About this concert
When Gustav Mahler came to Amsterdam to conduct the Dutch premiere of his First Symphony in 1903, a close collaboration started – so began the Concertgebouw Orchestra’s much-vaunted Mahler tradition. Klaus Mäkelä steps into that tradition with respect and self-confidence. He previously gave stunning interpretations of the Sixth and the Third; at the Concertgebouw’s Mahler Festival he conducts the First and the monumental Eighth Symphony.
Mahler wrote to his friend Willem Mengelberg, then chief conductor of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, that his Eighth Symphony was his greatest work ever: ‘All the others have led up to this one.’ Mahler composed the music as if it had been dictated to him in a vision. Indeed, he claimed have written an ode to the entire universe in two monumental movements. ‘These are no longer human voices, but planets and suns revolving,’ he said. From a practical perspective, too, it is a large-scale work. Mahler often called for a very large number of performers, and the Eighth, his ‘Symphony of a Thousand’ is scored for nearly 400 or more: in 1912, Mengelberg conducted a version featuring 2,000 musicians and singers.
You can still enjoy this concert:
- Live at the Mahler Pavilion in the Vondelpark (entry free of charge)
- On Dutch TV – Live on NPO 2 Extra and on NPO 2 on Sunday 18 May at 11.30 PM
‘These are no longer human voices, but planets and suns revolving.’
