Program Notes

Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)
Symphony No. 3 in D Minor
Duration: ca. 96 minutes

When Beethoven composed his final symphony, with its enormous scope, vocal soloists and choir, people thought the form had reached its inevitable end.

Then came Gustav Mahler.

With his Second and Third Symphonies, Mahler re-opened his predecessor’s tool kit and erected a larger, more ambitious structure, with a modern orchestra at his disposal. He even cast the Third in the same key as Beethoven’s Ninth – D minor – adding a children’s choir and mezzo-soprano and capping it with a massive coda that remains an unsurpassed musical declaration.

The longest work in the symphonic repertoire at nearly 100 minutes, this colossus is often performed for special occasions and fittingly ends The Florida Orchestra’s season with performances May 24-25. Jahja Ling chose this work for his final bow with the group, concluding a 14-year tenure as music director in 2002.

Such reverence is expected, as Mahler envisioned his symphonies as entire worlds unto themselves, and the Third is arguably his most indomitable, said TFO Music Director Michael Francis.

“It’s an epic example of dealing with all that life throws at us,’’ he said. “And the final movement is perhaps the most beautiful passage of music ever written.’’

The Third is Mahler’s most cosmic creation, fully expressing his obsession with the spiritual, a hymn to nature and love but with the human voice as its centerpiece. As the profound depth of the score unfolded, it took the composer by surprise.

“My symphony is going to be something the likes of which the world has not yet heard,’’ Mahler wrote in 1896. “All nature is voiced, and it tells of deeply mysterious matters. I can tell you, at certain passages I sometimes am overcome with an uncanny feeling and can hardly believe that I could have written them.’’

Cast in six movements, the work is essentially four short inner sections buttressed by two enormous bookends that together stretch nearly an hour. In fact, the score is 231 pages compared with the 99 of Beethoven’s Fifth − but length is part of the composer’s journey. Mahler divided the symphony into two parts: the first comprising the opening movement, and the second the next five sections. His “program’’ is as follows:

I. A stentorian, 35-minute introduction could be a symphony by itself, the music depicting the figure of Pan awakening in summer and his guises as the god of music, poets and fertility.

II. Here Mahler revels in the glory of nature through flowers in a meadow. Shortly after the work’s premiere, some conductors performed this movement independently, much to the composer’s distress.

III. Animals in the forest come alive in music borrowed from an earlier song cycle.

IV. Nightfall descends and introduces the mezzo-soprano in what might be viewed as the intellectual centerpiece of the symphony.

V. The children’s choir mimics the bimm bamm! of pealing bells in this short movement that sets up the weighty finale.

VI. This sustained, 25-minute crescendo remains among Mahler’s most ethereal creations − his ode to love – echoing the tranquil end of Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique Symphony.

“This is really a concert for listeners to soak in the pure joy of music,’’ Francis said. “Anyone who comes will have a life-changing experience. It’s one of the top symphonies of all time.’’

Program notes by Kurt Loft, former music critic for the Tampa Tribune who has covered the arts for more than 40 years. A member of the Music Critics Association of North America, he lives in St. Petersburg