Fredrik

Adagietto! Hi Almacg...

I'm glad you brought that up! Listen to what Leonard Bernstein has to say: "The whole world has been swooning to this Adagietto by Mahler since the movie "Death in Venice" hit the silver screen - quote: Leonard Bernstein.

If you wonder who Luchino Visconti is who did the movie "Death in Venice".


"Gustav Mahler's Adagietto"

Leonard Bernstein describes the ambigious character of Mahler's "Adagietto" with its leaning appoggiaturas, creating an esoteric feeling of weightlessness! "What's the magic secret with this music?" asks Bernstein.

”Ambiguity!” he continues.

You see, all that preliminary wamping on the harp... is first of all syntactically vague.... We have no idea what beat we're on or what meter we're in! And already, that's one ambiguity!

What's more? This is setting up the key of the piece... F major, by suggesting its tonic triad! But only suggesting it, because the fundamental note, the root of that triad... "F" itself is missing! And only 2/3 of the triad is given to us. The "A" and the "C"... roaming through several octaves… that's true, but still only two different notes! So we're not really sure that our key is going to be F major.

The absence of this tonic makes us only possibly aware of F major... because the two notes we hear could turn out to be two thirds of a whole other triad... namely this one... A minor... automatically we're facing another ambiguity! Which of these keys are we in? A minor or F major?

And again... which of the two keys are we in?
As the 3 upbeats begin... we almost vote for A minor... because there's that "A" on that cello part, which is the lowest part! But no, it sneakily descends to "G"... and then to "F"... oh, it feels so good!
We're home! In F major!

But there still an unresolved tug at the heart... in that appoggiatura up here, in the melody... and when it resolves... we just melt away with the pleasure of fulfillment!


uploaded by Fred




From Leonard Bernstein's Harvard Lectures serie.