# Understanding Mahler's 5th, Part 2



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Understanding Mahler's Fifth Symphony

*Part 2: I - Trauermarsch

Form*

0:00~2:02 Trumpet calls, theme A (C-sharp Minor)
2:02~4:01 Trumpet calls, variation on A (C-sharp minor)
4:01~4:29 Theme B (A-flat major)
4:29~5:18 Variation on theme A (C-sharp minor)

5:18~6:55 Stormy Interruption, theme C (B-flat minor)
6:55~8:52 Trumpet calls, variation on theme A (C-sharp minor)
8:52~9:42 Variation on Theme B (D-flat major)

9:42~11:23 Timpani, Variant on theme C (A minor)
11:23~12:30 Trumpet calls, Coda (C-sharp minor)

*Themes*

The trumpet call that opens the symphony and runs throughout its first movement.









The funeral march theme, A.









A mournful, sighing theme, B.









A wide leap to an appoggiatura, crucial throughout this and the following movements.









A new theme, derived from A, which will become the second theme of the next movement.









*Analysis*

A lone trumpet opens the symphony with a fanfare figure outlining a C-sharp minor triad. It moves down the scale in a stern dotted rhythm, then up in triplets. The full orchestra enters suddenly on an A major triad. The trumpet continues to move in its martial dotted rhythm, and the orchestra moves through D major and E-flat major to a half-cadence on G-sharp. Now the triplets of the opening are taken up by the whole orchestra, as trills and tremolos in the lower strings pull the music further downwards. Trombones begin a solemn procession, and the orchestra, remaining on the dominant of C-sharp minor, dissolves in a haze of timpani, bass drum, and tam-tam.

Now a mournful theme, clearly in C-sharp minor, is taken up by the violins, lightly backed by pizzicato from the low strings. The dotted rhythms of earlier appear, first in the accompaniment, and then in the melody itself, and the melody moves from violins to cellos. The procession returns, with the trombones now supported by clarinets and bassoons, and again settles on G-sharp. This leads to a repeat of the opening trumpet call, now backed by full orchestra. Although the scoring differs considerably, the path is much the same, and it leads as before to the mournful theme, which is varied and rescored, with a new countermelody for cello coming to the fore. The theme settles down and comes to rest briefly.

A new theme with a stoic character enters in the winds in the key of A-flat major, marked by a similar dotted rhythm as before. Before it can build any momentum, however, it breaks off in mid-sentence for the strings to reply in C-sharp minor with a variation on the first theme, and the rest of the orchestra follows suit, settling on D-flat minor.

The trumpet again sounds its call, but the orchestra breaks in without warning in the key of B-flat minor; the flutes leap upwards to an appoggiatura and the trumpet takes up a new theme, that of the second movement. The upper strings writhe wildly and impulsively against the unmoving horns and the stolid lower strings. When the trumpet call, now a semitone lower, reappears against this background, the timpani flails back and forth on a tritone, and the horns move alongside the strings in triplets against the unchanging pulse, pushing the orchestra into a cadence in B-flat minor. The trumpet plays the theme of the second movement again, now against the cross-rhythm pulsation of the wind section. It trails off, and its theme is answered by strings and winds, then horns, ever more impassioned, as the appoggiaturas in the strings move upwards, leading to a climax in the orchestra. The horns and strings carry off the remnants of the themes and trail off against the reappearance of the trumpet call, once again in C-sharp minor (spelled as D-flat).

As before, the trumpet call and orchestra chords lead to a half-cadence, and theme A begins hesitantly, this time in the winds, punctuated by pauses for the brass processional. The strings are absent, save for a solo viola, strangely doubled by trumpet, playing an impassioned recitative. As the procession again comes to a brief rest, theme B reappears, this time in D-flat major, with the strings taking the lead. The woodwinds echo with the leap to an appoggiatura as during the earlier intrusion, and once again the theme is interrupted and closes tentatively in D-flat with a quotation from the Kindertotenlieder.

The opening trumpet call is now played by timpani, but the E is reinterpreted as the fifth of A minor, in which key the first violins take up a new theme against staccato figures in the seconds and another echo of the leap to an appoggiatura in the violas. The theme soon reveals itself as a variant of that heard earlier in B-flat. Unlike earlier, the mood is dark but restrained, but it grows wilder as the wide leaps continue upward, leading to the climax of the movement, an extension of the appoggiatura from earlier over an E pedal. The orchestra begins to dissipate in a sea of tremolo and chromatic motion, but the trumpet theme from the beginning returns, and before long is playing solo. It trails off, and a solemn chorale punctuates between the trumpet's interjections, bringing the music firmly back into C-sharp minor. The fanfare is twice more sounded, answered by the clicking of col legno strings, and then rises twice more in trumpet and once more in the flute, with nothing more than the low rumble of the bass drum as a response. A final pizzicato C-sharp from the low strings brings the movement to a close.

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