Rassling with the symphonic adagios of Bruckner and Mahler, Part 2

We left off Part 1 of this post:

BEFORE WE PROCEED TO THE LAST THREE BRUCKNER SYMPHONIES, LET'S CONNECT WITH A MAHLER ADAGIO --
Which is where we'll pick up in Part 2.

FIRST LET'S CONSIDER A COUPLE OF NEAR-ADAGIOS

First, let's consider a couple of near-adagios. Mahler 1 and 2 have slow movements we wouldn't even think to call adagios. Mahler 3, about as strange a pile of symphonic construction as I'm aware of, actually concludes with an extended slow movement that might qualify, and the precedent of concluding a large symphony with a large slow movement is certainly going to catch fire with Mahler, but in M3 I think he's playing at something else here, especially when we consider the long opening section that begins all-strings and then for a good piece allows only small-bore wind intrusions. Let's listen -- I think you'll hear what I mean.

MAHLER: Symphony No. 3 in D: vi. Langsam. Ruhevoll. Empfunden. (Slow. Peaceful. Felt.)


Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti, cond. Decca, recorded in Orchestra Hall, November 1982

Boston Symphony Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA, recorded in Symphony Hall, Oct. 10-11, 1966

London Symphony Orchestra, Jascha Horenstein, cond. Unicorn-Kanchana, recorded in Fairfield Hall, Croydon, London, July 27-29, 1970

New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG, recorded live in Avery Fisher Hall, Nov. 25-28, 1987

Rassling with the symphonic adagios of Bruckner and Mahler, Part 1

NOTE TO READERS: It was hard enough getting this post strung out from start to finish. When that was done, I knew that one thing I'd most feared had happened: There are too many files, and these files are big ones, to have much hope of the post loading properly or easily. It already wasn't going to be finished at the finish line, but now it would have to be split in two. Part 2 will post pretty much any time now. -- Ken

[No. 7] Adagio - Sehr feierlich und sehr langsam
(Adagio - Very solemn and very slow)

[No. 8] Adagio - Feierlich langsam, doch nicht schleppend
(Adagio - Solemnly slow, yet not dragging)

The first statement of the main theme of the Adagios of Anton Bruckner's Seventh and Eighth Symphonies, played by, respectively: [7] the Berlin Phil under Seiji Ozawa and [8] the Vienna Phil under Herbert von Karajan


WHILE ALL ADAGIOS ARE SLOW MOVEMENTS,
ONLY SOME SLOW MOVEMENTS ARE ADAGIOS

And here we hear prime specimens of "NOT AN ADAGIO" slow movements from the undisputed masters of symphonic adagio-making:

BRUCKNER: Symphony No. 4 in E-flat:
ii. Andante quasi allegretto

Munich Philharmonic, Rudolf Kempe, cond. Acanta, recorded in the Bürgerbräukeller, Dec. 14-15, 1975 & Jan. 20-21, 1976

MAHLER: Symphony No. 6 in A minor:
iii. [or ii.] Andante moderato
[Mahler himself, you'll recall, was of two minds about the order of the symphony's middle movements, the Andante moderato and the Scherzo]

Cleveland Orchestra, George Szell, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded live in Severance Hall, October 1967

by Ken

In last week's post, we "chart[ed] our course from Beethoven's visionary symphonic adagio to the great symphonic adagios of Bruckner and Mahler," which is the course that lies ahead of us. It hasn't worked out quite the way -- that is, any of the ways -- it was meant to, but here we are, somewhere between Plan C and Plan D, forging ahead, starting with this idea I had (it seemed like a good idea at the time) that it might be helpful, in getting a handle on these symphonic adagios, to separate out slow movements that aren't adagios.

Okay, the performances I've slotted in above are skewed just a little, in the direction of "non-adagio-tizing" these specimen movements -- with performances that underscore these movements' non-adagio-ness, in particular Szell's almost breezy take on the Mahler 6's "Andante moderato" tempo marking. Still just drawing on the SC archive (meaning that these are performances we've heard before, unless a clip was made for a post that never got posted), which is overflowing with performances of this movement, which I love a lot, I could have inserted these broader and emotionally weightier statements --

MAHLER: Symphony No. 6 in A minor:
iii. [or ii.] Andante moderato

New Philharmonia Orchestra, Sir John Barbirolli, cond. EMI, recorded in Abbey Road Studio No. 1, London, Sept. 26-27, 1969

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Klaus Tennstedt, cond. EMI, recorded live in the Royal Festival Hall, November 1991

I love pretty much everything about the Barbirolli M6, not least the bold and soul-stirring Andante moderato, and I also love the darker, more insinuating quality of the Tennstedt live M6 Andante moderato. (I very much like the 1983 studio recording Tennstedt made as part of his LPO Mahler cycle, but I'm happy EMI also issued the later live performances of M6 and M7.)

Similarly with the Bruckner 4 Andante quasi allegretto --