the 2nd movement, and guest principal horn, Amadea Dalzeley-Gaist, stunning throughout.
The utterly miraculous final movement, a slow adagio, unfolds before our eyes and ears like a drawn out farewell to life and harmony, sad yet heartfelt. It feels like a musical expression of ‘Melencolia 1’, Albrecht Dürer’s 1514 etching of a female figure perhaps awaiting inspiration, but fearful that it may never come. The fine Scottish artist, Calum Colvin, used the inspiration of ‘Melencolia 1’ for his monumental Ossian work, one of which hangs in my drawing room, and listening to the last movement of Mahler’s 9th while observing Calum’s picture gives an insight into the composer’s deeply felt melancholy. Climaxes come and go while strands of melody blow around in the tumbleweed of Mahler’s consciousness. It is a movement of infinite sadness, and yet, I feel it is also inspiring. Gone are the triumphant climaxes of the 2nd, 3rd and 8th symphonies, but the sheer beauty of the orchestral writing shows us a way forward. The contemporary fame of Mahler the superstar conductor, which ended with his death, contrasts with the eternal legacy of his compositions, which we are enjoying 114 years later.
Huge congratulations are in order to Thomas Søndergård for his magisterial conducting, always fascinating to watch from the auditorium, and to the RSNO for a magnificent performance, which drew long and warm applause from the packed house after the moving silence at the very end. I don’t think it is fanciful to suggest that the long hiatus between the last notes dying away, and the applause, was filled by many thoughts of the world outside the Usher Hall, where a lot of things seem to be going awry both at home and abroad. Music certainly can help at these times!
