After almost exactly 12 hours of queueing in the freezing cold and wetness, finally we went in and the hall was boiling!! (comparatively). And, as always seems to happen, I could have got there an hour and a half later and been in the same place...

But it was very much worth it. Someone from college and Tommo enlivened the last shivering hour considerably

The trombones were so growly just after the start I had to stifle a giggle. Then, when the passage occurs in the (eek) false-recapitulation-type-thing, I prepared myself for the snarl, and they didn't do it!! 

To me the proportions seemed a bit out of synch somehow: when the Flügelhorn passages came along, I felt they didn't fulfil their function, which I (personally) perceive to be like an oasis, not just within the third movement, but also to fully relieve the effect of the first. The first movement did seem to go rather quickly, but maybe that was just my being wrapped up.

However they certainly saved the best until last. Even in those last three bars the sound just seemed to magnify and fill the depths of the subconscious. It can't be the instrumentation - it's tutti apart from the bass tuba (who only plays in the last bar), and with all respect that's not going to produce that much difference. It was a breathless moment.

The effect afterwards was simply indescribable. Myself and the surrounding front row were completely dumb-struck, and found it very hard to applaud, let alone cheer. Indeed the one who was first in the queue (and had slept out overnight for the privilege) sat down after the applause had finished with tears streaming down his face.

*sigh*

I don't really know what to say about it, opilec, since it will only be hopelessly inadequate.

I found it an extraordinary experience. It was unlike any other Mahler 3 I have heard, including an earlier Abbado one. There are some interesting comments at TOP by Wilf and others on the illuminating balance that Abbado achieved within the orchestral textures and I think that did have a great deal to do with the power and intensity of the performance. It seemed as if we were almost in the world of Das Lied von der Erde for much of the time and the emotional power of the performance came not from the febrile bombast that some conductors bring to the work but from the perfectly judged but spontaneous seeming gradations of tempo, dynamics and textural balance. I have never before felt it unfold so naturally as a continuous evolutionary and emotional journey from begining to end as it did last night. It was light years away from the broken-backed monster that Mahler 3 can sometimes threaten to be in lesser hands.

It was also breathtakingly daring in some of the pianissimos that Abbado drew from the orchestra. The beginning of the fourth movement (O Mensch! Gib acht!) was on the edge of audibility as it emerged from the silence. To dare to do that in a packed Albert Hall of all places is verging on the criminally reckless but the whole place held its collective breath and it worked terrifyingly well.

But throughout the performance, Abbado somehow used 'silence' as the baseline against which everything, from the most delicate textures to the big climaxes, was built up. As a result the climaxes when they came, particularly in the first movement and the big build up to the D major conclusion, were even more effective because it was all done by proportion rather than straight decibels.

I have absolutely no idea how it is done and there are very, very few conductors who can do it but Abbado is one of those few who can make an entire audience listen intently to every sound and every inflection over a span of one and three quarter hours or whatever it was while somehow simultaneously 'showing' you the whole arc of the work that you are collectively travelling through. Very intense at the time and ruddy exhausting afterwards.

There was also (also?!) wonderful playing by the orchestra, without which....   I hadn't realised until Ollie pointed it out afterwards that were some really big name players sitting there in the ranks and, my goodness, it showed as well. A woodwind section to die for, for example.

Oh, one question (since I didn't quite get round to asking Ollie the supplementary question I meant to ).  Those unsettling portamenti(?) on the solo oboe in the fourth movement. I adore them and now wouldn't want to hear them done any other way. The oboist really did underline them deliciously alarmingly last night. Is it marked that way in the published score but no one quite dared to take it at face value until Simon Rattle tried it and showed that it did work? Or was it a musicological discovery on someone's part from Mahler's early drafts or something and 'optional'? Whichever, I do hope they now become the norm. I'd now feel bereft without that 'curl'.

[Oh, and like others I really could have done without that wanker of a walrus who barked out a self-important 'bravo' while the final chord was still rolling round the hall but there you go. I was so full of "Was mir as Kind erzahlt" at that point I decided that he had better be embraced within it rather than taken off to the vet to be put down.]

George,

On the radio I only heard that Natalia Gutman (was it) was lead Cello, and Clemens Hagens was no.3 cello, and that Sabine Meyer was 1st Clarinet (all brilliant, I agree!).

Could you enlighten us as to who some of the others were, please?  e.g. who was the Oboe you mentioned?

Thanks

Tommo

Hi Tommo,

1st oboe was Kai Frömbgen. Other names I recognised in the line-up were Wolfram Christ leading the viola section, Jacques Zoon, principal flute, Wolfgang Meyer on E flat clarinet, and Ilya Gringolts who was in the First Violin section.

I agree with George's comments - a fabulous performance, sensitively balanced by Abbado, completely spellbinding. And it was good to meet up with folks beforehand and put some faces to names!

It was indeed and, pending the photographs appearing, I should report that His Eminence, Il Grande Inquisitor, was imposingly and very properly robed in a shirt whose colour can only be described as 'Crushed Cardinal'.

Very impressed by those of you who queued (for 12 hours, eruanto! Respect!!) in that weather when I was whingeing about being caught in the rain across Hyde Park. I did wander down the queue at about 5.45 looking for familiar faces (using that special "I'm only going to say hallo, not queue jump" gait) but sadly failed to make contact.

Once again, I demand to see photos, which seems to be my function on this MB (as well as advising on the futility of the one to a million thread).

I she by any chance actually working on the transcription of the solo from Mahler 3?  I'm pretty sure that was a grade 7 piece when I played as part of my A-level recital.  There were actually a couple of occasions where I was entirely convinced by the intonation in second position (to be hyper-critical, on the whole I felt it was a fine performance), but at least he knew precisely where he was heading to on the slide, and stuck there, unlike the Cleveland principal a couple of years ago who would seem to start playing the note in one place (on the slide), and then make quite a major "correction" in the course of the note!

Thinking about it, that might actually have been the case in my day too, I also did the Rimsky in the same recital, and then two movements of the Hindemith sonata for my final perfomance (in front of the A- level examnier, the recital was taped for examination purposes).  Only the 3rd movement of the Hindemith is set for Grade 8, but it was too short by itself for the A level performance so I did the final movement too.

Surely mechanics of the trombone are much more straightforward than any other brass intrument - want to play a lower note - make the instrument longer (OK that's what valves do too, but not so obviously...)