Discovered the 10th via Ormandy and have loved it ever since, in various versions. Once heard Sanderling (then unknown to me) guest conduct this the NY Philharmonic in this work and loved it then. Can't recall any specifics. Ultimately, I DON'T CARE how much is authentic Mahler and how much is added. The music itself is what matters, and it always moves me.
It's worth bearing in mind that there is (probably?) more Mahler in the 10th symphony, than there is Mozart in the Requiem- and yet posh conductors, who shy snootily away from the 10th, have no difficulty with the Requiem. Makes no sense..
Just as 9/11 conspiracists are called "Truthers," I call the Cooke denialsts "Tenthers." Here's my standard rebuttal to them: If anyone needs a precedent for what Cooke and others did for the Tenth, they need look no further than Mahler himself. Early in his career, he not only orchestrated Weber’s unfinished opera (“Die Drei Pintos”), he fully composed whole parts of it. From Wikipedia: "Mahler unscrambled Weber's drafts and instrumentalized the existing fragments in accordance with Weber's wishes. A further 13 musical numbers were needed in addition to the existing 7, and Mahler went ahead and composed this music himself, based on Weber's themes. The interlude music between Acts I and II and the two-part finale of Act III were written by Mahler, although still based on Weber's leitmotifs and themes." The Tenth is far more complete: the entire thematic line and around ninety percent of the harmony and counterpoint. If anyone refuses to listen to the Tenth, why not eschew the Ninth and Das Lied? Mahler never heard them performed and was known to make significant changes in his music after hearing it played-for example, the order of movements in the Sixth. Besides, we have only Alma’s word for it that Mahler wanted the symphony locked away. He continuously revised compositions throughout his life and specifically sanctioned others to posthumously modify them if they could be made to sound better-much as Mahler himself did in his re-orchestrations of Beethoven and Schumann.
I cannot live without the flute solo in the ending 😊 I would argue that had Cooke's performing version been a completed work by a lesser composer, it would have been regarded as a masterpiece.
I was listening to this performance with headphones, and the dissonant chord was like someone piercing my brain. Other conductors make it softer, but Sanderling goes for the kill.
On the occasion here's an anecdote on the topic of Sanderlings improvements on Cookes performance version: German born conductor Berthold Goldschmidt who had worked intensely with Cooke to complete the first performance version was also a personal friend of Kurt Sanderling from the prewar years. As Sanderling during a meeting with Goldschmidt showed him the score with his own additions of percussion parts Goldschmidt felt a bit offended and remarked: "But with these parts added it will also make the listener think of Shostakovich!" To which Sanderling answered: "Exactly!! I want to show the moment where Shostakovich was born!" Anyway, Sanderling's recording is a must have. Shattering, gripping and "realistic Mahler". And not to forget Ormandy's. A performance one cannot shake off that easily. It haunts you...
What a great point that Mahler was in the prime of his life musically when he wrote this. With the slow, somber slide into oblivion of the 9th most interpretations continue in that vein - great to know there is an after-vigor.
YES! I love that Sanderling Mahler triptych. One of my can't-live-without (sets of) recordings. (Just a personal cheer from the sidelines for this recording.)
The versions other than Cooke all try to add material that isn't there, while the Cooke version keeps the extrapolation basically non-existent. Simply put, Cooke respected Mahler more than his own need for glory .... and somewhat paradoxically, Cooke gained a bit of glory by not seeking it. PS thanks for the previous Ormandy Mahler 10 recommendation. Boy was Eugene an amazing conductor!!!
When you examine the Mahler sketches it's amazing that anyone could decipher them well enough to make any completion at all. But of all the versions, you're absolutely correct: Cooke rules. Carpenter should get the boot!
Are there enough examples for you to do a talk on 'Completions'? People always moan about Alfano's completion of Turandot, but its become so familiar now that I can't imagine another one. But I remember hearing the opening of the Elgar/Payne 3rd Symphony for the first time with those 'oriental' open 5ths and thinking "Elgar would NEVER have written that!"
Ormandy/Philadelphia (Sony Japan remastered & should be in Ormandy Columbia Stereo II box Feb 2025) has the edge with more existential melancholy conveyed by searing string virtuosity and more intensity overall. The first and last movements are among the most supreme moments in Mahler.
Ormandy is great, though I'm fascinated by anyone's ability to quantify comparative "existential melancholy." In any case, Sanderling has more transcendental Weltschmerz. So there!
I'm always astounded when a relatively obscure recording I've discovered on my own through years of diligent searching (I'd never even heard of Sanderling when I came across this one) gets the nod from Dave. I'd already stopped listening to my dozens of Mahler recordings acquired from 1965 on, but still made a trip to hear every live performance I could afford, and was looking and looking for a recording of the one Mahler work that still did it for me. even in imperfect recordings. This Tenth was it. Right up there with Fricsay's Verdi Requiem and Kegel's Missa Solemnis. (I'm still waiting for Dave to figure out that Furtwangler's second complete Ring is incomparably coherent and perfectly balanced, leaving all other versions sounding cheap and trashy. I have no doubt his discernment will bring him home to this recoding too, eventually.)
No, it won't. I grant the great conducting, but the sonics are lousy and frankly you can't hear what isn't there--as so many Furtwangler fans claim to do.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Thanx for responding, and I'm sure I won't bring you around by boasting that for years all I had to go on was a series of about twenty cassette tapes from WBAI's late lamented Ring Day, re-recorded at the outer edge of that magical but dinky little radio station's reach... But all my previous attempts to get into the Ring (not just highlights /excerpts) had fizzled out, year after year...always boring, pompous, episodic... until the fourth or fifth time I forced myself to hear the whole thing as brought to life by WF (while working at home on illustration jobs)... and I have NEVER been able to stay with even one Ring opera, from any other source, live or recorded, from start to finish.... Maybe if you set aside about 72 or 96 hours for repeated listenings, it would get through to you too! PS: I once knew a beautiful old woman who in her youth, during the war, had been WF's secretary (or maybe just a Berlin Phil clerical employee) which she didn't brag about, nor lie about, and preferred not to reminisce casually about, due to traumatic circumstances. She was half-Jewish (her Jewish father had ended his life to take the heat off the rest of the family). She said WF was wonderful in every way, and had done more to quietly protect Jewish musicians than anyone knew. I never heard her speak so reverently of anyone else, not even the leader of the cult where I met her. Only after reading a salacious bio of WF, I realized she'd probably been one of his many loves.
I’ve always liked the Wigglesworth one with Melbourne. I like the sonics and the performance… and I love the glissando in the strings at the end. I have no idea whether that’s in the score or not, but whatever, it works for me. 😊
Hi Dave...thanks to you I obtained both Gielen and Chailly...I enjoy them both...Is Sanderling FAR AND AWAY (in your opinion) that much superior, interpretation, orchestration and sonics? Thanks for being there....your video critiques are always my virtual masterclass.
Yo en mi caso, las interpretaciones de Gielen y Sanderling andan por ahí. Excepto ese acorde disonante. Allí Sanderling lleva la delantera, junto con la acústica. Gielen, lleva por la delantera en consistencia y el humor intencionado en la sinfonía. Además de la característica que este director, tiene el expresionismo y el nihilismo de su lado.
To me the tenth is as unique to the ninth as his third is to the second. Does that make sense. He doesn't just do a ninth 11. He uses a different palette. More lean compared to the ninth's denser textures. He was only 50 ( almost 51 ) but he knew he was dying. I think someday someone will come up with a better solution.
While working on the 10th during the summer of 1910, Mahler did not know he would die before its completion. He was aware that his health was in decline and had scaled back his formerly robust summer physical activities, but was not anticipating death anytime soon. After returning to New York, he rehearsed and conducted a busy concert schedule with the NYPO that included touring appearances, until falling fatally ill just after his performance on February 21, 1911. At that time, he already had compiled the concert programs for the remainder of the subscription season and intended to complete his 10th during the summer of 1911, among other activities with his family at their retreat in Toblach. Not the actions of a man who expected imminent death.
14 дней назад
I did not like the Sanderling on first listen. Based on your recommendation I gave it a couple more chances and am coming around to your view. It is definitely one that all Mahler fans should check out.
Discovered the 10th via Ormandy and have loved it ever since, in various versions. Once heard Sanderling (then unknown to me) guest conduct this the NY Philharmonic in this work and loved it then. Can't recall any specifics. Ultimately, I DON'T CARE how much is authentic Mahler and how much is added. The music itself is what matters, and it always moves me.
That's a very healthy attitude!
It's worth bearing in mind that there is (probably?) more Mahler in the 10th symphony, than there is Mozart in the Requiem- and yet posh conductors, who shy snootily away from the 10th, have no difficulty with the Requiem. Makes no sense..
Very true.
Just as 9/11 conspiracists are called "Truthers," I call the Cooke denialsts "Tenthers." Here's my standard rebuttal to them:
If anyone needs a precedent for what Cooke and others did for the Tenth, they need look no further than Mahler himself.
Early in his career, he not only orchestrated Weber’s unfinished opera (“Die Drei Pintos”), he fully composed whole parts of it.
From Wikipedia: "Mahler unscrambled Weber's drafts and instrumentalized the existing fragments in accordance with Weber's wishes. A further 13 musical numbers were needed in addition to the existing 7, and Mahler went ahead and composed this music himself, based on Weber's themes. The interlude music between Acts I and II and the two-part finale of Act III were written by Mahler, although still based on Weber's leitmotifs and themes."
The Tenth is far more complete: the entire thematic line and around ninety percent of the harmony and counterpoint. If anyone refuses to listen to the Tenth, why not eschew the Ninth and Das Lied? Mahler never heard them performed and was known to make significant changes in his music after hearing it played-for example, the order of movements in the Sixth.
Besides, we have only Alma’s word for it that Mahler wanted the symphony locked away. He continuously revised compositions throughout his life and specifically sanctioned others to posthumously modify them if they could be made to sound better-much as Mahler himself did in his re-orchestrations of Beethoven and Schumann.
I cannot live without the flute solo in the ending 😊 I would argue that had Cooke's performing version been a completed work by a lesser composer, it would have been regarded as a masterpiece.
I was listening to this performance with headphones, and the dissonant chord was like someone piercing my brain. Other conductors make it softer, but Sanderling goes for the kill.
That might be my favorite dissonance of all time.
On the occasion here's an anecdote on the topic of Sanderlings improvements on Cookes performance version:
German born conductor Berthold Goldschmidt who had worked intensely with Cooke to complete the first performance version was also a personal friend of Kurt Sanderling from the prewar years.
As Sanderling during a meeting with Goldschmidt showed him the score with his own additions of percussion parts Goldschmidt felt a bit offended and remarked:
"But with these parts added it will also make the listener think of Shostakovich!"
To which Sanderling answered:
"Exactly!! I want to show the moment where Shostakovich was born!"
Anyway, Sanderling's recording is a must have. Shattering, gripping and "realistic Mahler".
And not to forget Ormandy's.
A performance one cannot shake off that easily. It haunts you...
What a great point that Mahler was in the prime of his life musically when he wrote this. With the slow, somber slide into oblivion of the 9th most interpretations continue in that vein - great to know there is an after-vigor.
YES! I love that Sanderling Mahler triptych. One of my can't-live-without (sets of) recordings. (Just a personal cheer from the sidelines for this recording.)
The versions other than Cooke all try to add material that isn't there, while the Cooke version keeps the extrapolation basically non-existent.
Simply put, Cooke respected Mahler more than his own need for glory .... and somewhat paradoxically, Cooke gained a bit of glory by not seeking it.
PS thanks for the previous Ormandy Mahler 10 recommendation. Boy was Eugene an amazing conductor!!!
I return more to the Ormandy recording than to any other...
When you examine the Mahler sketches it's amazing that anyone could decipher them well enough to make any completion at all. But of all the versions, you're absolutely correct: Cooke rules. Carpenter should get the boot!
an emotionally searing reading. Plus, there's an even better SACD issue from Japan.
Are there enough examples for you to do a talk on 'Completions'?
People always moan about Alfano's completion of Turandot, but its become so familiar now that I can't imagine another one. But I remember hearing the opening of the Elgar/Payne 3rd Symphony for the first time with those 'oriental' open 5ths and thinking "Elgar would NEVER have written that!"
Bruckner 9th. To me feels complete as it is. Haven’t heard the completions.
And Barry Cooper's "Beethoven's Tenth".
Ormandy/Philadelphia (Sony Japan remastered & should be in Ormandy Columbia Stereo II box Feb 2025) has the edge with more existential melancholy conveyed by searing string virtuosity and more intensity overall. The first and last movements are among the most supreme moments in Mahler.
Ormandy is great, though I'm fascinated by anyone's ability to quantify comparative "existential melancholy." In any case, Sanderling has more transcendental Weltschmerz. So there!
I'm always astounded when a relatively obscure recording I've discovered on my own through years of diligent searching (I'd never even heard of Sanderling when I came across this one) gets the nod from Dave. I'd already stopped listening to my dozens of Mahler recordings acquired from 1965 on, but still made a trip to hear every live performance I could afford, and was looking and looking for a recording of the one Mahler work that still did it for me. even in imperfect recordings. This Tenth was it. Right up there with Fricsay's Verdi Requiem and Kegel's Missa Solemnis. (I'm still waiting for Dave to figure out that Furtwangler's second complete Ring is incomparably coherent and perfectly balanced, leaving all other versions sounding cheap and trashy. I have no doubt his discernment will bring him home to this recoding too, eventually.)
No, it won't. I grant the great conducting, but the sonics are lousy and frankly you can't hear what isn't there--as so many Furtwangler fans claim to do.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Thanx for responding, and I'm sure I won't bring you around by boasting that for years all I had to go on was a series of about twenty cassette tapes from WBAI's late lamented Ring Day, re-recorded at the outer edge of that magical but dinky little radio station's reach... But all my previous attempts to get into the Ring (not just highlights /excerpts) had fizzled out, year after year...always boring, pompous, episodic... until the fourth or fifth time I forced myself to hear the whole thing as brought to life by WF (while working at home on illustration jobs)... and I have NEVER been able to stay with even one Ring opera, from any other source, live or recorded, from start to finish.... Maybe if you set aside about 72 or 96 hours for repeated listenings, it would get through to you too!
PS: I once knew a beautiful old woman who in her youth, during the war, had been WF's secretary (or maybe just a Berlin Phil clerical employee) which she didn't brag about, nor lie about, and preferred not to reminisce casually about, due to traumatic circumstances. She was half-Jewish (her Jewish father had ended his life to take the heat off the rest of the family). She said WF was wonderful in every way, and had done more to quietly protect Jewish musicians than anyone knew. I never heard her speak so reverently of anyone else, not even the leader of the cult where I met her. Only after reading a salacious bio of WF, I realized she'd probably been one of his many loves.
I’ve always liked the Wigglesworth one with Melbourne. I like the sonics and the performance… and I love the glissando in the strings at the end. I have no idea whether that’s in the score or not, but whatever, it works for me. 😊
He also did a very fine version, which was a freebie with the BBC Music Magazine ( BBC National Orchestra of Wales)
Hi Dave...thanks to you I obtained both Gielen and Chailly...I enjoy them both...Is Sanderling FAR AND AWAY (in your opinion) that much superior, interpretation, orchestration and sonics? Thanks for being there....your video critiques are always my virtual masterclass.
No, it's not. All three are excellent in their various ways.
You might want to try Daniel Harding with Vienna Phil. It's possibly the best "all rounded" recording, not as modernist as Gielen maybe
Yo en mi caso, las interpretaciones de Gielen y Sanderling andan por ahí. Excepto ese acorde disonante. Allí Sanderling lleva la delantera, junto con la acústica. Gielen, lleva por la delantera en consistencia y el humor intencionado en la sinfonía. Además de la característica que este director, tiene el expresionismo y el nihilismo de su lado.
To me the tenth is as unique to the ninth as his third is to the second. Does that make sense. He doesn't just do a ninth 11. He uses a different palette. More lean compared to the ninth's denser textures. He was only 50 ( almost 51 ) but he knew he was dying. I think someday someone will come up with a better solution.
While working on the 10th during the summer of 1910, Mahler did not know he would die before its completion. He was aware that his health was in decline and had scaled back his formerly robust summer physical activities, but was not anticipating death anytime soon. After returning to New York, he rehearsed and conducted a busy concert schedule with the NYPO that included touring appearances, until falling fatally ill just after his performance on February 21, 1911. At that time, he already had compiled the concert programs for the remainder of the subscription season and intended to complete his 10th during the summer of 1911, among other activities with his family at their retreat in Toblach. Not the actions of a man who expected imminent death.
I did not like the Sanderling on first listen. Based on your recommendation I gave it a couple more chances and am coming around to your view. It is definitely one that all Mahler fans should check out.