Gustav Mahler score Klavierquartett, piano quartet, Movement 1: in A.---A listening guide of Klavierquartett with Lew Smoley.

A listening guide of Des Knaben Wunderhorn -  Urlicht with Lew Smoley from ClassicalPodcasts.com.

The final movement culminates in a resolution. The music, also reused in the First Symphony (in the Scherzo “Funeral March in Callot’s manner”), is subdued and gentle, lyrical and often reminiscent of a chorale in its harmonies. Its title, “Die zwei blauen Augen von meinem Schatz” (“The Two Blue Eyes of my Beloved”), deals with how the image of those eyes has caused the Wayfarer so much grief that he can no longer stand to be in the environment.He describes lying down under a linden tree, allowing the flowers to fall on him. He wishes to return to his life before his travels. He asks that the whole affair had never occurred: “Everything: love and grief, and world, and dreams!”  ---A listening guide of Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen – Die Zwei Blauen Augen with Lew Smoley

Das klagende Lied is a work in which Mahler comes closest to the opera. This is because the composition is pervaded by drama and its elaboration in a text that regularly gets the character of a theatrically very effective dialogue.Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) was fourteen years old when his younger brother Ernst Mahler (1862-1875) died. The loss touched him deeply and gave him a gnawing guilt. A few years later he started Das klagende Lied, his first major work. Mahler himself wrote the text. He relied on a folk tale about two brothers, in which the elder kills the younger. Mahler called the work ‘My worry child’. It was his requiem for his brother Ernst.---A listening guide of Das Klagende Lied –  Intro with Lew Smoley

The final movement is nearly as long as the previous five movements combined. Its text is drawn from two different poems, both involving the theme of leave-taking. Mahler himself added the last lines. This final song is also notable for its text-painting, using a mandolin to represent the singer’s lute, imitating bird calls with woodwinds, and repeatedly switching between the major and minor modes to articulate sharp contrasts in the text.---A listening guide of Das Lied von der Erde – Der Abschied with Lew Smoley.

Misprints are rare, but this song contains one incorrect note in the piano part. In measure 3 of the IMC edition, the first left hand note should be A instead of F. Few instances exist where Mahler uses a hemiola effect in the piano. Measures 10 and 11 are a wonderful example of this effect, where the pianist can bring out the left hand duple feel by playing stronger.“The changing of the summer guard”. ---A listening guide of Lieder Und Gesänge Aus Dem Jugendzeit – Ablösung Im Sommer with Lew Smoley.

Kindertotenlieder (Songs on the Death of Children) is a song cycle for voice and orchestra by Gustav Mahler. The words of the songs are poems by Friedrich Ruckert (1788-1866).The original Kindertotenlieder were a group of 428 poems written by Rückert in 1833-1834 in an outpouring of grief following the illness (scarlet fever) and death of two of his children. Karen Painter describes the poems thus: “Rückert’s 428 poems on the death of children became singular, almost manic documents of the psychological endeavor to cope with such loss. In ever new variations Rückert’s poems attempt a poetic resuscitation of the children that is punctuated by anguished outbursts. But above all the poems show a quiet acquiescence to fate and to a peaceful world of solace.” These poems were not intended for publication, and they appeared in print only in 1871, five years after the poet’s death.---A listening guide of Kindertotenlieder – Intro with Lew Smoley.

The third movement is a full display of despair. Entitled “Ich hab’ein glühend Messer” (“I Have a Gleaming Knife”), the Wayfarer likens his agony of lost love to having an actual metal blade piercing his heart. He obsesses to the point where everything in the environment reminds him of some aspect of his love, and he wishes he actually had the knife.The music is intense and driving, fitting to the agonized nature of the Wayfarer’s obsession.---A listening guide of Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen – Ich Hab’ Ein Glühend Messer with Lew Smoley.

A listening guide of Lieder Und Gesänge Aus Dem Jugendzeit – Serenade Aus Don Juan with Lew Smoley from ClassicalPodcasts.com.

A listening guide of Lieder Und Gesänge Aus Dem Jugendzeit – Maitanz Im Grünen with Lew Smoley from ClassicalPodcasts.com.