Gustav Mahler. Symphony No. 3. Claudio Abbado

In the summer of 2007, Claudio Abbado and his elite orchestra of the Lucerne Festival, with such outstanding musicians as violinist Kolja Blacher, clarinetist Sabine Meyer, trumpeter Reinhold Friedrich and cellist Natalia Gutman, presented Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 3.

Gustav Mahler worked on the Third Symphony during the summer holidays of 1895 and 1896. He spent them in Tyrol, in one of the most picturesque corners of Austria, on the shore of a small lake in the village of Steinbach. In a meadow not far from the hotel where he was staying, the Don had a small house built for his work. In complete silence, he spent many hours working.

The composer considered the symphony to be a work "in which the whole world is reflected... All of nature receives a voice in it and reveals its innermost secrets." In one of his letters he even wrote a program for it: he called the first part "The Coming of Summer", the second - "What Flowers Tell", the third - "What Animals Tell", the fourth - "What the Night Tells Me", the fifth - "The Story of the Morning Bells", the sixth - "What Love Tells". However, Mahler forbade the publication of this program.

The first performance of the Third Symphony took place only 6 years after it was written - on June 9, 1902 in Krefeld under the baton of the author.

PERFORMERS:

Lucerne Festival Orchestra

Conductor - Claudio Abbado

Anna Larsson - mezzo-soprano

Arnold Schoenberg Choir

Telzer Knabenchor Boys' Choir

WORKS:

Gustav Mahler. Symphony No. 3, D minor

Lucerne Festival, Lucerne, 2007