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 lifelong view of the beauty of afterlife and resurrection. In this large work, the composer further developed the creativity of “sound of the distance” and creating a “world of its own,” aspects already seen in his First Symphony. The work lasts around eighty to ninety minutes.

Mahler completed what would become the first movement of the symphony in 1888 as a single-movement symphonic poem called Totenfeier (Death Celebration). Some sketches for the second movement also date from that year. Mahler wavered five years on whether to make Totenfeier the opening movement of a symphony. In 1893, he composed the second and third movements. The finale was the problem. Mahler knew he wanted a vocal final movement. Finding the right text for this movement proved long and perplexing.

When Mahler took up his appointment at the Hamburg Opera in 1891, he found the other important conductor there to be Hans von Bülow, who was in charge of the city’s symphony concerts. Bülow, not known for his generosity, was impressed by Mahler. Bülow’s death in 1894 greatly affected Mahler. At the funeral, Mahler heard a setting of Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock’s Die Auferstehung (The Resurrection). “It struck me like lightning, this thing,” he wrote to conductor Anton Seidl,” and everything was revealed to me clear and plain.” Mahler used the first two verses of Klopstock’s hymn, then added verses of his own that dealt more explicitly with redemption and resurrection.* He finished the finale and revised the orchestration of the first movement in 1894, then inserted the song Urlicht (Primal Light) as the penultimate movement. This song was probably written in 1892 or 1893.

Mahler devised a narrative programme for the work, which he told to a number of friends. In this programme, the first movement represents a funeral and asks questions such as “Is there life after death?”; the second movement is a remembrance of happy times in the life of the deceased; the third movement represents a view of life as meaningless activity; the fourth movement is a wish for release from life without meaning; and the fifth movement – after a return of the doubts of the third movement and the questions of the first – ends with a fervent hope for everlasting, transcendent renewal, a theme that Mahler would ultimately transfigure into the music of his sublime Das Lied von der Erde.

The symphony is written for an orchestra, a mixed choir, two soloists (soprano and contralto), organ, and an offstage ensemble of brass and percussion. The use of two tam-tams, one pitched high and one pitched low, is particularly unusual; the end of the last movement features them struck in alternation repeatedly.

The work was first published in 1897 by Friedrich Hoffmeister.

Mahler 2 – Resurrection Symphony
“An Immense Project”
Christopher Wilkins, Music Director

*Fifth Movement

Note: The first eight lines were taken from the poem Die Auferstehung by Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock. Mahler omitted the final four lines of this poem and wrote the rest himself (beginning at “O glaube”).

Notes from Wikipedia

Watch and listen as English conductor, Sir Simon Rattle, conducts the final movement of Symphony No. 2 with England’s City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.   CLICK HERE

Mahler’s Description of each movement in Symphony No. 2 “Resurrection”

Learning to Love Gustav Mahler – article on LATimes .com (March 14, 2010) by Richard S. Ginell

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Dave Bennett’s Tribute to Benny Goodman
Saturday, October 10, 2009   2:00 PM & 8:00 PM
Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre

Andrew Lane, Conductor
Dave Bennett, Clarinet

Described as “Benny Goodman reincarnated,” virtuoso clarinetist Dave Bennett joins the talented musicians of the Orlando Philharmonic to perform some of Goodman’s  most popular hits along with some tunes that Goodman made his own. Included on the program are Moonglow, I Got Rhythm, Don’t Be That Way, Stompin at the Savoy, Goody Goody and Sing Sing Sing.

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“Clarinetist Dave Bennett’s extraordinary re-creation of the sounds and artistry of Benny Goodman brings the swing era back to life in all its splendor.”
-Michael Krajewski, Principal Pops Conductor Houston Symphony, Jacksonville Symphony, New Hampshire Music Festival

“Dave Bennett wowed the audience and brought the house down. I can’t wait to bring him back!”
-Kendra Whitlock, Director of Pops and Specials (2006) Detroit Symphony Orchestra

Commentary from Principal Pops Conductor Andrew Lane

I first got interested in Benny Goodman and his music when I saw “The Benny Goodman Story” when I was only 14 years old. His story was interesting to me because of his struggle to become known for his music and his unwillingness to compromise his musical style to arrive at his goal. (I would not have explained it quite that way at 14 but I think I got the idea of the story.)

Goodman was called the “King of Swing” and in the mid 1930s he was the leader of one of the most popular musical groups in America. His Carnegie Hall concert in 1938 has been described as the most important jazz concerts in history and during an era of segregation, he also led one of the most racially-integrated groups in America. This, no doubt, contributed to the unique sound and style of his music.

The Orlando Philharmonic is pleased to feature Dave Bennett and his band performing a “Tribute to Benny Goodman.” Those who know the music of Goodman will be transported back in time to the early days of jazz music as performed by the great master. Those not so familiar with his music will be amazed at Dave’s skill on the clarinet and will get a look at what it might have been like to attend a performance by the “King of Swing.” (Dave Bennett favors the look and musical style of Benny Goodman.)

Dave and his band will perform Benny Goodman favorites so many of us know and love, including Let’s Dance, Moonglow, Bugle Call Rag, Sing Sing Sing and more. All performed to perfection by a 25 year old clarinet virtuoso. The orchestral arrangements have been carefully crafted to pay tribute to the great Benny Goodman sound.

I always enjoy performing jazz with the Orlando Philharmonic. Our orchestra has a great feel for this musical style and I know this will make our evening together even more special.

Also, this is the perfect time to attend a concert dedicated to the music of Benny Goodman since in 2009 we celebrate the 100^th anniversary of his birth.

See you there!
Andrew Lane
Principal Pops Conductor

To hear more music, click http://www.davebennett.com/ then click on Discography and then click on the album icon “Dave Bennett Celebrates 100 Years of Benny”

Listen as Principal Pops Conductor Andrew Lane discusses Dave Bennett’s Tribute to Benny Goodman on the popular Smith & Riley show.  Click Here

Read More about Benny Goodman on NPR’s website.

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Brahms: Variations on a Theme of Joseph Haydn, op. 56a
Beethoven: Symphony No. 9, op. 125, D minor (Choral)

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He couldn’t hear.  Of all people.  Not a thing.  And because Beethoven couldn’t hear, the thought of him conducting – let alone composing – was pathetic to most people.  And so to answer them he composed the 7th symphony.  Just try to imagine Beethoven standing on that podium holding that baton, his hands waving gracefully through the air.   And the orchestra in his mind was playing perfectly and the orchestra in front of him trying desperately just to keep up…  There is a story that in order to write his music Beethoven literally sawed the legs of his piano so that he could lay the body flat on the ground, and then he would lay down on the ground with his ear pressed to the floor and he would push the keys with his fingers in order to hear his music through the vibrations of the floor.

Mr. Holland’s Opus (1985)

In his final years Beethoven was stone cold deaf.  It is not easy to imagine the tragedy this circumstance must have been for this greatest of musicians.  Beethoven had written about his deafness more than 20 years earlier:  “How can I possibly admit an infirmity in the one sense which ought to be more perfect in me than in others, a sense which I once possessed in the highest perfection?  My misfortune is doubly painful to me… [for] I must live almost alone, like one who has been banished.”

And yet, what was the subject of his final symphony, the great 9^th symphony?  Joy!  It concludes with an ecstatic vision of how wonderful life can be, creating a musical picture of a love-filled world where “all creatures drink of joy.”  And in the penultimate movement – the third – he seems to offer a vision of heaven on earth, a kind of musical utopia.  And there’s even more to it than that.  In the 9^th symphony, Beethoven challenges all of us to live the life we dream of, beyond circumstance, beyond what life deals out.  Is there any more convincing proof that human beings can affect the quality of the day?

His achievement did not come easily.  He had begun sketching musical ideas for Schiller’s An die Freude (“To Joy”) more than thirty years earlier.  Even after the famous hymn finally took shape, he struggled to find the “musical motivation” necessary to introduce human voices into a symphony (for the first time in history).   In the end, he hit upon a brilliant idea:  that the first sung words should be his own, not Schiller’s.  He would address every human being within earshot:  “Friends, not these sounds!”  – not the music of battle, conflict, and hatred – “Rather, let us sing together more comforting and joyful tones.”  And then… the utopian hymn to joy.

Beethoven’s joy is hard won in another respect, too.  The 9^th symphony begins not with the sounds of jubilation heard in the finale, but at the opposite end of the expressive spectrum, with ominous trembles and shudders, music shrouded in mystery.  These dark musical clouds soon grow threatening, and are revealed to contain within them terrorizing thunder.  The opening phrase repeats several times with increasing energy, each time culminating in great explosive outbursts.  It all proves prophetic of the struggle to come.  The whole of the 9^th symphony follows this course, moving from trickle to torrent, from darkness to light.

Beethoven’s resources in the 9^th symphony are the most lavish and potent yet devised in orchestral music.  He greatly expands the orchestra from its usual size; his musical structures are enormous; his tempos and dynamics constantly shift from one extreme to another; and then there is that immense chorus.

It is as if Beethoven is acknowledging right from the outset that extraordinary measures are required to achieve great things.  To live beyond fashion – in Schiller’s words – we must break free from our “business-as-usual” approach to life.  If we do not, we run the risk of returning to our petty, self-interested, small-minded, squabbling selves.

With the 9^th symphony Beethoven had an instant hit, but the work was also immediately recognized as something more.  Ever since that extraordinary first performance in May 7, 1824, when Beethoven stood before his orchestra making the gestures of a conductor though he could not hear a note, this symphony has been universally recognized as a kind of mountaintop, as an unrepeatable achievement.  And it will probably always be thus.  There is only one Hamlet, one Sistine Chapel, and only one 9^th.  All composers writing a symphony since Beethoven’s 9^th have had to come to terms with its legacy and its reputation.

The young Johannes Brahms felt that pressure as much as anyone.  His self-conscious need to become “Beethoven’s successor” was partly the result of a public declaration made by his mentor Robert Schumann, who made exactly such a prediction in print.  Brahms delayed composition of his first symphony until well into his middle age for this reason.

The first orchestral music he published was not a symphony, but rather his Haydn Variations.  Although they were an extension of Beethoven’s use of variation form, the Haydn Variations did not bear any obvious relationship to any Beethoven symphonic work.  And although they were modest in ambition and slight in scale, they did bring fame and admiration to Brahms, ultimately paving the way for the confident (and Beethovenian) symphonies he did write many years later.

On the OPO’s opening night program, it is fitting that we perform two related monuments of the repertoire:  the last symphonic work by the greatest composer of the Classical era, and the first by the greatest symphonist of the Romantic age.  Like good dinner guests, they will go wonderfully together and have a great deal to say to each other.

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Tamas Kocsis, violin •  Ronald Gardiner, cello
Jamie Strefeler, oboe •  Diane Bishop, bassoon
Colleen Blagov & Sandra del Cid, flutes

Haydn: Overture to an English Opera, Windsor Castle

Concerto for 2 Lire organizzate
Symphony No. 104 in D, London
Sinfonia concertante

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Insights from Music Director Christopher Wilkins

“I am Solomon from London, and I have come to fetch you.”  This is how one of the most productive relationships in the history of music began. Johann Peter Salomon, founder and leader of London’s most successful concert series, had traveled to Vienna for the purpose of securing a contract with Haydn to compose and perform for the Salomon Concerts.

Londoners – who had long clamored for a visit from Haydn – got what they wished for.  Haydn produced for them a string of masterful instrumental compositions, capped by his twelve final symphonies, the so-called “London” symphonies, and his multi-instrument concerto, the Sinfonia concertante.

I am thrilled to present these jewels of the Classical era in Orlando. The Sinfonia concertante and Symphony No. 104 are my personal favorites of all Haydn works, after The Creation.  A new tender, sublime and magical tone entered Haydn’s voice in England. The London music is unbridled, dramatic, and richly varied as always, but with a new blissful serenity.

Haydn apparently fell in love in London.  He took on a pupil by the name of Rebecca Shroeter, the young widow of composer and pianist J. S. Schroeter.  There is no question of her feelings for Haydn:  “No language can express half the love and affection I feel for you.”  On his return visit to London – a year and a half after his first visit – Haydn changed lodgings.  Was it coincidence that his new dwelling was very close to Rebecca Shroeter’s?  Could this account for the new ecstatic and tender quality of his final symphonies and the Sinfonia concertante?

London brought Haydn new inspiration in many ways.  Its orchestras were superb, and very large by Viennese standards.  They performed in several magnificent venues and were supported by a large, well-educated and enthusiastic public.

“Haydn’s London Years” features six outstanding soloists from the Orlando Philharmonic.  A strong display of virtuosity is very much in keeping with Haydn’s concerts in London.  They were extravaganzas. Haydn was thrilled by the quality of the orchestras and soloists in London, and his compositions were designed to celebrate great musicianship to the fullest.

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Haydn’s Symphony No. 104 “London”

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