New Arrivals/Restock

Title: Symphony 4
Artist: Sampson Minnesota Orchestra Vanska
Label: Bis
Product Type: SUPER-AUDIO CD
UPC: 7318599923567
Genre: Classical
Release Date: 2020-01-03
Number of Discs: 1
Additional Details: HYBRID SACD

In Gustav Mahler's first four symphonies many of the themes originate in his own settings of folk poems from the collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy's Magic Horn). A case in point, Symphony No.?4 is built around a single song, Das himmlische Leben (The Heavenly Life) which Mahler had composed some eight years earlier, in 1892. The song presents a child's vision of Heaven and is hinted at throughout the first three movements. In the fourth, marked 'Sehr behaglich' (Very comfortably), the song is heard in full from a solo soprano instructed by Mahler to sing: 'with serene, childlike expression; completely without parody!' The symphony is scored for a typically large, late-romantic orchestra (though without trombones and tuba) and an extensive percussion section which includes sleigh bells as well as glockenspiel. However, Mahler mostly deploys his forces with a transparency and lightness more akin to chamber music or eighteenth-century models like Mozart or Haydn. The Fourth has become one of his best-loved symphonies and is here performed by Minnesota Orchestra and Osmo Vänskä, joined by the angelic voice of English soprano Carolyn Sampson.

Tracks:
1.1 I. Bedächtig. Nicht Eilen
1.2 II. in Gemächlicher Bewegung. Ohne Hast
1.3 III. Ruhevoll (Poco Adagio)
1.4 V. Sehr Behaglich