Mahler - Symphony 9 [Morris-The Symphonica Of London]Now Mahler's Ninth is far from my favourite Symphony by him, in fact it's one of his less accessible works for me, maybe it has a lot to do with the fact that i haven't listened to it a lot, and i haven't listened to it a lot because each time i do listen to it, i come away with a mediocre experience, therefore i'm never rushing back to it to listen to it again, yet i persevere, and it's good to give this set a spin, i need to learn the beauty of the Ninth.
Wyn Morris was Welsh, born in 1929, and died in 2010, he didn't record a lot, mainly Symphonic cycles of Mahler and Beethoven, this set spills over onto a second disc, because of the 82 minutes it takes, the front cover is a gorgeous picture, a blue tinged photo of the sun breaking through the fir trees, hazy and misty light spreads to all the points of a clock, the trees tower over the viewer, there's a real sense of majesty and power, even the IMP Classics rainbow logo adds such a thrilling dash of colour to it all, i love this box set.
Of all the movements of Mahler, it seems that he put the most creative effort into the first movements, and the Second, Sixth, and Ninth are certainly so in my mind, each one starts off great, but then maybe get lost in the vastness of themselves, so it was the first movement that moved me the most, it's a mammoth statement, at over 30 minutes long here, and yet it really held my attention,
Here's Leonard Bernstein conducting the first movement on YouTube.
