Munich Philharmonic: Sibelius / MahlerDaniel Harding (conductor)
This event is in the past.
The fact that Gustav Mahler and Jean Sibelius, the two greatest symphony composers of their day, had such wildly diverging views on the nature of the symphony remains perplexing. When they met in Helsinki in November 1907, Mahler voiced his conviction that a symphony should be “like the whole world, encompassing everything”, whereas Sibelius took the view that a symphony should exhibit a “strict inner logic”.
This event is in the past.
The fact that Gustav Mahler and Jean Sibelius, the two greatest symphony composers of their day, had such wildly diverging views on the nature of the symphony remains perplexing. When they met in Helsinki in November 1907, Mahler voiced his conviction that a symphony should be “like the whole world, encompassing everything”, whereas Sibelius took the view that a symphony should exhibit a “strict inner logic”.
- Munich Philharmonic
- Daniel Harding, conductor
Daniel Harding brings the composers together with this programme. With Sibelius’s Tapiola, he takes the audience into the vastness of the Finnish forests. In his last orchestral work – a late high point in the transition between Romanticism and Modernism – Sibelius tells of “the gloomy forests of Nordland” and of “forest spirits” in the darkness.
Though Gustav Mahler complained that his Fifth was a “cursed work” as no one understood it, it is today one of his most popular symphonies. This is likely due to the moving Adagietto, which became universally known through its use in Visconti’s film adaptation of Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice.
Programme
- Jean Sibelius: “Tapiola” tone poem for grand orchestra, Op 112
- Gustav Mahler: Symphony No 5 in C-sharp minor
