Mahler: Symphony No 2, 1st movement (Valery Gergiev, London Symphony Orchestra)

[esmhorn]

What a great time for the assistant horn to decide to re-string his 3rd valve...it looks like he had a spare length of string handy luckily. Who carries spare rotor string with them?! And why didn't he do that before he got on stage? Its not like the assistant plays till halfway through the first page anyways.

[xjoshx18]

i love 3:42 !

[ChelsLin123]

heehee

1:06-1:08...poor horn player... D:

[jellington90]

I could click 0:04 all day

[daspianist]

This is wonderful.. is there moar? I'd love to buy a DVD of this.

[Susannekaffeekanne]

1:06 Hornists.... :D

[bountyhun98]

armstrong band? 2:30

[y7u7r7i]

Mahler´s first is so criticized, yet so beautifully orchestrated and so powerfull... For me, this second symphony sounds as a clear continuation of the first, wich makes me like it even more!!

[peytonjmusic]

wow these guys move around alot when they play

[keemez]

@peytonjmusic

Pretty annoying, isn't it? There seems to be some contagious disease among classical musicians that makes them think they have to bob and weave like boxers. All it really does is distract from the otherwise reverent aura of a professional orchestra.

[physphilmusic]

@keemez Has it ever entered your mind that they might be doing it out of their own free will? Unlike many people who say they enjoy classical music so that they can claim that they are part of some "higher", "reverent" culture, I feel the music in my blood and bones when I play and also when I watch. Moving around occurs naturally to me and to many of my fellow orchestral musicians, since we are not supposed to make faces as orchestral players. WHY THE HELL DO WE HAVE TO STAY STILL???!!!

[rreemmzzrruullee]

this is so amazing. i believe Gergiev truely conducts this better than bernstein did.

[GregHales]

Have not been the biggest Gergiev person lately, some of his Mahler reminds me of Solti, loud and fast...to much of a hurry to reach the end of the page. Why? he has to catch a plane to another gig? get some vodka? Let the music unfold naturally.

[sfrenchhorn07]

@GregHales I was just thinking the same thing. My favorite recording of the Mahler 2 is the Bernstein NYPO recording from the 80s on DG. In it Bernstein seems to be able to be much better in tune with the ebb and flow of the music than Gergiev.

[Epmonito]

Wow, the first chair horn is still trying to fix his strings during this whole movement! Hope he actually gets it fix and merrily on his way playing the important parts!

[EDGJZConglomerate]

LSO Live/Gergiev/Mahler 2 is one of the best recordings EVER! This piece is something more than music. It's . . . hyper-musical. There is nothing else quite like it. Mahler was a magician.

[scabycat]

@EDGJZConglomerate " one of the best recordings ever" - u should hear the royal liverpool philharmonic Mahler 2 under Gerard Schwarze - Recorded live in the philharmonic Hall with its vastly superior accustics- it is in a completely different league to this performance.

[Sinfoniahorn]

Love the flutist with the Live Strong bracelet.

[tomorocko]

Sounds great! does anyone know where this is being performed

[bherr4562]

@tomorocko Barbican Hall - Barbican Centre - London



[TheDukeOfEd99]

good orchestras know how to listen to eachother which is why they play so well as a group, the conductor just provides a sort of guideline

[gordonjacobtbn]

I would hate to play for that guy... where's the beat? lol

[RtasVadumeeKostas]

They're kinda cramped in there :P

[lavkod1]

Gergiev is in my opinion the best Conductor of the present day along with Barenboim and Abbado.

[HPTX911]

Gergiev conducts like a demon...GREAT!!

[gatorsbrianz]

Why do conductors think they need to look crazy to be good? He looks ridiculous and is hard to read.

[TheDukeOfEd99]

@gatorsbrianz conducting is like crack, once the adrenaline starts flowing you can't help it

[Clarimans]

Ridiculous! How does an orchestral player make a clean entrance with a cue like the one Gergiev gives at the beginning? Actually, I know the answer: don't watch the conductor. Love his performances though!

[R33TAKUYA]

おお！カスケードブラックホールだ！

[Violetatorelli]

Simply extraordinary! Perfect version of a monumental symphony. Bravo, Maestro! Many thanks!

[jhughesy1]

the conductor looks like he should be named Igor.

[rolask8er]

@jhughesy1 lol

[MrAlgykcho]

Simon Rattle is better in this symp. Also Abbado, you can also remember Walter..

Gergiev still better in Russan music.

[PENNSY671E]

I've performed this a few times with good amateur orchaestras and have seen my share of conductors.. This man has to be one of the most unorthodox of them all.. I watch him & am amazed how the players manage to follow. The critics said the same thing about Furtwangler - a legend in his own time. Perhaps this Gergiev will also become legendary, too.

[fcmilsweeper9]

I despise conductors like this...especially on concertos when you're a percussionist and counting rests can be much a blur...a imprecise conductor can mess you up a lot

[PENNSY671E]

I can certainly appreciate your frustration with an unclear beat. This has to be especially true with 20th Century repertoire..You must feel like tearing your hair out.

[theguyi26]

I agree. The beginning, he waves his hands madly and no one plays anything. I'm like, ok this video has no audio. Then the sound comes out. I'm like, ok the audio is out of sync. But it isn't! Weird-ass conductor!

[themusicalmoose]

haha I like the guy fixing his horn at 1:05, even professional players have problems sometimes, lol

[themusicalmoose]

he's still playing with it throughout the rest of the song, like 3:47

[theguyi26]

@themusicalmoose HAHA wtf he's like all-out repairing it.

[Prismer6]

@themusicalmoose The poor guy is trying to fix it the entire video...Haha he never plays a note.

[11235813211231853211]

one of my favorite symphonies. check out the recording of zubin mehta with the weiner philharminic and the vienna choir. you can also get it really cheap on amazon (i think its aound 8 dollars)

[MariBEllada]

Грандиозная музыка!

[alejoeisabel]

I recommed checking out the Christian Vasquez conducting the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra, Mahler 2

It is mind blowing.

[mahler151]

Oh man, no baton. first time watching this conductor and he's already one of my favorites!

[NateCan2]

i think he used a tooth pick as a baton once, which is really awesome

[mahler151]

Ahaha, that is awsome!

[losackp]

This is quite possibly my favorite symphony.

This recording is among my personal favorites. The "Urlicht" movement, I think, is quite superior. This is a wonderful recording. I have been listening to it exclusively for almost a year and a half. Thank you for the video. Bravo!

[GB4ManU7fan]

Damn, some of you guys know A LOT about Symphonies and Orchestas. I just got into this music, it's so beautiful.

[carpalton]

Historically, the two violin sections were almost always on opposite sides. That's why composers from Haydn to Mahler wrote "antiphonal" exchanges between the two sections, bouncing back and forth across the room.

Stokowski popularized the "modern" arrangement of having all violins on one side and all the basses on the other. Today conductors change the seating depending on the orchestra. But the divided-violin setup is the one Mahler originally wrote for (and used as conductor).

[MaestroKyle2009]

Why does he have the cellos and basses in the middle on the left side of the stage? Seems a bit strange and unorthodox.

[Lso]

Hello Maestro! Gergiev prefers this arrangement for the strings - it has historical precedents in the repertoire he tends to do with the LSO, but I think he actually just prefers the balance. For the players themselves there are both positives and negatives on sitting in this arrangement, depending on which section you belong to!

Other conductors (eg Sir Colin Davis) prefer the orchestra set out in the more traditional way we are used to here.

[az111za]

Please this matter has wondered me for a long time & till know !

I want to understand the idea of arranging strigs

[az111za]

Why do most conductors nowadays prefer to put the Viola section at their right & then the Cello section beside the Violas?

[az111za]

neither the classic arrangement of putting the Cello section at the right of the conductor & then the Viola section beside the Cellos

[az111za]

also what about the strange arrangement by maestro Gergiev? I'm sorry I have a lot of questions But I hope I can get an answer

[Lso]

Hiya - well as said above it's all down to personal preferences in balance of the strings. Sometimes it's the 2nd violins that go on the right - in this case its to bring out the antiphony in the music, for example in Brahms Sym No 3. Fashions for string layouts have come and gone for 100s of years - in fact in LSO of the 60s and 70s the double basses often sat in a long line at the back of the strings rather than on one side.

[Lso]

So the layout that's normal to us today would probably be viewed by conductors of the past as odd! Individual conductors make choices as to how they want the stringts laid out, and do change this depending on what the repertoire being played is.

[kongming819]

@Lso The current recognized layout as most people recognize it was set out in the 1920s by Stokowski. This format that Gergiev is using is what I call the Gewandhausorchester layout, since that orchestra has been using the same layout since its inception, I think, which is a very very very long time ago.

[michaeljones17]

why don't you try looking up your history before you start passing opinions. Arturo Toscanini had the cellos sit on the inside of the section so that recordings would be more balanced between bass and violin. Only common sense to have such a HUGE cello and bass soli to put them together and in the center.

[MaestroKyle2009]

That's personal taste just as much as the accoustics of the recording studio or concert hall. I listen to the Colorado Symphony all the time, and when they played this, the cellos and basses were in their "normal" places; right of the violas, who were center, with violins together on the left. I know that's how Toscanini did it; not many do it that way today due to better recording and mixing equipment. I understand where you're comming from though.

[thonyus]

@MaestroKyle2009 I seem to remember being told by Maestro Harold Farberman that Mahler used this seating arrangement for his performances of all his symphonies (a lot of passages in Mahler 10 make more sense when bearing this in mind). Curiously, though, Gergiev puts the horns behind the winds; Mahler had them leftstage of the winds, and the other brass rightstage of the winds. Maybe it was to facilitate the onstage-ofstage scrambles.

[kenalebla]

@MaestroKyle2009 My understanding is that the early recording industry is mostly responsible for the arrangement of the modern orchestra (or at least how we would normally see it today). It was more effective, with regards to early recording technology, to have all the high strings on one side and the lower strings on the other side. Unfortunately, most orchestras still adhere to this even though it ruins the antiphonal violin writing featured in much of the music written before the practice.

[rigcelli]

Marvelous Gergiev!!!!!!!!!!

[Biber0315]

What strange conducting!

[gustavyeung]

I have noticed his "shaking fingers" during his Vienna years and as an orchestra player I also doubt the effectiveness of it. But talking about the sound, that is great.

[Biber0315]

I was talking about the down beat

[StefkeUK]

Maurice Murphy and James Watson on first trumpet. What a treat !!!!.