# For Those Who Like the Climactic Ending of Mahler's 3rd



## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

Start listening at 48.00:






Come on, the greatness here is undeniable.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

Did he model this on Mahler 3, I wonder? Not that I'm criticising him - far from it, I really liked what I heard 

Thanks for introducing me to Casella; I'll have to investigate further...


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## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

Reichstag aus LICHT said:


> Did he model this on Mahler 3, I wonder? Not that I'm criticising him - far from it, I really liked what I heard
> 
> Thanks for introducing me to Casella; I'll have to investigate further...


I have recommended him many times now (learned about him from TC) but I think the problem is that no one is actually listening to the music. Damn good stuff here.


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## Stirling (Nov 18, 2015)

Did not like - there are better things to listen to.


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## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

There are two kinds of listeners for classical music, those who have to be told that it's okay to like something, and those who can hear quality long before it is culturally acceptable.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

By the very nature of the limited current popularity of classical music (see any number of other threads) it would seem that most CM listeners have long since gotten past caring about what is culturally acceptable.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Klassic said:


> There are two kinds of listeners for classical music, those who have to be told that it's okay to like something, and those who can hear quality long before it is culturally acceptable.


Let me guess, you're of the latter; a listener of such discerning taste, that taste having been gifted unto them from some supreme office of divinity, that it would be folly to disagree with them lest one be made out a fool? Give me a break.


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## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

Crudblud said:


> Let me guess, you're of the latter; a listener of such discerning taste, that taste having been gifted unto them from some supreme office of divinity, that it would be folly to disagree with them lest one be made out a fool? Give me a break.


Bit over-exaggerated here.

I don't need to be told that Casella is a quality composer, I never wait for approval. I would suggest you follow my example and do the same.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Reichstag aus LICHT said:


> Did he model this on Mahler 3, I wonder? Not that I'm criticising him - far from it, I really liked what I heard
> 
> Thanks for introducing me to Casella; I'll have to investigate further...


Me too :tiphat:


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## GioCar (Oct 30, 2013)

Klassic said:


> Start listening at 48.00:
> 
> 
> 
> ...




I'm happy you are so enthusiastic about Casella. His music really deserves to be better known and played.
Actually he has always been much more popular for his works as a scholar and a piano teacher. He also was a well-known piano virtuoso.
Just before WWII he made very important contributions to the Vivaldi re-discovery, and he also published many critical revisions of various famous piano works.
I have his Bach's WTC and Beethoven's 32 Sonatas score editions with his original commentary. A very interesting and inspiring reading.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Klassic said:


> Bit over-exaggerated here.
> 
> I don't need to be told that Casella is a quality composer, I never wait for approval. I would suggest you follow my example and do the same.


What's your point, that I must be following the herd because I'm not amazed by Casella? Well baaaaaaaa to you, I don't need your approval ─ or disapproval, for that matter ─ to hear what I hear, which, unfortunately for Casella, ain't all that much in this case.

You say that this is for those who like Mahler 3, but right away it seems to me that the orchestration has none of the subtlety or sensitivity of Mahler, rather it leans more towards film score sensationalism, concerned with producing over-the-top effects rather than presenting the material in a way that could at all be described as interesting. Indeed, listening to it, it is as though Casella endeavoured with this symphony to emulate all the ridiculous qualities found in Mahler by the critics of his time. I don't want to attack the composer without good cause, however ─ I'm sure most of us know all too well how easily misrepresentation in performance can reflect badly on the composer themselves ─ so I listened to the live performance by Noseda and the hr-Sinfonieorchester, also on YouTube. Unfortunately I found nothing to convince me that any fault lied with the performers, in fact the sound was pretty much identical despite the different conductor and orchestra.

Casella is all storms in this symphony, or at least he really wants to appear that way, but the music seems more like some workaday score from old Hollywood, a thin and gutless sonic paste of a condiment to go on top of something equally dull in the visual department, than a violent clash of the elements. Of course I don't really believe in representation of the extramusical in music, so that's by the by from my perspective, nonetheless it is enough to say that this symphony is far from gripping to my ear. Normally on a second listen I would at least be getting something from it that I had missed the first time around, and yet here there is nothing. This case has proven true for me with quite a few acclaimed composers whose music I simply cannot endure, the music of Korngold being a prime example of something which exhibits the same overblown "cinematic" qualities that I find here, and it just doesn't sound good to me.

Different strokes for different folks, as they say, and that is a saying which goes both ways, so maybe you should reconsider this business of insisting that people who disagree with you are part or victim of some conspiracy of "cultural acceptability."


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Crudblud said:


> it leans more towards film score sensationalism ... the music seems more like some workaday score from old Hollywood


Given that the symphony was composed in 1909, you can at least grant that Casella was a couple of decades ahead of his time?


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Nereffid said:


> Given that the symphony was composed in 1909, you can at least grant that Casella was a couple of decades ahead of his time?


Yes, that's perfectly reasonable, but I think focusing on which of those, Casella or film music, came first is missing the point. The point being that I don't like the aesthetic, and furthermore that it is possible to dislike the aesthetic without being some kind of hybrid of man and sheep.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Crudblud said:


> Casella is all storms in this symphony, or at least he really wants to appear that way, but the music seems more like some workaday score from old Hollywood, a thin and gutless sonic paste of a condiment to go on top of something equally dull in the visual department, than a violent clash of the elements. . . . This case has proven true for me with quite a few acclaimed composers whose music I simply cannot endure, the music of Korngold being a prime example of something which exhibits the same overblown "cinematic" qualities that I find here, and it just doesn't sound good to me.


I disagree wholeheartedly! This would have made an excellent score from old Hollywood (anachronistic as this is applied to a work from 1909  ) - Like for that Viking movie where they are looking for the giant golden bell and they hear it through the fog. And if I had had something exciting to watch on the screen while I was listening, I might have sat through more than one movement. But you would have had to nail my hands to the chair to get me to listen to the whole thing. Of course, I have the same reaction to Mahler's Third. Not the Fifth and Sixth, which I think are very good.


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## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

In my opinion the subtlety of the themes, as well as the counterpoint, make this a bonafide symphony. But look what's going on here, people are poisoning the well. Let's just say, for the sake of being done with this ad hominem, there is no symphony in the world that sounds more like a film score, so what! Is the music here good or bad, does Casella express quality? Damn right he does. This music is very much like Mahler.

*"...it leans more towards film score sensationalism, concerned with producing over-the-top effects rather than presenting the material in a way that could at all be described as interesting. Indeed, listening to it, it is as though Casella endeavoured with this symphony to emulate all the ridiculous qualities found in Mahler by the critics of his time." *

This makes me sad because it means you're not hearing Casella.

"Ridiculous qualities found in Mahler?" Yikes, *Mahlerian* help!


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## Xaltotun (Sep 3, 2010)

Klassic said:


> There are two kinds of listeners for classical music, those who have to be told that it's okay to like something, and those who can hear quality long before it is culturally acceptable.


'sright, that's Beckmesser and Walther right there. But Hans Sachs, who combines the two, has the most profound vision, I think.


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## Klassic (Dec 19, 2015)

GioCar said:


> I'm happy you are so enthusiastic about Casella. His music really deserves to be better known and played.


I am even happier you introduced me to him. 

I suspect you would agree: one does not come across music like this very often, even as one does not come across music like Mahler's very often. The way Casella's symphonies are woven together (his musical language) is a delight to me. I don't try to do a deep technical analysis on his music, I simply try to enjoy its expression and message, which are both very great indeed.


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