# Which Mahler symphony would you most like to see conducted by Mahler himself?



## R3PL4Y

Like the title says. Say Mahler is coming back to life for a single concert of one of his pieces. He will be leading the Vienna Philharmonic. What would you like to see him conduct?


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## Pugg

Number 3 for me please.


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## WaterRat

I'd like to see whether he'd be prepared to conduct a 'finished' version of the 10th, or tear it up in disgust.


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## Art Rock

It has to be the 9th.


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## Merl

Deffo the 1st symphony. I'd also like him to finish the 10th properly (he'd no doubt laugh at Deryck Cooke's cack-handed efforts) and then write an 11th (dedicated to me) and perform it at Glasgow Royal Concert Hall just for me. Then I'd get some pictures taken with him and get him to sign a load of stuff that I could later sell on eBay. Oh and I'd tell him that I still didn't like his 8th and could he re-write it without all those singers (or with no singing at all).


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## Dr Johnson

The 7th. .


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## Merl

Will Gustav be coming back as he was or like one of the walkers from The Walking Dead?


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## Totenfeier

I _need_ to hear how Mahler thought the 2nd should sound.


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## SixFootScowl

The 8th and let's bring back the worlds greatest singers for it too.


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## Mal

Number 2, with Klemperer directing the off stage band again.


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## realdealblues

Tough to say...

Maybe the 5th so we would know if the Adagietto should be played at the piano roll speed he played it at or not.

But if I really think about it...probably the 9th or Das Lied Von Der Erde, and more for him than for me since he never got to hear either preformed while he was alive.


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## Vasks

#2 and on the final chord he ascends back up to Heaven


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## Chronochromie

realdealblues said:


> Tough to say...
> 
> Maybe the 5th so we would know if the Adagietto should be played at the piano roll speed he played it at or not.


I wouldn't say "should" be played, there's always room for other interpretations of course, but we know that he thought it should be between 7 and 9 minutes long, according to the autograph score and the timings of one of his performances.


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## Kjetil Heggelund

I would like to see the one he would like to play


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## realdealblues

Chronochromie said:


> I wouldn't say "should" be played, there's always room for other interpretations of course, but we know that he thought it should be between 7 and 9 minutes long, according to the autograph score and the timings of one of his performances.


It was more of a sarcastic remark because of the many arguments about it and yes, to a certain degree we do know. Mahler's own score has 7 1/2 minutes written on it but it was written by Bruno Walter and no one knows when he wrote on it and whether it was a note from one of his own performances of the work or whether it was from one of Mahler's performances. The St. Petersburg performance had a double bass player who wrote down some timings on his parts and he wrote 7 minutes. The first edition of the score has 9 minutes but we don't have any proof that it was Mahler's own hand that made the indication. Either way, there is a large difference of "feel" between 7 minutes and 9 minutes to me personally.


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## hpowders

For me it would be the Fourth. I would love to hear his tempos for the adagio and final vocal movement.


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## Brahmsian Colors

Since he will be resurrected to conduct, the "Resurrection" would be apropos, though I would really prefer to see him conduct the Fourth.


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## Becca

...and an even larger difference to those modern conductors who come in at over 11 minutes.


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## R3PL4Y

Seeing as I have had the most trouble appreciating the sixth, I would like to know if this is just the result of many poor interpretations, or if I just need to try harder.


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## FDR

If I had to choose one I'd choose the Second Symphony.


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## LOLWUT

The third symphony.


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## SixFootScowl

Right now I am fixated on the 7th, but maybe that is because in a few weeks I will be attending it live.

http://ums.org/performance/berlin-philharmonic/

at Hill Auditorium.


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## Vaneyes

He'd be in no condition to, so the answer must be none.


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## hpowders

Vaneyes said:


> He'd be in no condition to, so the answer must be none.


I see you are very flexible, but stop with the dieting already.


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## Pugg

Vaneyes said:


> He'd be in no condition to, so the answer must be none.


Good one Vaneyes.


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## starthrower

Vaneyes said:


> He'd be in no condition to, so the answer must be none.


That guy conducts Saint Saens.


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## chalkpie

2 please. .


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## Judith

Saw Mahlers 6th symphony performed by our local orchestra "Sinfonia of Leeds". Wonderful performance!! Now that is one I would have liked to have seen Mahler conduct!!


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## SONNET CLV

I'd walk to Vienna to hear Mahler himself conduct one of his symphonies. And Montana aint too close to Austria (even if we speak a similar folksy dialect!).
But ... I just recently ordered tickets for the Mahler Second (to be performed by the Pittsburgh Symphony in June) and I think I'll go with that one. The Second has long been a favorite of mine. It's the symphony that introduced me to the composer, and I've been astounded by it since my first hearing (the old Bruno Walter recording on Columbia). Bruno Walter worked with Mahler, so I suspect listening to Walter's rendition is somewhat like hearing the master himself at work. But I would still like to hear that Second under Gustav's own baton.


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## Heck148

#9, make it with CSO or NYPO


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## Becca

SONNET CLV said:


> Bruno Walter worked with Mahler, so I suspect listening to Walter's rendition is somewhat like hearing the master himself at work. But I would still like to hear that Second under Gustav's own baton.


Don't forget that Otto Klemperer also worked with Mahler and conducted the off-stage instruments in performances of the 2nd with Mahler conducting. I have quite a few versions of the 2nd but it is the Klemperer that I go to most often, partly because it isn't as slow as most these days!


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## Pugg

Anyone of them with one of his favourite orchestras: The Royal Concertgebouw orchestra.


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## yetti66

7th or 3rd - 9th would be emotionally unbearable from his own baton


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## Granate

If he was lucky enough to come back to life:


We do a crowdfunding to pay him a heart surgery
Let him finish orchestrating the No.10
Then perform the complete No.10.

That is all I ask for. We already have Klemperer, Bernstein, Kubelík or Tennstedt to inspire us, but I find more legitimate to let him finish his last symphony, and then let's see if the heart surgery works.


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## hpowders

The Seventh, which to me is the most difficult Mahler symphony to hold together.

I would also love to hear him conduct the Adagietto from Symphony 5, since there is a debate on tempo-some doing it fast, others very slowly and also, the magnificent Adagio from Symphony 10.


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## MadMusicist

I just want to invite him over for dinner so we can have a nice long talk!


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## ahinton

SONNET CLV said:


> I'd walk to Vienna to hear Mahler himself conduct one of his symphonies. And Montana aint too close to Austria (even if we speak a similar folksy dialect!).


You'd get very wet in the process, you know...

6, 9, 10 for me; 9 because he never heard it live during his lifetime, 10 because I'd be intrigued to observe what he thought of Cooke's final version and the other versions that have been made, which of them he would choose to work from and how and to what extent he might alter his chosen one - or indeed whether he'd want instead to start again and make his own before conducting it - and 6 for a whole host of reasons, not least in which order he would perform its middle movements!


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## ahinton

MadMusicist said:


> I just want to invite him over for dinner so we can have a nice long talk!


Remembering that he conducted Rachmaninoff in the latter composer's Third Piano Concerto, I'd also like him to conduct another concert whose main work would be the Piano Concerto of Busoni with its composer as soloist (did he know it? - I don't know, but it's possible, of course) - but then that would come with the added problem of having to bring back two composers...


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## Pugg

MadMusicist said:


> I just want to invite him over for dinner so we can have a nice long talk!


With his own music prominent in this conversation.


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## ahinton

Pugg said:


> Number 3 for me please.


What? Not no. 4 with Ms Fleming in its finale?...


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## Pugg

ahinton said:


> What? Not no. 4 with Ms Fleming in its finale?...


Always Lucia Popp with Klaus Tennstedt, by miles.


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## ahinton

Pugg said:


> Always Lucia Popp with Klaus Tennstedt, by miles.


Time for a change of avatar for you then, perhaps! (though maybe you shouldn't tell Renée)...


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## Granate

Pugg said:


> Always Lucia Popp with Klaus Tennstedt, by miles.


It's funny, last summer I found two copies on vinyl of that recording in a record store in Amsterdam. 3€. Maybe you already have it. Maybe I should give it a second listen, because I really disliked the first one.

My choice is Bernstein's boy soprano.


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## Pugg

ahinton said:


> Time for a change of avatar for you then, perhaps! (though maybe you shouldn't tell Renée)...


Now that is a bridge to far, I love Renée but that do not means I can't love both and actually, Mrs Fleming is very approachable about talking about music, met her several times.


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## Pugg

Granate said:


> It's funny, last summer I found two copies on vinyl of that recording in a record store in Amsterdam. 3€. Maybe you already have it. Maybe I should give it a second listen, because I really disliked the first one.
> 
> My choice is Bernstein's boy soprano.


Do you mean different performances, I only know one, on EMI.


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## Granate

Pugg said:


> Do you mean different performances, I only know one, on EMI.


Yeah, that is the one. Two copies in that store.


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## Pugg

Granate said:


> Yeah, that is the one. Two copies in that store.


Better asking then missing something... thanks :cheers:


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## chill782002

I saw Haitink conduct the 2nd and Abbado conduct the 3rd but I've always wanted to see a performance of the 7th. One day hopefully. I'll take any live performance but for Mahler to conduct it himself would be the icing on the cake. Klemperer and Walter's performances should theoretically be the closest to his but who can say for sure?


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## mbhaub

That's exactly why I would like to hear Das Lied conducted by Mahler. Then we'd know once and for all if Walter (and Klemperer) got it right, some the questions of notes and orchestration would have been cleared up, and what tempos Mahler really had in mind. Alas, will never be,


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## Pugg

mbhaub said:


> That's exactly why I would like to hear Das Lied conducted by Mahler. Then we'd know once and for all if Walter (and Klemperer) got it right, some the questions of notes and orchestration would have been cleared up, and what tempos Mahler really had in mind. Alas, will never be,


I am quit sure Klemper ( almost)reaches perfection .


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## nightscape

I would easily go with the 2nd.


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## FBerwald

Symphony No. 10 as he wanted it to be.


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## SiegendesLicht

Symphony of a Thousand - with a corresponding number of choral singers.

Someone upthread mentioned walking to Vienna just to hear it - I would rather bike.


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## hpowders

SiegendesLicht said:


> Symphony of a Thousand - with a corresponding number of choral singers.
> 
> Someone upthread mentioned walking to Vienna just to hear it - I would rather bike.


Yes. I believe Mahler considered this to be his finest symphony, much like Beethoven considered his Hammerklavier sonata to be his finest piano sonata.

Who am I to argue?


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## Pugg

SiegendesLicht said:


> Symphony of a Thousand - with a corresponding number of choral singers.
> 
> Someone upthread mentioned walking to Vienna just to hear it - I would rather bike.


I am quit sure there are direct flights from your new home town towards Vienna.


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## Pianistikboy

Resurrection 2nd Symphony would a pleasure to listen, especially the final !! cheers


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## ICHTHUS

Oh my! It is hard to decide between the 8th and the 2nd. I would probably choose the 8th.


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## SuperTonic

I am going to hear the 2nd in a few months with the Dallas symphony. I'm so excited. This is one of my bucket list pieces to hear live.
I heard the 3rd a few years ago with the DSO and it was one of the best concerts I've ever attended.


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## Eramire156

I thought I'd expand the brief, and I would make if I could attend a concert that Mahler with Vienna, which would I chose, then I thought some more, if I could also attend a concert he conducted with the New York Philharmonic while he was its music director and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw,which has a long Mahler tradition, and which Mahler himself conducted.

First off with Vienna Philharmonic: November 24, 1907, Mahler's last concert with Vienna, the second symphony, with Amsterdam it has to be his fourth symphony on the night of October 23rd 1904 which after the intermission was followed by a repeat performance of the fourth. Now in New York I'd chose December16th 1909, when Mahler gave the American premier of his first symphony along with Schubert's unfinished and Beethoven's Corilian overture.
A fun exercise, if only Mahler had made records instead of piano rolls.


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## Judith

Well, I watched the 7th symphony performed on You Tube last night conducted by Vladimir Jurowski (not sure of orchestra) and was impressed as not so familiar with this one, so seeing this thread has given me "pause for thought". To see how Mahler would have conducted it!!


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## Janspe

Probably the 7th or the 9th. Can't really say why, but that feels right.


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## Pesaro

I would choose No. 7 because it is eccentric at times and I suspect Mahler was also.


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## Pugg

No 10 at this moment, to hear/ see if he proved Deryck Cooke finishing it .


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## Biffo

I don't see why it should be the Vienna Philharmonic, they hated Mahler. Having invited him to be their conductor they behaved badly whenever they could. Mahler only lasted four seasons (36 concerts). The break came when the 1st Symphony was badly received and the orchestra walked off leaving Mahler to face the boos alone. At a private run through of the 4th they deliberately played it as badly as they could leaving Mahler in a rage. He never gave the first performance of any of his symphonies in Vienna preferring other German orchestras, notably the Kaim Orchestra in Munich; its players were young and enthusiastic and loved Mahler's music. When he conducted the 6th in Vienna he used the Konzerverein Orchestra (forerunner of the Vienna Symphony).

For his farewell performance in 1907 the orchestra was appearing in its guise as the Court Opera Orchestra and behaved themselves.

I would like to hear Mahler conduct Das Lied von der Erde, don't care what orchestra.


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## jlspinks

My selection would be No. 2. Just a favorite of mine, though I like all of them except for the difficult No. 8.


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## Malx

Whilst the 2nd may be my favourite Mahler Symphony, I would have to choose the 6th as we would then find out in which order the Scherzo/Andante should be played.


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## Manxfeeder

Knee-jerk, I'd pick the 3rd, because the piece is so long, we'd get to see Mahler longer. But really, I'd like to hear the 4th just to see how he handles the variations in tempi.


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## Larkenfield

Malx said:


> Whilst the 2nd may be my favourite Mahler Symphony, I would have to choose the 6th as we would then find out in which order the Scherzo/Andante should be played.


"Three weeks before the first performance, Mahler had the Symphony read through in Vienna under his direction, at which time he irrevocably decided that the correct middle-movement order should be Andante-Scherzo. Mahler conducted the world premiere in Essen on 27 May 1906, with the middle movement order of Andante-Scherzo, after having instructed Kahnt to insert an erratum slip in the unsold copies of the scores and in Specht's booklet, detailing the correct middle movement order, and to republish the scores and booklet with the corrected middle-movement order, which Kahnt did in November 1906.

"From that point on, therefore, there would seem to be no question regarding the order of the movements, the more so as the remaining five complete performances of the Symphony in Mahler's lifetime were given with the order of Andante-Scherzo. Chronologically, these performances were:

October 1906, Oskar Fried conducting, Berlin (Mahler attended the rehearsals and performance)
8 November 1906, Mahler conducting, Munich
14 November 1906, Bernard Stavenhagen (a pupil of Liszt) conducting, Munich (the second performance in the city in a week)
January 1907, Mahler conducting, Vienna (the Philharmonic Orchestra)
March 1907, Hans Winderstein conducting, Leipzig
April 1907, Ernst von Schuch conducting, Dresden (middle movements only, in the order Andante-Scherzo).

"Mahler died in May 1911 in Vienna, six weeks before what would have been his 51st-birthday. The following November, Ferdinand Löwe conducted the Sixth Symphony in Vienna, with Alma in the audience, and in September 1916 Willem Mengelberg gave the Dutch premiere of the work in Amsterdam with the Concertgebouw Orchestra; both of these posthumous performances were given in accordance with the re-published score, the middle-movement order of Andante-Scherzo."

http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_features.php?id=6119


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## KJ von NNJ

I have seen the 3rd performed four times. Salonen, Jansons, Maazel and Boulez were the conductors. The 3rd is a special one for me so it would be an obvious choice. That said, the 8th would be a sight to behold with it's spectacular cast of players and Mahler conducting up a storm. 
The 10th. To simply hear his orchestration (especially in the final movement) would truly be fascinating. 
Any chance for a complete cycle? Everyone seems to be doing it these days! Ask Gus to throw in Das Lied von der Erde, Des Knaben Wunderhorn, Wayfarer, Kinder, Ruckert, Klagende, Blumine and anything else that pops into his blessed noggin!


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## Malx

Larkenfield said:


> "Three weeks before the first performance, Mahler had the Symphony read through in Vienna under his direction, at which time he irrevocably decided that the correct middle-movement order should be Andante-Scherzo. Mahler conducted the world premiere in Essen on 27 May 1906, with the middle movement order of Andante-Scherzo, after having instructed Kahnt to insert an erratum slip in the unsold copies of the scores and in Specht's booklet, detailing the correct middle movement order, and to republish the scores and booklet with the corrected middle-movement order, which Kahnt did in November 1906.
> 
> "From that point on, therefore, there would seem to be no question regarding the order of the movements, the more so as the remaining five complete performances of the Symphony in Mahler's lifetime were given with the order of Andante-Scherzo. Chronologically, these performances were:
> 
> October 1906, Oskar Fried conducting, Berlin (Mahler attended the rehearsals and performance)
> 8 November 1906, Mahler conducting, Munich
> 14 November 1906, Bernard Stavenhagen (a pupil of Liszt) conducting, Munich (the second performance in the city in a week)
> January 1907, Mahler conducting, Vienna (the Philharmonic Orchestra)
> March 1907, Hans Winderstein conducting, Leipzig
> April 1907, Ernst von Schuch conducting, Dresden (middle movements only, in the order Andante-Scherzo).
> 
> "Mahler died in May 1911 in Vienna, six weeks before what would have been his 51st-birthday. The following November, Ferdinand Löwe conducted the Sixth Symphony in Vienna, with Alma in the audience, and in September 1916 Willem Mengelberg gave the Dutch premiere of the work in Amsterdam with the Concertgebouw Orchestra; both of these posthumous performances were given in accordance with the re-published score, the middle-movement order of Andante-Scherzo."
> 
> http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_features.php?id=6119


Lark, the historic background is well known but I would still like to see what he would conduct - would the devil in him go against perceived practice just for the hell of it!


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## Haydn man

He can play whichever one he likes for me


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## mahlernerd

Art Rock said:


> It has to be the 9th.


I saw the 9th performed a couple of years ago. The ending silence was one of the most stunning and powerful moments of my life.


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## mahlernerd

The 1st. Just because I would love to see his reaction when he sees how much everyone loves it.


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## mbhaub

Cooke II version of the 10th. See what he makes of it.


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## Rogerx

No 8 -3-2 and than have a long conversation about the others.


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## flamencosketches

The 9th. Das Lied would be great too but only if he had a damn good pair of soloists!


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## Kollwitz

5 for me. It's the first symphony I fell in love with and, perhaps more importantly, the one that I'm most conscious of different approaches to conducting. 

Mahler's piano roll recording of the first movement seems to give it quite a bit of 'swing' and a decent pace, would love to hear that under his baton. Also curious to see how he handled the scherzo and, obviously, his pacing of the adagio.


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