Albert Camus once wrote ‘when I describe what the catastrophe of modern man looks like, music comes into my mind – the music of Gustav Mahler’. If asked to specify a particular work, it is quite possible that Camus would have proposed Symphony No. 6 in A minor – the symphony that Bruno Walter claimed portrayed ‘a terrifying, hopeless darkness, without a human sound’. Nevertheless, the period during which Mahler wrote his Sixth was one of the most successful and happiest of his life – prior to any marital difficulties, at the time of the birth of his second daughter Anna, his professional reputation growing. Alma Mahler, in her memoirs, suggested that the symphony was in fact predicting instances of future distress in the composer’s own life, and she and various commentators have proposed various interpretations of different elements. Most famous of these are possibly the hammer strokes in the Finale, falling, according to Alma, like ‘blows of fate’ on the ‘hero’ of the symphony. But Osmo Vänskä has a reputation for engaging with even the most iconic scores at face value, avoiding preconceived ideas and ‘time-honored’ traditions.

His and the Minnesota Orchestra’s recording of Mahler’s Sixth follows upon the 2017 release of the composer’s Fifth Symphony. Nominated to a 2018 Grammy Award, that interpretation has been described as ‘at once committed and detached, intense and transcendentally timeless’ (Norman Lebrecht) and ‘an exceptional performance that promises great things to come’ (allmusic.com).

REVIEWS:

The Finnish maestro opts for the revised order of middle movements, the searing andante preceding the scherzo, with its “old fatherly”, Ländler-like trio. The Minnesotans shine in the eerie sonorities of the finale, building to another allegro energico, but ending, movingly, in the minor tonality.

– Sunday Times (UK)

The interpretation here is intensely focused and utterly compelling, and the playing is impassioned and unnervingly vivid in the multichannel format, so listeners who loved the exceptional analog versions by Solti and Tennstedt or modern digital recordings by Abbado, Tilson Thomas, and Pappano can be sure that Vänskä's audiophile version ranks just as high in quality. The integrity of the performance and the expressive heights that are achieved carry the day and make Vänskä's recording essential for Mahler buffs.

– All Music Guide

In contrast to Symphony No. 8, also known as the "Symphony of a Thousand", another of Gustav Mahler's vocal-instrumental pieces, Das Lied von der Erde, speaks in a highly intimate language, full of tenderness and deep sorrow, mirroring the very essence of the artist's soul towards the end of his days. The grief, reflecting the painful events in the composer's life and expressed in a variety of shades in all the six songs, seems to dissolve at the end of the work in the repeated, atoned "forever", a word opening up the infinite space following the life on earth. The internationally renowned Czech mezzo-soprano Dagmar Peckova has always cherished Mahler's music, as evinced by the highly acclaimed recordings she has made with Jiri Belohlavek, conducting the Prague Philharmonia. Her partners on the album are the tenor Richard Samek, whose voice is known to audiences at Europe's prominent opera houses, and a chamber ensemble, instead of a large Romantic orchestra, for which Mahler scored the piece. In order to emphasise the work's intimacy, Peckova opted for Schoenberg's chamber arrangement of Das Lied von der Erde. The recording has made the soloist's dream come true, and thus added the final piece in the mosaic of her feted Mahler discography.

Also available on Blu-ray

Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 is an incomprehensible wonder of music history, rigorously peculiar, disturbingly new, and timelessly modern. “Wie ein Naturlaut” (Like a sound of nature) is indicated above the first notes of the symphony. It is both the prelude and the key to his symphonic cosmos as a whole. Mahler captures this music of the world, transforms it into a symphony in the old, comprehensive sense of the word and uses it to create his masterpiece of harmony. Composed over the course of just a few months at the beginning of 1888 in Leipzig, this symphony is a true musical awakening. Riccardo Chailly and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig bring Mahler’s sounds of nature to life in a riveting performance. This production was recorded live in January 2015 at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig. As a bonus, this release also includes an exclusive interview with Riccardo Chailly.


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REVIEW:

The D major coda is played for all its worth, with standing horns joined (just as Mahler requests) by trumpet and trombone reinforcements. Multi-miked sound matches picture, taking you right inside Mahler’s orchestration at its most outlandish (and, indeed, Berliozian). Chailly’s Concertgebouw recording (1/97) was a high point of his Decca cycle but he’s one of those musicians who not only know that there is always more to say but who challenge themselves to communicate it.

– Gramophone

This recording project collaboration of Paul Kletzki with the Israel Philharmonic was the first time the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra was recorded by a major international recording company. EMI sent recording teams from London to Tel-Aviv in 1954 and 1956 to record the IPO & Kletzki in works by Mahler, Schumann, Mendelssohn and Sch�nberg. Kletzki was an early advocate of Mahler's works - this recording of the 9th symphony was just the second studio recording of that symphony. These recordings were distributed internationally for many years. This release - the recipient of a Diapason d'Or from France - is their first re-release on compact disc and digital platforms

In this great program of music, Daniel Raiskin and his Koblenz Orchestra prove they are at the highest standard, producing superb sound and very musical playing.

This release is Erwin Stein's chamber arrangement of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 4. In 1921, Arnold Schoenberg organized a series of private concerts, performed by small ensembles. Schoenberg and Stein combined their ingenuity and created "sophisticated versions" of important orchestral works. These arrangements were usually for a few woodwinds, a string quintet, percussion and piano. Stein also added a harmonium, which was quite rare at the time but the organ adds a unique timbre to this arrangement.

Gustav Mahler’s Ninth Symphony shows the culmination of the composer’s career. The concert recorded in this landmark live performance was part of The Mahler Project, in which friends and conductors Daniel Barenboim and Pierre Boulez tackled all of Mahler’s symphonies with the Staatskapelle Berlin. A documentary from Christoph Engel accompanies the concert, in which a diverse selection of statements and conversations from both conductors is featured.

Also available on standard DVD

Andris Nelsons conducted the Lucerne Festival Orchestra for the third time in August 2015, the orchestra’s second summer without founder and guiding spirit Claudio Abbado. The first half of his concert was already a highlight: the baritone Matthias Goerne seemed completely at home in a selection of songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn. His warm, dark voice allows him to capture the somber and tragic atmosphere of this music like no one else. Its shaded timbre is most perfectly suited to the work’s melancholy and nocturnal moods, where one can directly experience how an artist of this caliber can bring music to the edge of the abyss. The Lucerne Festival Orchestra, renowned for its unique Mahler sound, had last played Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 in the summer of 2004 with Abbado – a flowing, transparent, and ethereal interpretation. Nelsons finds a completely different approach to the work. His Mahler is fiery, expansive, and powerful. In spite of the introductory funeral march, his reading is more positive than tragic, radiating an intense vitality. It is breathtaking to observe the orchestra’s response to Nelsons’s energetic, physical, and emotional conducting style. The relationship between orchestra and conductor is one of giving and taking, nothing else.

Picture Format Blu?ray: NTSC 16:9, Full HD

Sound Formats Blu?ray: DTS HD Master Audio, PCM Stereo

Region Code: 0 (worldwide)

Running Time: 123:12 min

Disc Format: BD 25

Subtitles: German (Original), French, English, Japanese, Korean

The Taschenphilharmonie, conducted by Peter Stangel, presents this outstanding recording of Mahler’s 7th Symphony. Gustav Mahler wrote his seventh symphony in 1904-1905, though it would not be premiered until 1908. The “smallest Symphony Orchestra in the world,” the Taschenphilharmonie is made up of first-class musicians who came together a decade ago to make music.

The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Hannu Lintu presents Mahler’s Symphony Nr. 1 with the original 2nd movement Blumine restored which Mahler excised after a few performances of the symphony. To this day, there is much discussion of Mahler’s decision to drop this lovely movement with many theories attached to the discussion. Nonetheless this recording performs a valuable cultural service with its inclusion, especially in the hands of the very capable FRSO.

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

The hr-Sinfonieorchester has for decades been numbered among the world's leading Mahler orchestras. Between 2008 and 2013 it gave its most recent Mahler cycle as part of the Rheingau Music Festival under principal conductor Paavo Järvi. The recordings were made in the unique space of the Basilica of Eberbach Monastery, in the magnificent ambiance of the Friedrich von Thiersch Hall at the Wiesbaden Kurhaus and in the outstanding acoustics of the Great Hall of the Alte Oper in Frankfurt. In all of these venues Mahler's symphonies left a particularly fascinating impression.

Gustav Mahler
THE COMPLETE SYMPHONIES

Symphony No. 1 in D Major, “Titan”
Symphony No. 2 in C Minor, “Resurrection”
Symphony No. 3 in D Minor
Symphony No. 4 in G Major
Symphony No. 5 in C-Sharp Minor
Symphony No. 6 in A Minor, “Tragic”
Symphony No. 7 in E Minor
Symphony No. 8 in E-Flat Major, “Symphony of a Thousand”
Symphony No. 9 in D Major
Symphony No. 10 in F-Sharp Minor: I. Adagio

Camilla Tilling, soprano
Genia Kühmeier, soprano
Erin Wall, soprano
Ailish Tynan, soprano
Anna Lucia Richter, soprano
Lilli Paasikivi, mezzo-soprano
Waltraud Meier, mezzo-soprano
Alice Coote, mezzo-soprano
Charlotte Hellekant, mezzo-soprano
Nikolai Schukoff, tenor
Michael Nagy, baritone
Ain Anger, bass

Bavarian Radio Chorus
North German Radio Chorus
Limburger Cathedral Boys Choir
Leipzig MDR Radio Choir
Czech Philharmonic Choir, Brno
Europa Chor Akademie
Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra
Paavo Järvi, conductor

Recorded at Rheingau Musik Festival, 2003–2013

Bonus:
- Introductions to the Symphonies by Paavo Järvi
- Paavo’s Mahler: The Project

Picture format: 1080i High Definition
Sound format: PCM Stereo / DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Audio Language (bonus): English
Subtitles: German, English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese (Symphonies Nos. 2, 3, 4, 8) / German, Korean, Japanese (bonus)
Booklet notes: English, German, French
Running time: 12 hrs 35 mins (concert) + 96 mins (bonus)
No. of Discs: 5 (BD 50)

Arnold Schönberg founded the Society for Musical Private Performances in November 1918 “to give Arnold Schoenberg the opportunity personally to carry out his intention of providing artists and art lovers with a veritable and precise knowledge of Modern Music”, as Alban Berg described in a leaflet in 1919. Chamber music, solo pieces and songs saw performance, and to a great extent, properly arranged for the available means, original large-scale orchestral works of topical and artistic high-quality were also produced. In the autumn of 1921, Schönberg embarked on an arrangement of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, which, however, he broke off in the middle of the first movement. The continuation was to be taken over by Webern, but this did not happen, evidently as a consequence of the end of the society. It was only in 1982/83 that the German composer, conductor and musicologist Rainer Riehn (b. 1941) was prepared to continue what had been begun.

This C Major Entertainment release of Gustav Mahler's Ninth Symphony and the Adagio from the unfinished 10th Symphony concludes the issuance of the complete, acclaimed Mahler cycle with Paavo J�rvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, which since the 1980's and the release of Eliahu Inbal's FRSO Mahler cycle has come to be known as a "powerful Mahler orchestra" (Frankfurter Rundschau). As on previous releases, conductor Paavo J�rvi's learned and probing introductions to the symphonies heard on the accompanying release are a worthy and self-recommending bonus feature."Paavo J�rvi interprets the 9th symphony with self-assurance and stylistic certainty, as one expects from only the great Mahler conductors." (Frankfurter Neue Presse on the 9th)"J�rvi's understanding of the slow movement of the 10th Symphony brought a unique clarity. (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung)

Also available on Blu-ray

The highly praised Mahler Cycle with Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra continues with the release of the 7th and 8th Symphonies.

PAAVO JÄRVI CONDUCTS MAHLER SYMPHONIES

Gustav Mahler:
Symphony No. 7 in E Minor
Symphony No. 8 in E-Flat Major, “Symphony of a Thousand”

Erin Wall, soprano
Ailish Tynan, soprano
Anna Lucia Richter, soprano
Alice Coote, mezzo-soprano
Charlotte Hellekant, mezzo-soprano
Nikolai Schukoff, tenor
Michael Nagy, baritone
Ain Anger, bass

Limburger Cathedral Boys Choir
Czech Philharmonic Choir, Brno
Europa Chor Akademie
Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra
Paavo Järvi, conductor

Recorded at the Rheingau Musik Festival, 2011 (Symphony No. 7) and 2013 (Symphony No. 8)

Bonus:
- Introductions to the Symphonies by Paavo Järvi

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: Latin, German, English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese / English, German, Korean, Japanese (bonus)
Booklet notes: English, German, French
Running time: 149 mins (concert) + 20 mins (bonus)
No. of DVDs: 2 (DVD 9)

This 2 DVD C Major Entertainment release of Gustav Mahler's Fifth and Sixth Symphonies continues the issuance of the complete, acclaimed Mahler cycle with Paavo J�rvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, which since the 1980s and the release of Eliahu Inbal's FRSO Mahler cycle has come to be known as a "powerful Mahler orchestra" (Frankfurter Rundschau). As on previous releases, conductor Paavo J�rvi's learned and probing introductions to the symphonies heard on the accompanying release are a worthy and self-recommending bonus feature.