Symphony No. 3

No use looking up there (at the mountains surrounding Steinbach-am-Attersee). That's all been composed by me!

Mahler to Bruno Walter, July 1896.

Gentlemen, I have to make a confession to you, and it is this: every time one of my symphonies has been performed, people have hissed or made a noise, in other words they have disturbed it. Don't allow yourselves to be put off by this, we shall play our stuff to the end, as best we can; I hope you will help me in this, and then we'll see.

Mahler, addressing the Cologne Orchestra at the beginning of rehearsals for the premiere, June 1902.

The gestation of the Third Symphony was far shorter than that of the Resurrection, and yet far more complex, and a number of draft plans for the layout of the symphony survive, either in Mahler's own papers or in his correspondence.

The earliest draft runs as follows:

Das Glüliche Leben, ein Sommernachstraum (nicht nach Shakespeare, Anmerkungen eines Kritikers ... Rezensenten): [The Happy Life, a Midsummer Night's Dream (not after Shakespeare, annotations by a critic ... Reviewer):]

1. Was mir der Wald erzählt [What the forest tells me]
2. Was mir die Dämmerung erzählt [What the twilight tells me]
3. Was mir die Liebe erzählt [What love tells me]
4. Was mir die Dämmerung erzählt [What the twilight tells me]
5. Was mir die Blumen auf der Wiese erzählen [What the flowers in the meadow tell me]
6. Was mir der Kuckuck erzählt [What the cuckoo tells me]
7. Was mir das Kind erzählt [What the child tells me]

This soon became expanded and modified:

1. Der Sommer marschiert ein (Fanfare - lustiger marsch. Einleitung nu Bläser und konzertierende Kontrabässa) [Summer marches in (Fanfare - lively March. Introduction only with Wind and solo Doublebasses)]
2. Was mir der Wald erzählt (I. Satz) [What the forest tells me (!st movement)]
3. Was mir die Liebe erzählt (Adagio) [What love tells me (Adagio)]
4. Was mir die Dämmerung erzählt (Scherzo, nur Streicher) [What the twilight tells me (Scherzo, strings only)]
5. Was mir die Blumen auf der Wiese erzählen [What the flowes in the meadow tell me]
6. Was mir der Kuckuck erzählt [What the cuckoo tells me]
7. Was mir das Kind erzählt [What the child tells me]

On August 29, 1895 Mahler wrote to Friedrich Löhr:

My new symphony will last about 1 1/2 hours - it is all in large symphonic form.
The emphasis on my personal emotional life (in the form of "what things tell me") is appropriate to the work's singular intellectual content. II-V inclusive are to express the successive orders of beings, which I shall correspondingly express thus:

• II What the flowers tell me
• III What the beasts tell me
• IV What the night tells me (man)
• V What the morning tells me (angels)
  The last two numbers with sung text.
• What love tells me,. is a synopsis of my feelings towards all beings, in which deeply painful spiritual paths are not avoided, but gradually lead through to a blessed faith; "the joyful science". Finally d[as] h[immlische] L[eben] (VII), which I have finally however entitled "What the child tells me."

On an enclosed sheet, Mahler had written:

• I Summer marches in.
• II What the flowers in the meadow tell me.
• III What the beasts of the forest tell me.
• IV What the night tells me. (Alto solo.)
• V What the morning bell tells me. (Women's chorus with alto solo.)
• VI What love tells me.
  Motto: "Father behold these wounds of mine! Let no creature be unredeemed!" (from Des Knaben Wunderhorn)
• VII Life in heaven. (Soprano solo, humourous.)
  All but Nro. I is finished in score.

The last movement refers to the Wunderhorn song Das himmlische leben (The Heavenly Life) which Mahler had written in 1902, and which was eventually to find a home as the finale of the Fourth Symphony. In fact, as numerous thematic cross-references show, we could consider the entire symphony to have been generated backwards from this song, which ultimately did not become a part of the work at all.

On August 6, 1896 (three months before the completion of the autograph score, which is dated November 22 - appropriately St. Cecilia's Day), Mahler wrote to Max Marschalk:

My work is quite finished. It has the following titles, from which you can probably put together something of a guide.

For some time this has featured in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's longest regularly-programmed symphony; unfortunately, in the wrong hands it can easily become a less than fascinating experience on record.

By far the best version I have ever heard is the 1970 LSO/Horenstein (Unicorn). Jascha Horenstein was one of the twentieth century's great unsung conductors. His recorded legacy is pitifully small and much of it, especially from the 50s, was made with second-rate (or worse) orchestras. Only toward the end of his life did he get the chance to record with the finest ensembles, but with what effect! Despite the claims of, inker alia, Bernstein, Abbado, Inbal and Tennstedt this, for me, is Mahler's Third.

If you must have a more modern recording then the second Bernstein (DG) may well be the performance for you. Beautifully played - despite the brass, which struck me as a little harsh in the first movement particularly - and well recorded, Bernstein's affection shines through, although for me this does not displace his 1962 NYPO recording (now available on Sony), which was the landmark recording for nearly a decade - until the Horenstein came along in fact.

Tennstedt (EMI), (recently reissued as part of a set) is fine, as is Inbal (Denon) - both of these are digital recordings, but they scarcely compete with either Horenstein or Bernstein.

Tahra is a French label run (or jointly run) by Miriam Scherchen, the great Hermann's daughter. Although the label has more recently branched out with other conductors (notably Furtwängler), the earliest releases were, understandably, of Scherchen. The very first, as far as I know, was an outstanding version of the Third recorded live in 1960 in Leipzig, coupled with the Adagio from the Tenth.

Scherchen is never conventional, and many may find his Third wilful; for me it is yet another reminder of what a great conductor the man was, and what a tragedy it is that, as with Horenstein, we have so little by him in really good sound with a first-class orchestra.

Abravanel's Third is good, although the singing seems a bit characterless, particularly his alto. Scarcely competitive either on the grounds of performance or recording.

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