I was walking around the hills behind the Stanford University campus at sunset, listening to the piece on my Sony Walkman, and when the huge, glowing chords that bring the work to a close stopped ringing in my ears I was completely overwhelmed with a sense of love and spiritual joy.  For the next few days I listened to parts of it again and tried to learn more about it.  Then I had the crazy idea of having a huge party at the house I was living in off campus and inviting everyone I knew to hear it.  I was getting ready to graduate and move back to New York City, so I figured it might make for a strange and wonderful way to end my time in college.

There were probably 75 friends at the house that I shared with four roommates in nearby Los Altos when I announced that we should all crowd into the living room and listen to Mahler’s Third Symphony.  No one — including me — really knew who Mahler was, but to my astonishment everyone was silent for the entire time the Vienna Philharmonic and Claudio Abbado were making that magnificent noise on our stereo.  The room was dark except for one lamp, and people were scattered on the couches and chairs and floor, many holding and hugging each other, some making out, more than a few a little drunk.  But when it was over people were clapping like we had been in a concert hall.  We had all had a collective religious experience.  And for all intents and purposes, the Ecstatic Living Room was born.

Here is a clip of the great Leonard Bernstein leading the Vienna Philharmonic in the first movement:

A year later, I was back in New York City without a clue what I wanted to do with my life.  As the first day of summer approached, I thought nostalgically about that party a year ago. So I took out my Mahler 3 recording and listened to it while looking out over the Hudson River from the 18th floor apartment I was living in with my brother.  Once again, when the huge finale, which Mahler meant to depict the love that God had for his creation, came to an end, I felt utterly transformed.  From that time on I marked the first day of summer by listening to Mahler’s Third.  I look forward to it like kids look forward to Christmas morning.  It’s my special day of reflection and inspiration and renewal.

Mahler originally called this vast six-movement work “A Summer Morning Dream,” and his program for the long first movement once featured the heading, “Pan Awakes – Summer Marches In.”  But even if you didn’t know this, you might think of this as a summery kind of piece.  It’s big and bold and intense, like a hot summer day, when nature is literally exploding with life all around you.

The idea behind the symphony is simple but monumental: Mahler wanted to depict nothing less than the entirety of evolution, from inanimate nature (movement 1) to, five movements later, the consciousness of God’s all-encompassing love.  To achieve his ends Mahler stayed close to his key idea that a symphony should embrace everything that the world had to offer — life in all its paradox, beauty and contradiction.  It has huge climaxes as well as intimate and incredibly tender moments;  it has military marches and sublime hymn-like melodies; it has moments radiant with hope and other moments of primordial terror.

On the last pages of the score, Mahler told the musicians that the playing should be “saturated with feeling.”  For me, this is the point where I have not failed to cry each and every time I’ve heard the piece.

Monday, June 21 is the first day of summer in the Northern Hemisphere, so why not take the opportunity on that day — or anytime this summer — to discover Mahler’s Third Symphony.  One of several great recordings of the work is a Philips disc from 1988 with Bernard Haitink leading the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, which is available for download on iTunes.  Listen alone, or with a friend, or with a houseful of people.  It may just blow your mind; it might even change your life.

……………………………………………

Here is one of the tracks from the album, titled “Air Pour Les Guerriers”:

I sensed the bit of jest in Albert’s question, because perhaps the idea of us two guys listening to harpsichord music to unwind might seem a bit, well, fey.   Not that we have anything against fey, of course, but more because we had had a long history of unwinding with drinks to classical music.   In fact, the idea of the Ecstatic Living Room was launched, right where we were sitting, in Albert’s living room, many years ago where we would convene regularly to relax and explore music….though typically more muscular stuff.    We spent hundreds of hours listening to classical music, but in our 20s and 30s we seemed to gravitate to the music of Shostakovich, Beethoven, Mahler and new music that had, at least for me, supplanted much of the rock music I had been listening to.

Buy on Amazon
Buy on iTunes

—————————————————————————————————

Buy on ArkivMusic

As is evidenced above, seasonal words sometimes sneak into the titles of certain works, but those aren’t the only works I connect with particular seasons. Mahler’s Fourth Symphony doesn’t have a seasonal subtitle or a nickname, but for me it’s definitely summer music, the slow movement passing like high clouds against a bright blue sky as you gaze at them from a hammock. Ravel’s Dapnhis and Chloe ballet is summer muic for me as well, conjuring up sunlit Greek Isles and brilliant white-sand beaches. On the other hand, Sibelius’s seven symphonies are mostly winter fare for me: I’m sure Finland (the composer’s homeland) has perfectly beautiful summers, but for me much of his music has a bracing, wintry quality that’s both awesome and imposing.

Spring is a rich time for musical associations. In churches and concert halls around the world throngs are performing and listening to Handel’s Messiah and Bach’s epic Passions in celebration of Easter season. But there’s also plenty of other, “non-religious” music that conjures up spring, both as natural phenomenon and as a symbol of hope and renewed vitality. I haven’t done a count, but it seems like spring finds its way into more titles of works than any of the other seasons: Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring; Beethoven’s Spring sonata for violin and piano; Schumann’s Spring Symphony (his first); Copland’s Appalachian Spring; Britten’s Spring Symphony; Richard Strauss’s Voices of Spring; and Delius’s On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring; the “Spring” concerto from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, to name but a few examples that come to mind. But there are also other works without the seasonal word in their titles that seem to have Spring written all over them, like Mahler’s First Symphony.

So as winter finally loosens its grip in the Northern Hemisphere and you get ready for your own springtime rituals – from taking out that baseball mitt or tennis racquet to planting your garden – here’s a list of five of my favorite works for spring listening.

1. Igor Stravinsky: Rite of Spring. So you’ve felt cooped up all winter and really want to let loose? Start with Stravinsky’s most famous (and riot-inducing) ballet. Stravinsky used the phrase “Pictures from Pagan Russia” in a subtitle, a reference to the work’s story line, which ends in nothing less than human sacrifice (oh, that!). In conductor Valery Gergiev’s version with the Kirov Orchestra you can feel previously sleeping life bursting through the long-frozen Russian earth with savage force.  Buy on iTunes

Here’s a video clip of Mo. Gergiev conducting the first part of the Rite of Spring:

2. Aaron Copland: Appalachian Spring. Compared to Stravinsky’s ballet, Copland’s spring celebration is a much more civilized affair, as 19^th century pioneers celebrate the raising of a new farmhouse. But the innocence and joy of the new season light up every bar of the work, and the famous hymn-like melody in the finale, from the Shaker tune “Tis a Gift to Be Simple,” leaves a lump in your throat as it builds to a noble climax. Bernstein’s recording with the Los Angeles Philharmonic is as authentic as it gets. Buy on iTunes

3. Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 1. The quiet, shimmering strings that open this symphony conjure up the awakening of spring like no other work. Repeated cuckoo calls and brass fanfare from afar confirm that the new season is here to stay, beginning a romantic adventure that includes young love, a broken heart and, in the final movement, a triumph of renewed hope. There are many wonderful recorded performances of this symphony to choose from. Leonard Bernstein recorded it twice, in the 1960’s with the New York Philharmonic, and three decades later with Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw. Both are classics.

Buy Bernstein’s recording with the New York Phil on iTunes
Buy Bernstein’s recording with the Royal Concertgebouw on iTunes

4. Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 2, Resurrection. Despite the subtitle, this work features song lyrics that are taken from romantic poetry and not the New Testament of the Bible. In ways, the symphony continues the epic story that began with Mahler’s previous symphony. It’s a huge, sprawling work that is by turns terrifying and awe-inspiring as it charts the journey of the human soul from death to its reunion with the eternal spirit. If you’ve had a particularly rough winter, this work will lift your spirits like few others. Simon Rattle’s performance with the City of Birmingham Orchestra won a Gramophone Award and is justifiably famous.  Buy on iTunes

5. Schumann: Symphony No. 1, Spring. Bright brass fanfares and boisterous timpani strokes give the first movement a jolt of joyous energy that lights up the whole symphony. From the blazing opening to the giddy spirits in the finale, Leonard Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic have plenty of fun and make the music dazzle. Buy on iTunes