Mahler · Gustav Mahler
Mahler Symphony No. 3 in D minor
The longest of the commonly performed symphonies
- Key
- D minor
- Composed
- 1896
- Premiere
- 1902 Krefeld
- Duration
- About 95 min
- Movements
- 6 movements
- Instrumentation
- Woodwinds 4·4·5·4 (doubling piccolo, English horn, E♭ clarinet, bass clarinet, contrabassoon) · Brass 8·4·4·1 (+ offstage posthorn) · Timpani (2 players) · Percussion (bass drum, snare drum, cymbals, tambourine, tam-tam, triangle, rute, 2 glockenspiels, bells) · 2 harps · Alto soloist, women's chorus and boys' chorus · Strings
The story behind this piece
With six movements and a running time of about 100 minutes, it is the longest of the commonly performed symphonies. He wrote most of it in the summers of 1895–1896 at the resort of Steinbach. Mahler originally gave each movement a title such as "Pan Awakes, Summer Marches In," "What the Flowers of the Meadow Tell Me," "What the Animals of the Forest Tell Me," "What Man Tells Me," "What the Angels Tell Me," and "What Love Tells Me," but removed them all when it was published.
In the fourth movement, the alto soloist sings the "Midnight Song" from Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, and in the fifth movement a children's chorus imitates the sound of bells. The originally planned seventh movement, "Heavenly Life," was dropped and became the finale of Symphony No. 4. The complete premiere took place a few years after it was finished, on June 9, 1902, in Krefeld, conducted by Mahler.
What to listen for
- Middle of the third movement: a posthorn plays a distant, singing solo from offstage.
- Fifth movement: the children's chorus imitates the ringing of bells with "bimm-bamm."
- Sixth movement: a long, slow finale that begins with the strings, without singing.
Listen · Score
Credits