Mahler: Symphony No. 9 Live (Benjamin Zander, Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra)
Brattle Media

If the idea of a youth orchestra tackling a work as deep and profound as Mahler's Symphony No. 9 appears incongruous (a more logical choice would seem to be be his first, with all its youthful vitality), don't be deceived: under the unerring stewardship of Benjamin Zander (b. 1939), the Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra (founded by the conductor in 2012 and comprising 120 musicians ranging in age from twelve to twenty-one) delivers a mature performance that's not just credible but superb. Mature in this instance doesn't simply refer to the competency of execution but also the sensibility brought to the work. There's no attempt to distinguish it from other performances by incorporating novelty effects or unconventional treatments; in this live performance recorded at Boston Symphony Hall on March 11, 2018, Zander and company channel their collective energies into delivering a stellar interpretation admirably free of contrivance.

It's not the youth orchestra's first stab at a Mahler work, with the 2017 release of a live performance of his sixth symphony (also under Zander) the recipient of fulsome praise, having been selected by both The Chicago Tribune and The Boston Globe as one of the best classical recordings of the year. Of that earlier Mahler release, critic Lloyd Schwartz deemed it “one of the most thrilling Mahler performances I have ever heard”; one imagines he would say something similar about this follow-up.

Mahler's ninth is arguably his profoundest creation, one he wrote near the end of his life and that's formally his last symphony, the tenth left unfinished by the composer but later brought to a workable form by Deryck Cooke. As Mahler's thoughts were turning to issues of mortality at the time of the ninth's writing (1908-09), it's almost impossible not to hear in the material that preoccupation, especially during its first and fourth movements (Alban Berg, for example, wrote of the ninth, “The whole [first] movement is permeated with the premonition of death”). In those parts, the divide separating musical expression and inner experience seems to collapse, and the impression established is of a being contemplating death's imminent arrival and surrendering to it peacefully. (Mahler, incidentally, never heard the symphony performed as he died a year before the work's 1912 premiere by Bruno Walter and the Vienna Philharmonic.)

Structurally, the work frames two scherzi with two massive slow movements, an unconventional design but one whose symmetricality formally satisfies. In detailed reflections on the work by the conductor included as liner notes with the release, Zander argues that the ninth is best experienced in emotional terms; though the opening “Andante comodo” movement is in a sonata form, it unfolds more as if thoughts and ruminations are being transcribed into physical form, this organic developmental quality being one of the aspects that makes the work so daring. If one embraces that interpretative approach, the movement seemingly presents a being in the throes of emotional turmoil. In its first moments tentative, it quickly turns serene, its string gestures filled with yearning and supplication. Darkness arrives quickly, however, signaled by anguished outpourings until the peaceful mood reinstates itself, now more forcefully. For twenty-nine minutes, the music alternates between these poles, harmonious on the one hand, despairing on the other; declamatory climaxes, ominous passages, and gentle uplift are all part of the emotional terrain covered, the listener rapidly tossed between the harmonious acceptance of nonexistence and unease at the uncertainties death brings. Every attempt to solidly establish the peaceful state is thwarted when darkness drags the music downwards into distress. Ultimately, however, the distance between the poles diminishes until a reconciliation of sorts is achieved, the thematic expressions associated with the strings and trumpets resolved in a horn melody that, three minutes before the end, blends elements of both and paves the way for a closing scene of serenity featuring the violin, oboe, harp, and French horn.

Dramatically different in tone is the lively second movement, which sees the music shifting to the Viennese dance worlds of the waltz and ländler. Though Zander characterizes the dance as a “grim parody,” there's no denying the mood of the second's bright and carefree compared to the first, even if there are moments when Mahler's penchant for the grotesque does surface in the use of chromaticism, rapid scene changes, and dynamic contrasts. Themes from the first are re-voiced, sometimes elegantly and at other times in macabre garb. The third movement, designated “Rondo-Burleske” by the composer, opens with a bold trumpet figure that initiates thirteen minutes of contrapuntal magic; as energized as it largely is, it also includes a lovely central episode whose tenderness anticipates the glorious finale to come.

In contrast to the alternations between serenity and anguish that mark the first movement, the concluding “Molto adagio” largely opts for affirmation, the battle over and acceptance of the inevitable firmly in place. Feelings of peace and resolution are present from the start, so dominantly that the rumblings of disturbance that occasionally arise are overcome by rapture. For twenty-six minutes, tremulous strings, gentle woodwinds, and muted horns convey the sense of life slipping away and its end met with dignity and grace. The greatest test of an orchestra's handling of the ninth occurs during its majestic slow movements, especially a passage such as the fourth's fragile closing where the strings are suspended on high for measures on end, the tempo slows to a crawl, and the volume reduces to a hush.

March 2019