The Symphony No. 8 in E-flat major by Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...

 is one of the largest-scale choral works in the classical concert repertoire. Because it requires huge instrumental and vocal forces it is frequently called the "Symphony of a Thousand", although the work is often performed with fewer than a thousand, and Mahler himself did not sanction the name. The work was composed in a single inspired burst, at Maiernigg in southern Austria in the summer of 1906. The last of Mahler's works that was premiered in his lifetime, the symphony

Symphony

A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...

 was a critical and popular success when he conducted its first performance in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

 on .

The fusion of song and symphony had been a characteristic of Mahler's early works. In his "middle" compositional period after 1901, a change of direction led him to produce three purely instrumental symphonies. The Eighth, marking the end of the middle period, returns to a combination of orchestra and voice in a symphonic context. The structure of the work is unconventional; instead of the normal framework of several movements, the piece is in two parts. Part I is based on the Latin text of a 9th-century Christian hymn for Pentecost, Veni creator spiritus

Veni Creator Spiritus

Veni Creator Spiritus is a hymn believed to have been written by Rabanus Maurus in the 9th century. It is normally sung in Gregorian Chant and often associated with the Roman Catholic Church, where it is performed during the liturgical celebration of the feast of Pentecost...

("Come, Creator Spirit"), and Part II is a setting of the words from the closing scene of Goethe's Faust

Goethe's Faust

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust is a tragic play in two parts: and . Although written as a closet drama, it is the play with the largest audience numbers on German-language stages...

. The two parts are unified by a common idea, that of redemption through the power of love, a unity conveyed through shared musical themes.

Mahler had been convinced from the start of the work's significance; in renouncing the pessimism that had marked much of his music, he offered the Eighth as an expression of confidence in the eternal human spirit. In the period following the composer's death, performances were comparatively rare. However, from the mid-20th century onwards the symphony has been heard regularly in concert halls all over the world, and has been recorded many times. While recognising its wide popularity, modern critics have divided opinions on the work; some find its optimism unconvincing, and consider it artistically and musically inferior to Mahler's other symphonies. However, it has also been compared to Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...

's Ninth Symphony

Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven)

The Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, is the final complete symphony of Ludwig van Beethoven. Completed in 1824, the symphony is one of the best known works of the Western classical repertoire, and has been adapted for use as the European Anthem...

 as a defining human statement for its century.

Background

By the summer of 1906, Mahler had been director of the Vienna Hofoper

Vienna State Opera

The Vienna State Opera is an opera house – and opera company – with a history dating back to the mid-19th century. It is located in the centre of Vienna, Austria. It was originally called the Vienna Court Opera . In 1920, with the replacement of the Habsburg Monarchy by the First Austrian...

 for nine years. Throughout this time his practice was to leave Vienna at the close of the Hofoper season for a summer retreat, where he could devote himself to composition. Since 1899 this haven had been at Maiernigg, near the resort town of Maria Wörth

Maria Wörth

Maria Wörth is a municipality in the district of Klagenfurt-Land in the Austrian state of Carinthia. The centre of the resort town is situated on a peninsula at the southern shore of the Wörthersee. In the east the municipal area borders the Carinthian capital Klagenfurt. The municipality consists...

 in Carinthia

Carinthia (state)

Carinthia is the southernmost Austrian state or Land. Situated within the Eastern Alps it is chiefly noted for its mountains and lakes.The main language is German. Its regional dialects belong to the Southern Austro-Bavarian group...

, southern Austria, where Mahler built a villa overlooking the Wörthersee

Wörthersee

The Wörthersee is an alpine lake in the southern Austrian state of Carinthia.-General facts:The lake is elongated, about 20 km long and 1–2 km wide. It stretches from the Carinthian capital Klagenfurt in the east to Velden in the west...

. In these restful surroundings Mahler completed his Fourth

Symphony No. 4 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 4 by Gustav Mahler was written between 1899 and 1901, though it incorporates a song originally written in 1892. The song, "Das himmlische Leben", presents a child's vision of Heaven. It is sung by a soprano in the work's fourth and last movement...

, Fifth

Symphony No. 5 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 5 in C sharp minor by Gustav Mahler was composed in 1901 and 1902, mostly during the summer months at Mahler's cottage at Maiernigg. Among its most distinctive features are the funereal trumpet solo that opens the work and the frequently performed Adagietto.The musical canvas and...

, Sixth

Symphony No. 6 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 6 in A minor by Gustav Mahler, sometimes referred to as the Tragische , was composed between 1903 and 1904 . The work's first performance was in Essen, on May 27, 1906, conducted by the composer.The tragic, even nihilistic ending of No...

 and Seventh

Symphony No. 7 (Mahler)

Gustav Mahler's Seventh Symphony was written in 1904-05, with repeated revisions to the scoring. It is sometimes referred to by the title Song of the Night , though this title was not Mahler's own and he disapproved of it. Although the symphony is often described as being in the key of 'E minor,'...

 symphonies, his Rückert songs

Rückert-Lieder

Rückert-Lieder is a song cycle of five Lieder for voice and orchestra or piano by Gustav Mahler, based on poems written by Friedrich Rückert...

 and his song cycle Kindertotenlieder

Kindertotenlieder

Kindertotenlieder is a song cycle for voice and orchestra by Gustav Mahler...

("Songs on the Death of Children").

Until 1901, Mahler's compositions had been heavily influenced by the German folk-poem collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn

Des Knaben Wunderhorn

Des Knaben Wunderhorn is a collection of German folk poems edited by Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano, and published in Heidelberg, in the Grand Duchy of Baden, between 1805 and 1808...

("The Youth's Magic Horn"), which he had first encountered around 1887. The music of Mahler's many Wunderhorn settings is reflected in his Second

Symphony No. 2 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 2 by Gustav Mahler, known as the Resurrection, was written between 1888 and 1894, and first performed in 1895. Apart from the Eighth Symphony, this symphony was Mahler's most popular and successful work during his lifetime. It is his first major work that would eventually mark his...

, Third

Symphony No. 3 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 3 by Gustav Mahler was written between 1893 and 1896. It is his longest piece and is the longest symphony in the standard repertoire, with a typical performance lasting around ninety to one hundred minutes.- Structure :...

 and Fourth symphonies, which all employ vocal as well as instrumental forces. From about 1901, however, Mahler's music underwent a change in character as he moved into the middle period of his compositional life. Here, the more austere poems of Friedrich Rückert

Friedrich Rückert

Friedrich Rückert was a German poet, translator, and professor of Oriental languages.-Biography:Rückert was born at Schweinfurt and was the eldest son of a lawyer. He was educated at the local Gymnasium and at the universities of Würzburg and Heidelberg. From 1816-1817, he worked on the editorial...

 replace the Wunderhorn collection as the primary influence; the songs are less folk-related, and no longer infiltrate the symphonies as extensively as before. During this period the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Symphonies were written, all as purely instrumental works, portrayed by Mahler scholar Deryck Cooke as "more stern and forthright ..., more tautly symphonic, with a new granite-like hardness of orchestration".

Mahler arrived at Maiernigg in June 1906 with the draft manuscript of his Seventh Symphony; he intended to spend time revising the orchestration until an idea for a new work should strike. The composer's wife Alma Mahler

Alma Mahler

Alma Maria Mahler Gropius Werfel was a Viennese-born socialite well known in her youth for her beauty and vivacity. She became the wife, successively, of composer Gustav Mahler, architect Walter Gropius, and novelist Franz Werfel, as well as the consort of several other prominent men...

, in her memoirs, says that for a fortnight Mahler was "haunted by the spectre of failing inspiration"; Mahler's recollection, however, is that on the first day of the vacation he was seized by the creative spirit, and plunged immediately into composition of the work that would become his Eighth Symphony.

Composition

Two notes in Mahler's handwriting dating from June 1906 show that early schemes for the work, which he may not at first have intended as a fully choral symphony, were based on a four-movement structure in which two "hymns" surround an instrumental core. These outlines show that Mahler had fixed on the idea of opening with the Latin hymn, but had not yet settled on the precise form of the rest. The first note is as follows:

1. Hymn: Veni Creator
2. Scherzo
3. Adagio: Caritas ("Christian love")
4. Hymn: Die Geburt des Eros ("The birth of Eros")

The second note includes musical sketches for the Veni creator movement, and two bars

Bar (music)

In musical notation, a bar is a segment of time defined by a given number of beats of a given duration. Typically, a piece consists of several bars of the same length, and in modern musical notation the number of beats in each bar is specified at the beginning of the score by the top number of a...

 in B minor

B minor

B minor is a minor scale based on B, consisting of the pitches B, C, D, E, F, G, and A. The harmonic minor raises the A to A. Its key signature has two sharps .Its relative major is D major, and its parallel major is B major....

 which are thought to relate to the Caritas. The four-movement plan is retained in a slightly different form, still without specific indication of the extent of the choral element:

1. Veni creator
2. Caritas
3. Weihnachtspiele mit dem Kindlein ("Christmas games with the child")
4. Schöpfung durch Eros. Hymne ("Creation through Eros. Hymn")

From Mahler's later comments on the symphony's gestation, it is evident that the four-movement plan was relatively short-lived. He soon replaced the last three movements with a single section, essentially a dramatic cantata

Cantata

A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....

, based on the closing scene of Goethe's Faust, Part II—the depiction of an ideal of redemption through eternal womanhood (das Ewige-Weibliche). Mahler had long nurtured an ambition to set the end of the Faust epic to music, "and to set it quite differently from other composers who have made it saccharine and feeble." In comments recorded by his biographer Richard Specht

Richard Specht

Richard Specht was an Austrian lyricist, dramatist, musicologist and writer.Specht is most well known for his writings on classical music, and in his time was seen as a leading music journalist...

, Mahler makes no mention of the original four-movement plans. He told Specht that having chanced on the Veni creator hymn, he had a sudden vision of the complete work: "I saw the whole piece immediately before my eyes, and only needed to write it down as though it were being dictated to me."

The work was written at a frantic pace—"in record time", according to musicologist Henry-Louis de La Grange. It was completed in all its essentials by mid-August, even though Mahler had to absent himself for a week to attend the Salzburg Festival

Salzburg Festival

The Salzburg Festival is a prominent festival of music and drama established in 1920. It is held each summer within the Austrian town of Salzburg, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart...

. Mahler began composing the Veni creator hymn without waiting for the text to arrive from Vienna. When it did, according to Alma Mahler, "the complete text fitted the music exactly. Intuitively he had composed the music for the full strophes [verses]." Although amendments and alterations were subsequently carried out to the score, there is very little manuscript evidence of the sweeping changes and rewriting that occurred with his earlier symphonies as they were prepared for performance.

With its use of vocal elements throughout, rather than in episodes at or near the end, the work was the first completely choral symphony to be written. Mahler had no doubts about the ground-breaking nature of the symphony, calling it the grandest thing he had ever done, and maintaining that all his previous symphonies were merely preludes to it. "Try to imagine the whole universe beginning to ring and resound. There are no longer human voices, but planets and suns revolving." It was his "gift to the nation ... a great joy-bringer."

Orchestra

The symphony is scored for a very large orchestra, in keeping with Mahler's conception of the work as a "new symphonic universe", a synthesis of symphony, cantata, oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

, motet

Motet

In classical music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions.-Etymology:The name comes either from the Latin movere, or a Latinized version of Old French mot, "word" or "verbal utterance." The Medieval Latin for "motet" is motectum, and the Italian...

, and lied

Lied

is a German word literally meaning "song", usually used to describe romantic songs setting German poems of reasonably high literary aspirations, especially during the nineteenth century, beginning with Carl Loewe, Heinrich Marschner, and Franz Schubert and culminating with Hugo Wolf...

 in a combination of styles. De La Grange comments: "To give expression to his cosmic vision, it was ... necessary to go beyond all previously-known limits and dimensions." The orchestral forces required are, however, not as large as those deployed in Arnold Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...

's oratorio Gurre-Lieder

Gurre-Lieder

Gurre-Lieder is a massive cantata for five vocal soloists, narrator, chorus and large orchestra, composed by Arnold Schoenberg, on poems by the Danish novelist Jens Peter Jacobsen...

, completed in 1911. The woodwind section for the Eighth includes two piccolo

Piccolo

The piccolo is a half-size flute, and a member of the woodwind family of musical instruments. The piccolo has the same fingerings as its larger sibling, the standard transverse flute, but the sound it produces is an octave higher than written...

s (one doubling 5th flute), four flute

Flute

The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...

s, four oboe

Oboe

The oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...

s, a cor anglais

Cor anglais

The cor anglais , or English horn , is a double-reed woodwind instrument in the oboe family....

, three B-flat clarinet

Clarinet

The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...

s, at least two E-flat clarinet

E-flat clarinet

The E-flat clarinet is a member of the clarinet family. It is usually classed as a soprano clarinet, although some authors describe it as a "sopranino" or even "piccolo" clarinet. Smaller in size and higher in pitch than the more common B clarinet, it is a transposing instrument in E, sounding a...

s, a B-flat bass clarinet

Bass clarinet

The bass clarinet is a musical instrument of the clarinet family. Like the more common soprano B clarinet, it is usually pitched in B , but it plays notes an octave below the soprano B clarinet...

, four bassoon

Bassoon

The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...

s and a contrabassoon

Contrabassoon

The contrabassoon, also known as the double bassoon or double-bassoon, is a larger version of the bassoon, sounding an octave lower...

. The brass section requires eight horns

Horn (instrument)

The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....

, four trumpet

Trumpet

The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...

s, four trombone

Trombone

The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...

s, tuba

Tuba

The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...

 and a "separately placed" ensemble of four trumpets (the first of which may be doubled) and three trombones. The percussion forces consist of two sets of timpani

Timpani

Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...

, cymbal

Cymbal

Cymbals are a common percussion instrument. Cymbals consist of thin, normally round plates of various alloys; see cymbal making for a discussion of their manufacture. The greater majority of cymbals are of indefinite pitch, although small disc-shaped cymbals based on ancient designs sound a...

s, bass drum

Bass drum

Bass drums are percussion instruments that can vary in size and are used in several musical genres. Three major types of bass drums can be distinguished. The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum . It is the largest drum of...

, tamtam

TamTam

The tamtam is a percussion instrument that is similar to a gong. It is sometimes spelled tam-tam.TamTam, Tam-Tam, tamtam, or tam-tam may also refer to:* Tam-Tams, a weekly drum circle held Sundays in the summer in Montreal...

, triangle

Triangle (instrument)

The triangle is an idiophone type of musical instrument in the percussion family. It is a bar of metal, usually steel but sometimes other metals like beryllium copper, bent into a triangle shape. The instrument is usually held by a loop of some form of thread or wire at the top curve...

 and low-pitched bells

Tubular bell

Tubular bells are musical instruments in the percussion family. Each bell is a metal tube, 30–38 mm in diameter, tuned by altering its length. Its standard range is from C4-F5, though many professional instruments reach G5 . Tubular bells are often replaced by studio chimes, which are a smaller...

. Mahler also added a glockenspiel

Glockenspiel

A glockenspiel is a percussion instrument composed of a set of tuned keys arranged in the fashion of the keyboard of a piano. In this way, it is similar to the xylophone; however, the xylophone's bars are made of wood, while the glockenspiel's are metal plates or tubes, and making it a metallophone...

 during the final rehearsals. Other instruments include an organ, a harmonium

Harmonium

A harmonium is a free-standing keyboard instrument similar to a reed organ. Sound is produced by air being blown through sets of free reeds, resulting in a sound similar to that of an accordion...

, a piano (also added during the rehearsals), two harps (although at least four are preferred), a celesta

Celesta

The celesta or celeste is a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. Its appearance is similar to that of an upright piano or of a large wooden music box . The keys are connected to hammers which strike a graduated set of metal plates suspended over wooden resonators...

, and at least one mandolin

Mandolin

A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...

 (but preferably several). Mahler recommended that in very large halls, the first player in each of the woodwind sections should be doubled and that numbers in the strings should also be augmented.

Choral and vocal forces

The choral and vocal forces consist of two SATB

SATB

In music, SATB is an initialism for soprano, alto, tenor, bass, defining the voices required by a chorus or choir to perform a particular musical work...

 choirs, a children's choir, and eight soloists: three soprano

Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...

, two alto, tenor

Tenor

The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...

, baritone

Baritone

Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...

, and bass

Bass (voice type)

A bass is a type of male singing voice and possesses the lowest vocal range of all voice types. According to The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, a bass is typically classified as having a range extending from around the second E below middle C to the E above middle C...

. In Part II the soloists are assigned to dramatic roles represented in Goethe's text, as illustrated in the following table.

Voice type	Role	Premiere soloists,
First soprano	Magna Peccatrix (a sinful woman)	Gertrude Förstel (Vienna Opera)
Second soprano	Una poenitentium (a penitent formerly known as Gretchen)	Martha Winternitz-Dorda (Hamburg Opera)
Third soprano	Mater Gloriosa (the Virgin Mary)	Emma Bellwidt (Frankfurt)
First alto	Mulier Samaritana (a Samaritan woman)	Ottilie Metzger (Hamburg Opera)
Second alto	Maria Aegyptiaca (Mary of Egypt Mary of Egypt Mary of Egypt is revered as the patron saint of penitents, most particularly in the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic churches, as well as in the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches.-Life:... )	Anne Erler-Schnaudt (Munich Opera)
Tenor	Doctor Marianus	Felix Sensius (Berlin)
Baritone	Pater Ecstaticus	Nicola Geisse-Winkel (Wiesbaden Opera)
Bass	Pater Profundus	Michael Mayer (Vienna Opera)

De La Grange draws attention to the notably high tessitura

Tessitura

In music, the term tessitura generally describes the most musically acceptable and comfortable range for a given singer or, less frequently, musical instrument; the range in which a given type of voice presents its best-sounding texture or timbre...

 for the sopranos, for soloists and for choral singers. He characterises the alto solos as brief and unremarkable; however, the tenor solo role in Part II is both extensive and demanding, requiring on several occasions to be heard over the choruses. The wide melodic leaps in the Pater Profundus role present particular challenges to the bass soloist.

Premiere

Mahler made arrangements with the impresario Emil Gutmann for the symphony to be premiered in Munich in the autumn of 1910. He soon regretted this involvement, writing of his fears that Gutmann would turn the performance into "a catastrophic Barnum and Bailey show". Preparations began early in the year, with the selection of choirs from the choral societies of Munich, Leipzig and Vienna. The Munich Zentral-Singschule provided 350 students for the children's choir. Meanwhile Bruno Walter

Bruno Walter

Bruno Walter was a German-born conductor. He is considered one of the best known conductors of the 20th century. Walter was born in Berlin, but is known to have lived in several countries between 1933 and 1939, before finally settling in the United States in 1939...

, Mahler's assistant at the Vienna Hofoper, was responsible for the recruitment and preparation of the eight soloists. Through the spring and summer these forces prepared in their home towns, before assembling in Munich early in September for three full days of final rehearsals under Mahler. His youthful assistant Otto Klemperer

Otto Klemperer

Otto Klemperer was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century.-Biography:Otto Klemperer was born in Breslau, Silesia Province, then in Germany...

 remarked later on the many small changes that Mahler made to the score during rehearsal: "He always wanted more clarity, more and more dynamic contrast. At one point during rehearsals he turned to us and said, 'If, after my death, something doesn't sound right, then change it. You have not only a right but a duty to do so.'"

For the premiere, fixed for 12 September, Gutmann had hired the newly built Neue Musik-Festhalle, in the Munich International Exhibition grounds near Theresienhöhe (now a branch of the Deutsches Museum

Deutsches Museum

The Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of technology and science, with approximately 1.5 million visitors per year and about 28,000 exhibited objects from 50 fields of science and technology. The museum was founded on June 28, 1903, at a meeting of the Association...

). This vast hall had a capacity of 3,200; to assist ticket sales and raise publicity, Gutmann devised the nickname "Symphony of a Thousand", which has remained the symphony's popular subtitle despite Mahler's disapproval. Among the many distinguished figures present at the sold-out premiere were the composers Richard Strauss

Richard Strauss

Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...

, Camille Saint-Saëns

Camille Saint-Saëns

Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...

 and Anton Webern

Anton Webern

Anton Webern was an Austrian composer and conductor. He was a member of the Second Viennese School. As a student and significant follower of Arnold Schoenberg, he became one of the best-known exponents of the twelve-tone technique; in addition, his innovations regarding schematic organization of...

; the writers Thomas Mann

Thomas Mann

Thomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual...

 and Arthur Schnitzler

Arthur Schnitzler

Dr. Arthur Schnitzler was an Austrian author and dramatist.- Biography :Arthur Schnitzler, son of a prominent Hungarian-Jewish laryngologist Johann Schnitzler and Luise Markbreiter , was born in Praterstraße 16, Leopoldstadt, Vienna, in the Austro-Hungarian...

; and the leading theatre director of the day, Max Reinhardt

Max Reinhardt

----Max Reinhardt was an Austrian theater and film director and actor.-Biography:...

. Also in the audience was the 28-year-old British-born conductor Leopold Stokowski

Leopold Stokowski

Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...

, who six years later would lead the first United States performance of the symphony.

Up to this time, receptions of Mahler's new symphonies had usually been disappointing. However, the Munich premiere of the Eighth Symphony was an unqualified triumph; as the final chords died away there was a short pause before a huge outbreak of applause which lasted for twenty minutes. Back at his hotel Mahler received a letter from Thomas Mann, which referred to the composer as "the man who, as I believe, expresses the art of our time in its profoundest and most sacred form".

The symphony's duration at its first performance was recorded by the critic-composer Julius Korngold

Julius Korngold

Julius Korngold was a noted music critic. He was regarded as the top critic in Vienna in the early twentieth century, when that city was viewed as the centre of classical music. He is most notable for championing the works of Gustav Mahler at a time when many did not think much of him...

 as 85 minutes. This performance was the last time that Mahler conducted a premiere of one of his own works. Eight months after his Munich triumph, he died at the age of 50. His remaining works—Das Lied von der Erde

Das Lied von der Erde

Das Lied von der Erde is a large-scale work for two vocal soloists and orchestra by the Austrian composer Gustav Mahler...

("The Song of the Earth"), his Ninth Symphony

Symphony No. 9 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 9 by Gustav Mahler was written between 1909 and 1910, and was the last symphony that he completed.Though the work is often described as being in the key of D major, the tonal scheme of the symphony as whole is progressive...

 and the unfinished Tenth

Symphony No. 10 (Mahler)

The Symphony No. 10 by Gustav Mahler was written in the summer of 1910, and was his final composition. At the time of Mahler's death the composition was substantially complete in the form of a continuous draft; but not being fully elaborated at every point, and mostly not orchestrated, it was not...

—were all premiered after his death.

Subsequent performances

On the day following the Munich premiere Mahler led the orchestra and choruses in a repeat performance.
During the next three years, according to the calculations of Mahler's friend Guido Adler

Guido Adler

Guido Adler was a Bohemian-Austrian musicologist and writer.His father Joachim, a physician, died of typhoid fever in 1857...

 the Eighth Symphony received a further 20 performances across Europe. These included the Dutch premiere, in Amsterdam under Willem Mengelberg

Willem Mengelberg

Joseph Willem Mengelberg was a Dutch conductor, famous for his performances of Mahler and Strauss with the Concertgebouw Orchestra.- Biography :...

 on , and the first Prague performance, given on under Mahler's former Vienna Hofoper colleague, Alexander Zemlinsky. Vienna itself had to wait until 1918 before the symphony was heard there. In the US, Leopold Stokowski persuaded an initially reluctant board of the Philadelphia Orchestra

Philadelphia Orchestra

The Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900...

 to finance the American premiere, which took place on . The occasion was a great success; the symphony was played several more times in Philadelphia before the orchestra and choruses travelled to New York, for a series of equally well-received performances at the Metropolitan Opera House

Metropolitan Opera House (39th St)

The Metropolitan Opera House was an opera house located at 1411 Broadway in New York City. Opened in 1883 and demolished in 1967, it was the first home of the Metropolitan Opera Company.-History:...

.

At the Amsterdam Mahler Festival in May 1920, Mahler's completed symphonies and his major song cycles were presented over nine concerts given by the Concertgebouw Orchestra and choruses, under Mengelberg's direction. The music critic Samuel Langford

Samuel Langford

Samuel Langford was an influential English music critic of the early twentieth century.Trained as a pianist, Langford became chief music critic of The Manchester Guardian in 1906, serving in that post until his death...

, who attended the occasion, commented that "we do not leave Amsterdam greatly envying the diet of Mahler first and every other composer afterward, to which Mengelberg is training the music-lovers of that city." The Austrian music historian Oscar Bie, while impressed with the festival as a whole, wrote subsequently that the Eighth was "stronger in effect than in significance, and purer in its voices than in emotion". Langford had commented on the British "not being very eager about Mahler", and the Eighth Symphony was not performed in Britain until , when Sir Henry Wood presented it with the BBC Symphony Orchestra

BBC Symphony Orchestra

The BBC Symphony Orchestra is the principal broadcast orchestra of the British Broadcasting Corporation and one of the leading orchestras in Britain.-History:...

. The work was played again eight years later by the same forces; among those present in the audience was the youthful composer Benjamin Britten

Benjamin Britten

Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...

. Impressed by the music, he nevertheless found the performance itself "execrable".

The years after World War II saw a number of notable performances of the Eighth Symphony, including Sir Adrian Boult

Adrian Boult

Sir Adrian Cedric Boult CH was an English conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London for the Royal Opera House and Sergei Diaghilev's ballet company. His first prominent post was...

's broadcast from the Royal Albert Hall

Royal Albert Hall

The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....

 on , the Japanese premiere under Kazuo Yamada

Kazuo Yamada

was a Japanese conductor and composer.-Major works:*Violin Sonata*Sonata for Cello Solo*String Quartet No. 1*Notturno for flute and piano*From Soshigaya for voice and piano-External links:*...

 in Tokyo in December 1949, and the Australian premiere under Eugene Goossens

Eugène Aynsley Goossens

Sir Eugene Aynsley Goossens was an English conductor and composer.-Biography:He was born in Camden Town, London, the son of the Belgian conductor and violinist Eugène Goossens and the grandson of the conductor Eugène Goossens...

 in 1951. A Carnegie Hall performance under Stokowski in 1950 became the first complete recording of the symphony to be issued. After 1950 the increasing numbers of performances and recordings of the work signified its growing popularity, but not all critics were won over. Theodor Adorno

Theodor W. Adorno

Theodor W. Adorno was a German sociologist, philosopher, and musicologist known for his critical theory of society....

 found the piece weak, "a giant symbolic shell"; this most affirmative work of Mahler's is, in Adorno's view, his least successful, musically and artistically inferior to his other symphonies. The composer-critic Robert Simpson

Robert Simpson (composer)

Robert Simpson was an English composer and long-serving BBC producer and broadcaster.He is best known for his orchestral and chamber music , and for his writings on the music of Beethoven, Bruckner, Nielsen and Sibelius. He studied composition under Herbert Howells...

, usually a champion of Mahler, referred to Part II as "an ocean of shameless kitsch." Mahler biographer Jonathan Carr

Jonathan Carr

Jonathan Carr was a British writer and journalist.Jonathan Carr may also refer to:*Jonathan Dodgson Carr, industrial baker, founder of Carr's*Jonathan Carr , American murderer in the Wichita Massacre...

 finds much of the symphony "bland", lacking the tension and resolution present in the composer's other symphonies. Deryck Cooke, on the other hand, compares Mahler's Eighth to Beethoven's Choral (Ninth) Symphony. To Cooke, Mahler's is "the Choral Symphony of the twentieth century: like Beethoven's, but in a different way, it sets before us an ideal [of redemption] which we are as yet far from realising—even perhaps moving away from—but which we can hardly abandon without perishing".

In the late 20th century and into the 21st, the Eighth was performed in all parts of the world. A succession of premieres in the Far East culminated in October 2002 in Beijing, when Long Yu

Long Yu

Yu Long is currently the Music Director of the China Philharmonic and the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra.Yu was born into a family of musicians in Shanghai and received his early childhood music education from his grandfather the composer Ding Shande...

 led the China Philharmonic Orchestra

China Philharmonic Orchestra

The China Philharmonic Orchestra is an orchestra founded in Beijing, China on May 25, 2000, based on the previous "China Broadcasting Symphony Orchestra"...

 in the first performance of the work in the People's Republic of China. The Sydney Olympic Arts festival in August 2000 opened with a performance of the Eighth by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra

Sydney Symphony Orchestra

The Sydney Symphony Orchestra , commonly known as the Sydney Symphony, is an Australian symphony orchestra based in Sydney...

 under its chief conductor Edo de Waart

Edo de Waart

Edo de Waart is a Dutch conductor, and the Music Director of both the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra....

. The popularity of the work, and its heroic scale, meant that it was often used as a set piece on celebratory occasions; on , Yoav Talmi

Yoav Talmi

Yoav Talmi is an Israeli conductor and composer. He studied composition and orchestral direction first in Israel, at the Rubin Academy of Music in Tel Aviv, and then in the United States, at the Juilliard School. In 1966, he was awarded the Koussevitzky Conducting Prize at the Tanglewood Music...

 led 200 instrumentalists and a choir of 800 in a performance in Quebec City

Quebec City

Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...

, to mark the 400th anniversary of the city's foundation. In London on the opening concert of the BBC Proms celebrated the 150th anniversary of Mahler's birth with a performance of the Eighth, with Jiří Bělohlávek

Jirí Belohlávek

Jiří Bělohlávek is a Czech conductor. His father was a barrister and judge. In his youth Bělohlávek studied cello with Miloš Sádlo and was later a graduate of the Prague Conservatory and the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague...

 conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra

BBC Symphony Orchestra

The BBC Symphony Orchestra is the principal broadcast orchestra of the British Broadcasting Corporation and one of the leading orchestras in Britain.-History:...

. This performance was the eighth in the history of the Proms.
On 3 July 2011, Mahler's 8th Symphony was performed by approximately 1.100 artists (21 choirs from Slovenia and Croatia, the Slovene Symphonic Orchestra and the Zagreb Symphonic Orchestra) at the rebuilt Kongresni trg (Congress square) in Ljubljana on the occasion of the opening of the 59th Ljubljana Festival. The following evening the concert was held at the Zagreb Arena. Both performances were held in honour to the 20th anniversary of the statehood of Slovenia and Croatia.

In Colombia, it was premiered on october 15th, 2011, under the conduction of Ernesto Diemecke and the Philharmonic Orchestra of Bogotá as part of the cycle "Mahler in Bogota" .

The Eighth conducted by Antonio Pappano

Antonio Pappano

Antonio Pappano is a British conductor and pianist of Italian parentage.Pappano's family relocated to England from Castelfranco in Miscano near Benevento, Italy in 1958 and at the time of his birth his parents worked in the restaurant business, but Pasquale Pappano, his father, was by vocation a...

 opened on october 22th, 2011, the symphonic season of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia

Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia

The Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia is one of the oldest musical institutions in the world, based in Italy.It is based at the Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome, and was founded by the papal bull, Ratione congruit, issued by Sixtus V in 1585, which invoked two saints prominent in Western...

Structure and form

The Eighth Symphony's two parts combine the sacred text of the 9th-century Latin hymn Veni creator spiritus with the secular text from the closing passages from Goethe's 19th-century dramatic poem Faust. Despite the evident disparities within this juxtaposition, the work as a whole expresses a single idea, that of redemption through the power of love. The choice of these two texts was not arbitrary; Goethe, a poet whom Mahler revered, believed that Veni creator embodied aspects of his own philosophy, and had translated it into German in 1820. Once inspired by the Veni creator idea, Mahler soon saw the Faust poem as an ideal counterpart to the Latin hymn. The unity between the two parts of the symphony is established, musically, by the extent to which they share thematic material. In particular, the first notes of the Veni creator theme—E-flat→B-flat→A-flat—dominate the climaxes to each part; at the symphony's culmination, Goethe's glorification of "Eternal Womanhood" is set in the form of a religious chorale.

In composing his score, Mahler temporarily abandoned the more progressive tonal elements which had appeared in his most recent works. The symphony's key is, for Mahler, unusually stable; despite frequent diversions into other keys the music always returns to its central E-flat major. This is the first of his works in which familiar fingerprints—birdsong, military marches, Austrian dances—are almost entirely absent. Although the vast choral and orchestral forces employed suggest a work of monumental sound, according to critic Michael Kennedy

Michael Kennedy (music critic)

Dr. George Michael Sinclair Kennedy CBE is an English biographer, journalist and writer on classical music. He joined the Daily Telegraph at the age of 15 in 1941, and began writing music criticism for it in 1948...

 "the predominant expression is not of torrents of sound but of the contrasts of subtle tone-colours and the luminous quality of the scoring".

For Part I, most modern commentators accept the sonata-form

Sonata form

Sonata form is a large-scale musical structure used widely since the middle of the 18th century . While it is typically used in the first movement of multi-movement pieces, it is sometimes used in subsequent movements as well—particularly the final movement...

 outline that was discerned by early analysts. The structure of Part II is more difficult to summarise, being an amalgam of many genres. Analysts, including Specht, Cooke and Paul Bekker

Paul Bekker

Paul Bekker was one of the most articulate and influential German music critics of the 20th century....

, have identified Adagio, Scherzo

Scherzo

A scherzo is a piece of music, often a movement from a larger piece such as a symphony or a sonata. The scherzo's precise definition has varied over the years, but it often refers to a movement which replaces the minuet as the third movement in a four-movement work, such as a symphony, sonata, or...

 and Finale "movements" within the overall scheme of Part II, though others, including de La Grange and Donald Mitchell

Donald Mitchell (writer)

Donald Mitchell is a British writer on music, particularly known for his books on Gustav Mahler and Benjamin Britten and for the book The Language of Modern Music, published 1963....

, find little to sustain this division. Musicologist Ortrun Landemann has suggested that the formal scheme for Part II, after the orchestral introduction, is a sonata plan without the recapitulation

Recapitulation (music)

In music theory, the recapitulation is one of the sections of a movement written in sonata form. The recapitulation occurs after the movement's development section, and typically presents once more the musical themes from the movement's exposition...

, consisting of exposition

Exposition (music)

In musical form and analysis, exposition is the initial presentation of the thematic material of a musical composition, movement, or section. The use of the term generally implies that the material will be developed or varied....

, development

Musical development

In European classical music, musical development is a process by which a musical idea is communicated in the course of a composition. It refers to the transformation and restatement of initial material, and is often contrasted with musical variation, which is a slightly different means to the same...

 and conclusion.

Part I: Veni creator spiritus

Mitchell describes Part I as resembling a giant motet

Motet

In classical music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions.-Etymology:The name comes either from the Latin movere, or a Latinized version of Old French mot, "word" or "verbal utterance." The Medieval Latin for "motet" is motectum, and the Italian...

, and argues that a key to its understanding is to read it as Mahler's attempt to emulate the polyphony

Polyphony

In music, polyphony is a texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords ....

 of Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...

's great motets, specifically Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied ("Sing to the Lord a new song"). The symphony begins with a single tonic chord

Tonic (music)

In music, the tonic is the first scale degree of the diatonic scale and the tonal center or final resolution tone. The triad formed on the tonic note, the tonic chord, is thus the most significant chord...

 in E-flat, sounded on the organ, before the entry of the massed choirs in a fortissimo

Dynamics (music)

In music, dynamics normally refers to the volume of a sound or note, but can also refer to every aspect of the execution of a given piece, either stylistic or functional . The term is also applied to the written or printed musical notation used to indicate dynamics...

 invocation: "Veni, veni creator spiritus". The three note "creator" motif is immediately taken up by the trombones and then the trumpets in a marching theme that will be used as a unifying factor throughout the work. After their first declamatory statement the two choirs engage in a sung dialogue, which ends with a short transition to an extended lyrical passage, "Imple superna gratia", a plea for divine grace. Here, what Kennedy calls "the unmistakable presence of twentieth-century Mahler" is felt as a solo soprano introduces a meditative theme. She is soon joined by other solo voices as the new theme is explored before the choirs return exuberantly, in an A-flat episode in which the soloists compete with the choral masses.

In the next section, "Infirma nostri corporis/virtute firmans perpeti" ("Our weak frames fortify with thine eternal strength"), the tonic key of E-flat returns with a variation of the opening theme. The section is interrupted by a short orchestral interlude in which the low bells are sounded, adding a sombre touch to the music. This new, less secure mood is carried through when "Infirma nostri corporis" resumes, this time without the choruses, in a subdued D minor

D minor

D minor is a minor scale based on D, consisting of the pitches D, E, F, G, A, B, and C. In the harmonic minor, the C is raised to C. Its key signature has one flat ....

 echo of the initial invocation. At the end of this episode another transition precedes the "unforgettable surge in E major

E major

E major is a major scale based on E, with the pitches E, F, G, A, B, C, and D. Its key signature has four sharps .Its relative minor is C-sharp minor, and its parallel minor is E minor....

", in which the entire body of choral forces declaims "Accende lumen sensibus" ("Illuminate our senses"). The first children's chorus follows, in a joyful mood, as the music gathers force and pace. This is a passage of great complexity, in the form of a double fugue involving development of many of the preceding themes, with constant changes to the key signature. All forces combine again in the recapitulation of the "Veni creator" section in shortened form. A quieter passage of recapitulation leads to an orchestral coda before the children's chorus announces the doxology

Doxology

A doxology is a short hymn of praises to God in various Christian worship services, often added to the end of canticles, psalms, and hymns...

 "Gloria sit Patri Domino" ("Glory be to God the Father"). Thereafter the music moves swiftly and powerfully to its climax, in which an offstage

Offstage brass and percussion

An offstage brass and percussion part is a sound effect used in Classical music, which is created by having one or more trumpet players , horn players, or percussionists from a symphony orchestra or opera orchestra play a note, melody, or rhythm from behind the stage...

 brass ensemble bursts forth with the "Accende" theme while the main orchestra and choruses end on a triumphant rising scale.

Part II: Closing scene from Goethe's Faust

The second part of the symphony follows the narrative of the final stages in Goethe's poem—the journey of Faust's soul, rescued from the clutches of Mephistopheles

Mephistopheles

Mephistopheles is a demon featured in German folklore...

, on to its final ascent into heaven. Landemann's proposed sonata structure for the movement is based on a division, after an orchestral prelude, into five sections which he identifies musically as an exposition, three development episodes, and a finale.
The long orchestral prelude (166 bars) is in E-flat minor and, in the manner of an operatic overture, anticipates several of the themes which will be heard later in the movement. The exposition begins in near-silence; the scene depicted is that of a rocky, wooded mountainside, the dwelling place of anchorite

Anchorite

Anchorite denotes someone who, for religious reasons, withdraws from secular society so as to be able to lead an intensely prayer-oriented, ascetic, and—circumstances permitting—Eucharist-focused life...

s whose utterances are heard in an atmospheric chorus complete with whispers and echoes. A solemn baritone solo, the voice of Pater Ecstaticus, ends warmly as the key changes to the major

Major and minor

In Western music, the adjectives major and minor can describe a musical composition, movement, section, scale, key, chord, or interval.Major and minor are frequently referred to in the titles of classical compositions, especially in reference to the key of a piece.-Intervals and chords:With regard...

 when the trumpets sound the "Accende" theme from Part I. This is followed by a demanding and dramatic aria for bass, the voice of Pater Profundis, who ends his tortured meditation by asking for God's mercy on his thoughts. The repeated chords in this section are reminiscent of Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...

's Parsifal

Parsifal

Parsifal is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner. It is loosely based on Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the 13th century epic poem of the Arthurian knight Parzival and his quest for the Holy Grail, and on Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval, the Story of the Grail.Wagner first conceived the work...

. The mood lightens with the entry of the angels and blessed boys (women's and children's choruses) bearing the soul of Faust; the music here is perhaps a relic of the "Christmas Games" scherzo envisioned in the abortive four-movement draft plan. The atmosphere is festive, with triumphant shouts of "Jauchzet auf!" ("Rejoice!") before the exposition ends in a postlude which refers to the "Infirma nostri corporis" music from Part I.

The first phase of development begins as a women's chorus of the younger angels invoke a "happy company of blessed children" who must bear Faust's soul heavenwards. The blessed boys receive the soul gladly; their voices are joined by Doctor Marianus (tenor), who accompanies their chorus before breaking into a rapturous E major paean to the Mater Gloriosa, "Queen and ruler of the world!". As the aria ends, the male voices in the chorus echo the soloist's words to an orchestral background of viola tremolos, in a passage described by de La Grange as "emotionally irresistible".

In the second part of the development, the entry of the Mater Gloriosa is signalled in E major by a sustained harmonium chord, with harp arpeggio

Arpeggio

An arpeggio is a musical technique where notes in a chord are played or sung in sequence, one after the other, rather than ringing out simultaneously...

s played over a pianissimo violin melody which de La Grange labels the "love" theme. Thereafter the key changes frequently as a chorus of penitent women petition the Mater for a hearing; this is followed by the solo entreaties of Magna Peccatrix, Mulier Samaritana and Maria Aegyptiaca. In these arias the "love" theme is further explored, and the "scherzo" theme associated with the first appearance of the angels returns. These two motifs predominate in the trio which follows, a request to the Mater on behalf of a fourth penitent, Faust's lover once known as Gretchen, who has come to make her plea for the soul of Faust. After Gretchen's entreaty, a solo of "limpid beauty" in Kennedy's words, an atmosphere of hushed reverence descends. The Mater Gloriosa then sings her only two lines, in the symphony's opening key of E-flat major, permitting Gretchen to lead the soul of Faust into heaven.

The final development episode is a hymn-like tenor solo and chorus, in which Doctor Marianus calls on the penitents to "Gaze aloft". A short orchestral passage follows, scored for an eccentric chamber group consisting of piccolo, flute, harmonium, celesta, piano, harps and a string quartet. This acts as a transition to the finale, the Chorus Mysticus, which begins in E-flat major almost imperceptibly—Mahler's notation here is Wie ein Hauch, "like a breath". The sound rises in a gradual crescendo, as the solo voices alternately join or contrast with the chorus. As the climax approaches, many themes are reprised: the love theme, Gretchen's song, the Accende from Part I. Finally, as the chorus concludes with "Eternal Womanhood draws us on high", the off-stage brass re-enters with a final salute on the Veni creator motif, to end the symphony with a triumphant flourish.

Publication

Only one autograph score of the Eighth Symphony is known to exist. Once the property of Alma Mahler, it is held by the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich. In 1906 Mahler signed a contract with the Viennese publishing firm Universal Edition (UE), which thus became the main publisher of all his works. The full orchestral score of the Eighth Symphony was published by UE in 1912. A Russian version, published in Moscow by Izdatel'stvo Muzyka in 1976, was republished in the United States by Dover Publications in 1989, with an English text and notes. The International Gustav Mahler Society, founded in 1955, has as its main objective the production of a complete critical edition of all of Mahler's works. As of 2010 its critical edition of the Eighth remains a project for the future.

Recordings

For the complete discography, see Symphony No. 8 (Mahler) discography

Symphony No. 8 (Mahler) discography

The first complete recording of Gustav Mahler's Eighth Symphony was made on 9 April 1950, with Leopold Stokowski conducting the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and combined New York choirs. This was one of the earliest of the long-playing records made by Columbia, who had introduced the microgroove...

.

Sir Adrian Boult's 1948 broadcast performance with the BBC Symphony Orchestra was recorded by the BBC, but not issued until 2009 when it was made available in MP3

MP3

MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression...

 form. The first issued recording of the complete symphony was Stokowski's Carnegie Hall performance with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and combined New York choirs on . Nearly two years before, in July 1948, the Hungarian-born conductor Eugene Ormandy

Eugene Ormandy

Eugene Ormandy was a Hungarian-born conductor and violinist.-Early life:Born Jenő Blau in Budapest, Hungary, Ormandy began studying violin at the Royal National Hungarian Academy of Music at the age of five...

 had recorded the "Veni creator spiritus" movement at the Hollywood Bowl

Hollywood Bowl

The Hollywood Bowl is a modern amphitheater in the Hollywood area of Los Angeles, California, United States that is used primarily for music performances...

. Since Stokowski's version, at least 70 recordings of the symphony have been made by many of the world's leading orchestras and singers, mostly during live performances.

External links

• German and Latin texts, with English translation, taken from the Naxos 85505533-34 recording cond. Antoni Wit