# Movement and Mahler 8



## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

Fill in the blanks:

I typically ______ when listening to music and Mahler's 8th symphony _____ among my top works of his.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

I am totally confused when listening to music and Mahler's 8th symphony no way is one of his greatest/best/my favorite works.:lol:

That was just kidding. I will listen to it tonight and come up with an answer tomorrow if Mahler 8 is to my taste!


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

KevinW said:


> I am totally confused when listening to music and Mahler's 8th symphony no way is one of his greatest/best/my favorite works.:lol:
> 
> That was just kidding. I will listen to it tonight and come up with an answer tomorrow if Mahler 8 is to my taste!


There is now a poll associated with the OP.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist said:


> There is now a poll associated with the OP.


I just saw the poll after posting my reply.


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

KevinW said:


> I just saw the poll after posting my reply.


You haven't heard the piece yet you voted?

Come on you need at least 6 months experience on TC to do that.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist said:


> You haven't heard the piece yet you voted?
> 
> Come on you need at least 6 months experience on TC to do that.


Sorry. I accidentally clicked on it. I do like moving while listening to whatever classical music though.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist said:


> Fill in the blanks:
> 
> I typically sitting ______ when listening to music and Mahler's 8th symphony _____ among my top works of his.


sitting for --------1
1 for the second---------------------


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Always sitting down when listening to music. And after over three decades of listening to Mahler (every work at least ten times, most of them far more than that), I can say that I really like the 8th, and that it is to my taste clearly near the bottom of his output.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

I prefer to stand and move a lot while listening to music. They are making me so thrilled that I always imagine myself as the conductor conducting with the baton. Although I do not know how to conduct, but I am just into the music so much and start to wave my hands and start to imitate conducting, and this is why I want to learn conducting now. Once I was so obsessed with Beethoven Violin Concerto that I started to ''conduct'', my roommate then filmed me doing this and posted on Instagram... :lol: The post got tons of likes and many comments praised me as the modern Beethoven...


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

KevinW said:


> Although I do not know how to conduct, but I am just into the music so much and start to wave my hands and start to imitate conducting


I just acquired the score to Mahler's 8th. Wow, there's a lot going on there with tons of people doing tons of things in different meters and tempi. It's difficult just to follow the score. If you aspire to be a conductor, I'd avoid this piece until my final year of conducting lessons.


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

I mainly sit down when listening to music, but regularly listen while on a walk.

Although M8 is not a favourite work of his, for me, it's been growing on me recently. Currently listening to the first movement (Boulez). Pretty amazing music!


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

I usually hear music lying in the sofa, with closed eyes, and I may or may not move while listening depending on the piece I'm hearing and on my mood. Mahler's 8th isn't one of my favorite Mahler symphonies at the moment: his 2nd and 9th symphonies, plus DLVDE, are.


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## bz3 (Oct 15, 2015)

I generally listen to non-vocal music while doing chores, walking, etc, but I do listen to the 8th during these activities. Like most of Mahler, it's a bit much for me to sit through unless I'm reading (in which case I never listen to vocal music). I will listen to sections of it as a dedicated effort, as I will to movements in Mahler, but I'm generally doing something else (reading, browsing internet, watching TV on mute) when I listen to a lot of music. 

Only favorites and operas get my undivided attention.


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

I remember being very deeply moved by Mahler's 8th when I listened to it for the first time. I consider it to be an unbelievably optimistic and uplifting work, already just musically. But then again I am a Wagnerian, which probably makes me biased towards exactly this kind of music. I also think that this music, the ending particularly, does justice to Goethe's _Faust_ (whether it's actually possible to do justice to such a work requires of course some further contemplation). While I haven't read the second part of _Faust_ wholly, I am well enough acquainted with the ending scene and the whole first part of the work to be of an opinion that the redemption of Faust is supposed to be _overwhelming_. The music is not pompous but it is almost uncomfortably massive.

In short, I am a great proponent of this work. And I sit down  I want to follow the text.


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## MrMeatScience (Feb 15, 2015)

I don't think I really have a seated/moving tendency when it comes to music. It's probably pretty close to 50/50 and just depends on how I'm feeling that day.

I like Mahler 8 a lot, but not as much as his other works. One of my big term papers as a postgrad was on it and I had it playing basically non-stop for weeks. Haven't come back to it in earnest since then, as I still feel as though I overdosed on it!


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

Interesting. Surprised by how many people sit down.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

I typically do this when listening to music and Mahler's 8th symphony


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## BachIsBest (Feb 17, 2018)

I accidentally chose the "sit down; Is" option, when I should have chosen the movement option. That being said, I pace when I listen to music as I generally focus on things better when I pace (I sometimes even pace when reading). I feel if you're going on a jog or a walk while listening to Mahler's 8th, you probably aren't devoting your entire attention to the music, whereas, as I said, pacing is often a method to help you focus on the music.

Unrelatedly, and I've posted this before, I think the unpopularity of the work compared to the others in Mahler's cannon is partially related to just how anti-modern the piece is. The blatantly religious themes, euphoric ending, massive production, and the lack of cynicism, all conspire to make something that belongs squarely in a pre-modern world. Mahler's oft been called the "herald of modernism", but the 8th sounds more like the "finale of romanticism". Thus, we end up with a work that was considered Mahler's greatest when it was written but now is considered one of his weakest.


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

Mandryka said:


> I typically do this when listening to *music and Mahler's 8th symphony*


Are they disjoint sets? :lol:


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

BachIsBest said:


> I accidentally chose the "sit down; Is" option, when I should have chosen the movement option. That being said, I pace when I listen to music as I generally focus on things better when I pace (I sometimes even pace when reading). I feel if you're going on a jog or a walk while listening to Mahler's 8th, you probably aren't devoting your entire attention to the music, whereas, as I said, pacing is often a method to help you focus on the music.
> 
> Unrelatedly, and I've posted this before, I think the unpopularity of the work compared to the others in Mahler's cannon is partially related to just how anti-modern the piece is. The blatantly religious themes, euphoric ending, massive production, and the lack of cynicism, all conspire to make something that belongs squarely in a pre-modern world. Mahler's oft been called the "herald of modernism", but the 8th sounds more like the "finale of romanticism". Thus, we end up with a work that was considered Mahler's greatest when it was written but now is considered one of his weakest.


I actually think it is one of his most Modern works (his most?) harmonically and stylistically, but your points are valid. Its spirit is not "hip" among modernists.


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## BachIsBest (Feb 17, 2018)

BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist said:


> I actually think it is one of his most Modern works (his most?) harmonically and stylistically, but your points are valid. Its spirit is not "hip" among modernists.


Harmonically, it may be slightly more modern, although I don't think he's really going beyond stuff already done by Wagner or Strauss. Stylistically, I don't buy it at all, for the reasons in my previous post.


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