Mahler - Symphony 5 [Chailly-Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra]
Another disc listened to over the park, while writing my Journal, it's my favourite Mahler Symphony, and i marvelled at the invention of it, the opening trumpet fanfare is a moment of pure genius, and the way the orchestra is brought in to substantiate the solo trumpet is thrilling, and the rest of the Symphony is chock full of invention and memorableness, it's a long Symphony [71 minutes here], but never at any time am i fighting to keep my concentration over certain parts, if Mahler had tried to shorten it, he would have to remove vital organs from its body, and it would be deformed and die, here Mahler is the king of the brass [especially the trumpet], the whole Symphony is like one big fanfare, and the ending has a powerful resolution to it, it's nigh on a perfect as a Symphony can get, Mahler only has 10 other entries in my Blog, and half of them are for the Fifth Symphony!, it speaks for itself.
Riccardo Chailly [pronounced shar-ee] is Italian, he is 59, he recorded this disc in 1997, the booklet cover is a painting by Mark Jackson, over which lettering and the Roman symbol V [5] is superimposed, also a linking circle and triangle, it's sparse, but i prefer it to the other cover which is going around of Chailly himself on the front.
The second movement is my favourite, and the other 5 entries in my Blog of Mahler's Fifth Symphony, i also find the second movement was favoured, again it speaks for itself, it's a movement that Mahler titles 'ardently stormy, with great vehemence', and certainly the opening has that in spades, the brass certainly blast away here, with hard percussion in the background [0:00-1:20], and yet the movement is punctuated with serene moments of caressing strings [1:20-3:34], or rather it's the louder outbursts that are the punctuations [3:34-4:23], the conclusion / resolution is awe inspiring [12:07-13:20], Shostakovich does the same thing with his Tenth, it's a wonderful moment, Chailly paces the movement expertly.
Here's on Valery Gergiev conducting the second movement on YouTube.
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