Haitink Chicago Mahler 3

Mahler’s Third Symphony is full of programmatic ideas, despite the composer’s subsequent decision to eradicate all descriptive titles from its six movements. Thanks to these titles, and Mahler’s well-recorded remarks to Natalie Bauer-Lechner, Richard Batka, Anna von Mildenburg and Bruno Walter, it is now a common, albeit sometimes unrealistic, expectation from the audience that the symphony should “encompass the whole world”.

It is precisely the focus on such extramusical elements that has faltered many performances, with the interpreter trying too hard to encompass, in the most literal sense, “the world”, thus losing sight of the most important part of this equation – the music itself. What Haitink and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra achieved in this performance was nothing short of extraordinary. It was spellbinding to hear a Mahler symphony these days so devoid of cliché, so exposed in its imperfections, yet so raw and shattering in its musical power.

Mahler aptly described this first movement as having a “will of its own”; indeed it is held together by instinct rather than by deliberate effort, sometimes even tottering on the brink of total disintegration. Haitink was unapologetic about this seemingly disjointed series of marches. Instead of trying to seamlessly transition from one segment to another, he preserved the starkly contrasted edges at every turn. Not a single shred of the unyielding darkness was swept under the carpet. This was a brilliant move that allowed the Dionysian turmoil to be self-sustaining from within, rather than sensationally propelled from without.

Many have complained that the Third Symphony is a “glorious mess”. Structurally, it is highly segmented; yet there is a vital force that grasps these elements together – the tempo relationship. As a brilliant conductor, Mahler himself was fully aware of this problem, hence the footnote on the same page that clearly stated that “the opening tempo is, for the most part, to be retained throughout the whole movement, and the strictest continuity of tempo is to be maintained in spite of momentary changes in beat or modification.” Clear as this instruction may be, it is rarely observed. Haitink, however, navigated through Mahler’s turbulent cosmo with unerring temporal accuracy, thereby minimizing the disjointed feel that has negatively impacted so many performances.

More importantly, Haitink had a remarkable reach that held the entire gargantuan musical structure together. One such striking example came at the first appearance of the dirge proper at bar 14. The eight horns played in unison the elegy almost as mysteriously veiled as the Midnight Song in the fourth movement. I have never heard this lament played like the fourth movement before. It was uncomfortably foreboding, and eerily demanded one’s full attention amid its quietude, thus adding an extra impact by the time one hears the text of the Midnight Song.

The naturally paced tempo allowed many interesting elements to reveal themselves. Mahler’s expanded his orchestral palette to a new height in this symphony, which he subsequently perfected for the late symphonies. Immediately after the principal March, Mahler began to explore the echoing effect in the so-called “Pan is Sleeping” passage (rehearsal nos. 10 and 11). The idyllic solo oboe enters on the fifth bar of rehearsal no. 11, and is faithfully echoed by the clarinets, this bucolic melody is then handed gently over to the solo violin, which is again nestled by the echoing trills in the strings. Haitink’s careful handling of the tempo allows this musical echo to reverberate with great effect.

Mahlerites in Chicago have been rather lucky to have heard the symphony performed several times in the recent past. However, this was one of those rare occasions in which the players reached the collective fervor and refinement in one magical night. Jay Friedman’s solo trombone at rehearsal no. 14 was jaw-dropping, even by the most stringent standard of most seasoned Mahlerites. The solo passage was handled not only with great passion and superb virtuosity, it was handled with keen sense of musical intellect only a musician who has studied the score intimately can display. Mahler’s accent markings on very particular notes in this passage are remarkable. At first glance, they seem peculiarly lacking in any perceivable pattern. However, Mahler’s intention cannot be any clearer when one looks at the relationship of these accented notes with the triplet figures and the trills motives that punctuate the trombone solo. When these accents are executed, the effect can be staggering. As demonstrated by Mr. Friedman’s superb reading, it was no longer merely a solo trombone supported by a palpable undercurrent – the trombone became part of the propelling force, first pacing the music with the steady accents, then impatiently nudging the music ahead with Mahler’s strategically placed instructions to accelerate (marked Vörwarts), and decidedly without the accents. This stoic reading of the score proved even more vital, if one considered how Mahler treated the second trombone solo at figure 33. This time it is all about “swelling” (a crescendo followed by a decrescendo). Notice how the accompanying orchestral color has changed from the rhythmically unsteady trills and triplets into the highly metered character in the lower strings. The solo trombone brought forth the musical contrast in these two passages convincingly.

It would have already been one of life’s great delights to be able to hear such marvelous trombone, but within a short moment, Dale Clevenger and Robert Chen embraced the variations of the melody and lovingly delivered the audience to the childhood reverie with the most beautiful and heartfelt solo horn and violin duet. It was magical.

Haitink’s precise sense of tempo worked its wonders again at these crucial transitions. Mahler had up to this point taken the listeners through the epic journey of the gigantic exposition of the symphony – from the raucous cauldron of natural power to childhood memory of marching band. Yet, Haitink’s rigorously-wrought tempo relationship remained steadfastly unchanged. As a result, when most conductors would be frantically trying to bring the music under control at figure 43 when the development section brought back the March from the distance, we were already there in Haitink’s rendition. The Traumerei of distant memory was rudely evaporated under the bright sun as summer marched in, and what made this such a shock was that the transition was seamless. Haitink’s ability to telescope Mahler’s musical idea was remarkable. By the time the orchestra unleashed its raw power and virtuosity in the frenzied Coda, one could not help but realize one was in for a ride.

The enchanting allure of the second movement often masks the challenge a conductor would face in holding the variations together. The rhythms of this movement move fluidly and abruptly. It is one of the shortest movements written by Mahler, yet within this 10 minutes of music, Mahler alters its meter from the cozy 3/4 minuet to 3/8, 2/4, 9/8, and back to 3/8, finally ending in 2/4. Yet the music must flow happily forward with the care-free naiveté characteristics of his Wunderhornlieder. At every turn, Mahler cautions repeatedly about using the exact same tempo – Sempre l’istesso tempo. Haitink’s superb control again allowed this music to evolve with grace and charm; coupled it with the impeccable performance of all the principal players, the audience was drawn into the most enthralling reverie. It was great to experience this movement without any extraneous rubato except those introduced by Mahler. It was succinct and effective. Haitink took only one single liberty in stretching the tempo right at the end of Figure 15, where the composer instructed the viola section to play with sempre glissando, and marked the score with molto ritardando and morendo – a quintessential Mahlerian way of tweaking the musical space-time. Haitink for the first time allowed the silence to linger for just an extra second before nodding to Robert Chen to launch into his galloping figures on the solo violin. That extra chance to breathe actually took everyone’s breath away.

Mahler wrote a rather peculiar remark about the third movement, “The Scherzo, especially, the animal-piece, is at once the most scurrilous and most tragic there ever was – in the way that only music can mystically lead us form the one to the other in the twinkling of an eye. The piece is really a sort of face-pulling and tongue-poking on the part of all Nature. But there is such a gruesome, panic humor in it that one is more likely to be overcome by horror than laughter.” I have never been led by any performance to feel the horror in the charming Scherzando, and thus always approach this movement with piqued curiosity of what the conductor may do.

Mahler expanded the 67-bar Wunderhorn setting of “Ablösung im Sommer” (The Change-over in Summer) to the enormous symphonic structure of 590 measures in this movement. The Wunderhorn poem provided the antithesis that had always fascinated Mahler as a composer. The first verse describes the death of the cuckoo; in the second, the nightingale is proclaimed his successor. Structurally the third movement is a Rondo with the so-called “animalistic” motif as the recurring theme, punctuated by Mahler’s colorful instructions of Lustigkeit, Übermut and Grobheit. To hear the conductor’s vision of the ever-changing music character, one needs to hear how he handles the evolution of each returning theme, especially the enormous orchestral outburst triggered by the second posthorn solo. The progression of the music is greatly affected by the two posthorn passages.

The much longer first Posthorn solo triggered a musical reaction Mahler aptly described as mit geheimnisvoller Hast (with mysterious haste), capped by Mahler at pianissimo. Haitink managed the music up to this point with what can only be described as “mellow merriment”, it was controlled and unrushed. Amid the absolutely marvelous display of virtuosity by every one of the orchestral players, Chris Martin’s wonderful posthorn passage lulled the audience into a dreamscape that was uniquely Mahlerian. However, to these ears, the true power of Haitink’s reading was only revealed toward the end of the movement. What Haitink did after the second posthorn solo opened a whole new perspective that have never really come across in any other performance I have heard. In contrast to the mystical quietude following the first posthorn, Mahler wrote a nearly grotesque dynamic arch, starting from ppp, clinching the climatic fff, and finally diminished to the barely audible ppppp. Haitink prepared this passage with great care – the violin octet was lovingly caressed by a beautiful glissando in cello (three bars after figure 28, not marked in the score), and the horn section gently nestled the bucolic posthorn. It was the most tranquil of human existence in Nature….

Then the Schopenhauerian struggle struck with unrelenting power. It is important to note that Mahler specifically prevented the strings from executing any crescendo in the scurrying figure, leaving only the woodwinds to scream in the harrowing outcry. It is a passage permeated with great sense of urgency and utmost chaos that depicts Schopenhauer’s “battleground of tormented and agonized beings who continue to exist by devouring the other.” When the music reached its ironic climax of the absolutely dissonant E-flat minor chord, Haitink had magically achieved what Mahler would later describe as “the heavy shadow of lifeless nature”. The animals had all fled in horror, leaving behind only the human – setting the stage perfectly and logically for the fourth movement.

Amid this beklemmt, hair-raising silence, Michelle DeYoung’s silky yet powerful voice commanded “O Mensch! Gib acht!” Haitink’s handling of the third movement had made this the most convincing transition into the “Midnight Song“. Haitink did not dwell much on the hinaufziehen figure on the oboe, a topic over which much ink has been spilled. Instead, the orchestra concentrated on the various evocative images. Dale Clenvenger’s horn accompaniment was remarkable, as it continued to imbue the solo voice with the stillness of an arioso that was absolutely appropriate, and was unfortunately slightly negated by Ms. DeYoung’s rather intense vibrato. The children’s choir took over the short fifth movement with great angelic charm. However, Haitink had set up a rather inexorable world of Will from the first movement and purposely and masterfully left the chaos unresolved at the end of the Scherzando that the music now begged the world-renouncing contemplation to bring it to a Schopenhauerian end.

And the deepest contemplation was exactly what Haitink and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra delivered. One cannot help but marveled at the sound world created by the string section. It was wrought with immense Wagnerian power at the lower strings, yet with an exuberant emancipation in the upper strings that was aesthetically Mahlerian – a profound convergence of two great authorities at this pivotal moment of handing over the baton wherein the influence of Barenboim and Haitink had morphed into an unimaginable harmony. It was the utmost privilege of those who had attended the concert to hear such magic.

Many conductors have allowed the over-zealous strings section to over-play the beginning of this movement, turning it into a schmaltzy caricature instead of the meditation that carries the burden of resolving the tension built up in the previous movements. Under Haitink’s baton, there was neither a single unmarked glissando, nor a shred of overly intense vibrato in the whole passage. It was delivered with one breath, with Haitink modulating each transitions with thoughtfully placed, very subtle, rubato, until the orchestra unleashed the great power of the third climax at measure 220–244. The famous Chicago brass certainly still packed its famous punch when called upon to do so.

Following Mathieu DuFour’s beautifully executed flute passage, we heard the great D major theme being announced one more time by the impeccable brass duet of Chris Martin and Jay Friedman. The music that had now been elevated to heaven, was gently brought back by the heartrendingly beautiful celli, culminating eventually in the magical coda. What comes at this point, as all Mahlerites would agree, transcends all words. I shall therefore let the glory of this great Mahlerian Adagio resonate through these pages into your own sound-world.

It was a memorable night, made particularly special since it evoked the evening when the Chicago Mahler Society was founded and when Mahler’s Third Symphony was performed in another unforgettable concert – by Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic – seven years and one day ago.

Haitink’s thoughtful performance weaved this stupendous and highly episodic symphony into a coherent work that flowed forward organically. Every element of the symphony rang through effectively as the conductor realized his position as a mere conduit through which Mahler must speak. There simply was no better tribute for a Mahlerian conductor.

Welcome to Chicago, maestro.

	Concert Review Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 3 Bernard Haitink, conductor Chicago Symphony Orchestra Michelle DeYoung, mezzo-soprano Women of the Chicago Symphony Chorus Duain Wolfe, chorus director Chicago Children's Choir Josephine Lee, artistic director Chicago Symphony Center October 19, 2006	This performance is now available on the Chicago Symphony's own label, "CSO Resound".
	by Teng-Leong Chew
	Mahler’s Third Symphony is full of programmatic ideas, despite the composer’s subsequent decision to eradicate all descriptive titles from its six movements. Thanks to these titles, and Mahler’s well-recorded remarks to Natalie Bauer-Lechner, Richard Batka, Anna von Mildenburg and Bruno Walter, it is now a common, albeit sometimes unrealistic, expectation from the audience that the symphony should “encompass the whole world”. It is precisely the focus on such extramusical elements that has faltered many performances, with the interpreter trying too hard to encompass, in the most literal sense, “the world”, thus losing sight of the most important part of this equation – the music itself. What Haitink and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra achieved in this performance was nothing short of extraordinary. It was spellbinding to hear a Mahler symphony these days so devoid of cliché, so exposed in its imperfections, yet so raw and shattering in its musical power. Mahler aptly described this first movement as having a “will of its own”; indeed it is held together by instinct rather than by deliberate effort, sometimes even tottering on the brink of total disintegration. Haitink was unapologetic about this seemingly disjointed series of marches. Instead of trying to seamlessly transition from one segment to another, he preserved the starkly contrasted edges at every turn. Not a single shred of the unyielding darkness was swept under the carpet. This was a brilliant move that allowed the Dionysian turmoil to be self-sustaining from within, rather than sensationally propelled from without. Many have complained that the Third Symphony is a “glorious mess”. Structurally, it is highly segmented; yet there is a vital force that grasps these elements together – the tempo relationship. As a brilliant conductor, Mahler himself was fully aware of this problem, hence the footnote on the same page that clearly stated that “the opening tempo is, for the most part, to be retained throughout the whole movement, and the strictest continuity of tempo is to be maintained in spite of momentary changes in beat or modification.” Clear as this instruction may be, it is rarely observed. Haitink, however, navigated through Mahler’s turbulent cosmo with unerring temporal accuracy, thereby minimizing the disjointed feel that has negatively impacted so many performances. More importantly, Haitink had a remarkable reach that held the entire gargantuan musical structure together. One such striking example came at the first appearance of the dirge proper at bar 14. The eight horns played in unison the elegy almost as mysteriously veiled as the Midnight Song in the fourth movement. I have never heard this lament played like the fourth movement before. It was uncomfortably foreboding, and eerily demanded one’s full attention amid its quietude, thus adding an extra impact by the time one hears the text of the Midnight Song. The naturally paced tempo allowed many interesting elements to reveal themselves. Mahler’s expanded his orchestral palette to a new height in this symphony, which he subsequently perfected for the late symphonies. Immediately after the principal March, Mahler began to explore the echoing effect in the so-called “Pan is Sleeping” passage (rehearsal nos. 10 and 11). The idyllic solo oboe enters on the fifth bar of rehearsal no. 11, and is faithfully echoed by the clarinets, this bucolic melody is then handed gently over to the solo violin, which is again nestled by the echoing trills in the strings. Haitink’s careful handling of the tempo allows this musical echo to reverberate with great effect. Mahlerites in Chicago have been rather lucky to have heard the symphony performed several times in the recent past. However, this was one of those rare occasions in which the players reached the collective fervor and refinement in one magical night. Jay Friedman’s solo trombone at rehearsal no. 14 was jaw-dropping, even by the most stringent standard of most seasoned Mahlerites. The solo passage was handled not only with great passion and superb virtuosity, it was handled with keen sense of musical intellect only a musician who has studied the score intimately can display. Mahler’s accent markings on very particular notes in this passage are remarkable. At first glance, they seem peculiarly lacking in any perceivable pattern. However, Mahler’s intention cannot be any clearer when one looks at the relationship of these accented notes with the triplet figures and the trills motives that punctuate the trombone solo. When these accents are executed, the effect can be staggering. As demonstrated by Mr. Friedman’s superb reading, it was no longer merely a solo trombone supported by a palpable undercurrent – the trombone became part of the propelling force, first pacing the music with the steady accents, then impatiently nudging the music ahead with Mahler’s strategically placed instructions to accelerate (marked Vörwarts), and decidedly without the accents. This stoic reading of the score proved even more vital, if one considered how Mahler treated the second trombone solo at figure 33. This time it is all about “swelling” (a crescendo followed by a decrescendo). Notice how the accompanying orchestral color has changed from the rhythmically unsteady trills and triplets into the highly metered character in the lower strings. The solo trombone brought forth the musical contrast in these two passages convincingly. It would have already been one of life’s great delights to be able to hear such marvelous trombone, but within a short moment, Dale Clevenger and Robert Chen embraced the variations of the melody and lovingly delivered the audience to the childhood reverie with the most beautiful and heartfelt solo horn and violin duet. It was magical. Haitink’s precise sense of tempo worked its wonders again at these crucial transitions. Mahler had up to this point taken the listeners through the epic journey of the gigantic exposition of the symphony – from the raucous cauldron of natural power to childhood memory of marching band. Yet, Haitink’s rigorously-wrought tempo relationship remained steadfastly unchanged. As a result, when most conductors would be frantically trying to bring the music under control at figure 43 when the development section brought back the March from the distance, we were already there in Haitink’s rendition. The Traumerei of distant memory was rudely evaporated under the bright sun as summer marched in, and what made this such a shock was that the transition was seamless. Haitink’s ability to telescope Mahler’s musical idea was remarkable. By the time the orchestra unleashed its raw power and virtuosity in the frenzied Coda, one could not help but realize one was in for a ride. The enchanting allure of the second movement often masks the challenge a conductor would face in holding the variations together. The rhythms of this movement move fluidly and abruptly. It is one of the shortest movements written by Mahler, yet within this 10 minutes of music, Mahler alters its meter from the cozy 3/4 minuet to 3/8, 2/4, 9/8, and back to 3/8, finally ending in 2/4. Yet the music must flow happily forward with the care-free naiveté characteristics of his Wunderhornlieder. At every turn, Mahler cautions repeatedly about using the exact same tempo – Sempre l’istesso tempo. Haitink’s superb control again allowed this music to evolve with grace and charm; coupled it with the impeccable performance of all the principal players, the audience was drawn into the most enthralling reverie. It was great to experience this movement without any extraneous rubato except those introduced by Mahler. It was succinct and effective. Haitink took only one single liberty in stretching the tempo right at the end of Figure 15, where the composer instructed the viola section to play with sempre glissando, and marked the score with molto ritardando and morendo – a quintessential Mahlerian way of tweaking the musical space-time. Haitink for the first time allowed the silence to linger for just an extra second before nodding to Robert Chen to launch into his galloping figures on the solo violin. That extra chance to breathe actually took everyone’s breath away. Mahler wrote a rather peculiar remark about the third movement, “The Scherzo, especially, the animal-piece, is at once the most scurrilous and most tragic there ever was – in the way that only music can mystically lead us form the one to the other in the twinkling of an eye. The piece is really a sort of face-pulling and tongue-poking on the part of all Nature. But there is such a gruesome, panic humor in it that one is more likely to be overcome by horror than laughter.” I have never been led by any performance to feel the horror in the charming Scherzando, and thus always approach this movement with piqued curiosity of what the conductor may do. Mahler expanded the 67-bar Wunderhorn setting of “Ablösung im Sommer” (The Change-over in Summer) to the enormous symphonic structure of 590 measures in this movement. The Wunderhorn poem provided the antithesis that had always fascinated Mahler as a composer. The first verse describes the death of the cuckoo; in the second, the nightingale is proclaimed his successor. Structurally the third movement is a Rondo with the so-called “animalistic” motif as the recurring theme, punctuated by Mahler’s colorful instructions of Lustigkeit, Übermut and Grobheit. To hear the conductor’s vision of the ever-changing music character, one needs to hear how he handles the evolution of each returning theme, especially the enormous orchestral outburst triggered by the second posthorn solo. The progression of the music is greatly affected by the two posthorn passages. The much longer first Posthorn solo triggered a musical reaction Mahler aptly described as mit geheimnisvoller Hast (with mysterious haste), capped by Mahler at pianissimo. Haitink managed the music up to this point with what can only be described as “mellow merriment”, it was controlled and unrushed. Amid the absolutely marvelous display of virtuosity by every one of the orchestral players, Chris Martin’s wonderful posthorn passage lulled the audience into a dreamscape that was uniquely Mahlerian. However, to these ears, the true power of Haitink’s reading was only revealed toward the end of the movement. What Haitink did after the second posthorn solo opened a whole new perspective that have never really come across in any other performance I have heard. In contrast to the mystical quietude following the first posthorn, Mahler wrote a nearly grotesque dynamic arch, starting from ppp, clinching the climatic fff, and finally diminished to the barely audible ppppp. Haitink prepared this passage with great care – the violin octet was lovingly caressed by a beautiful glissando in cello (three bars after figure 28, not marked in the score), and the horn section gently nestled the bucolic posthorn. It was the most tranquil of human existence in Nature…. Then the Schopenhauerian struggle struck with unrelenting power. It is important to note that Mahler specifically prevented the strings from executing any crescendo in the scurrying figure, leaving only the woodwinds to scream in the harrowing outcry. It is a passage permeated with great sense of urgency and utmost chaos that depicts Schopenhauer’s “battleground of tormented and agonized beings who continue to exist by devouring the other.” When the music reached its ironic climax of the absolutely dissonant E-flat minor chord, Haitink had magically achieved what Mahler would later describe as “the heavy shadow of lifeless nature”. The animals had all fled in horror, leaving behind only the human – setting the stage perfectly and logically for the fourth movement. Amid this beklemmt, hair-raising silence, Michelle DeYoung’s silky yet powerful voice commanded “O Mensch! Gib acht!” Haitink’s handling of the third movement had made this the most convincing transition into the “Midnight Song“. Haitink did not dwell much on the hinaufziehen figure on the oboe, a topic over which much ink has been spilled. Instead, the orchestra concentrated on the various evocative images. Dale Clenvenger’s horn accompaniment was remarkable, as it continued to imbue the solo voice with the stillness of an arioso that was absolutely appropriate, and was unfortunately slightly negated by Ms. DeYoung’s rather intense vibrato. The children’s choir took over the short fifth movement with great angelic charm. However, Haitink had set up a rather inexorable world of Will from the first movement and purposely and masterfully left the chaos unresolved at the end of the Scherzando that the music now begged the world-renouncing contemplation to bring it to a Schopenhauerian end. And the deepest contemplation was exactly what Haitink and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra delivered. One cannot help but marveled at the sound world created by the string section. It was wrought with immense Wagnerian power at the lower strings, yet with an exuberant emancipation in the upper strings that was aesthetically Mahlerian – a profound convergence of two great authorities at this pivotal moment of handing over the baton wherein the influence of Barenboim and Haitink had morphed into an unimaginable harmony. It was the utmost privilege of those who had attended the concert to hear such magic. Many conductors have allowed the over-zealous strings section to over-play the beginning of this movement, turning it into a schmaltzy caricature instead of the meditation that carries the burden of resolving the tension built up in the previous movements. Under Haitink’s baton, there was neither a single unmarked glissando, nor a shred of overly intense vibrato in the whole passage. It was delivered with one breath, with Haitink modulating each transitions with thoughtfully placed, very subtle, rubato, until the orchestra unleashed the great power of the third climax at measure 220–244. The famous Chicago brass certainly still packed its famous punch when called upon to do so. Following Mathieu DuFour’s beautifully executed flute passage, we heard the great D major theme being announced one more time by the impeccable brass duet of Chris Martin and Jay Friedman. The music that had now been elevated to heaven, was gently brought back by the heartrendingly beautiful celli, culminating eventually in the magical coda. What comes at this point, as all Mahlerites would agree, transcends all words. I shall therefore let the glory of this great Mahlerian Adagio resonate through these pages into your own sound-world. It was a memorable night, made particularly special since it evoked the evening when the Chicago Mahler Society was founded and when Mahler’s Third Symphony was performed in another unforgettable concert – by Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic – seven years and one day ago. Haitink’s thoughtful performance weaved this stupendous and highly episodic symphony into a coherent work that flowed forward organically. Every element of the symphony rang through effectively as the conductor realized his position as a mere conduit through which Mahler must speak. There simply was no better tribute for a Mahlerian conductor. Welcome to Chicago, maestro.
	© 2007 The Chicago Mahlerites