“ ‘Big’ defines Mahler, who died a century ago this month, on May 18, 1911, in Vienna,” writes Richard Scheinin in Saturday’s (5/7) San Jose Mercury News (California). “His symphonies—there are nine, plus an unfinished tenth—are worlds unto themselves, he once said. They can be overwhelming, spilling over with angst, loss and joy, at once heaven-bound and earthbound, steeped in the sounds he heard as a boy in eastern Bohemia: marching band music, klezmer music, high church music, Bohemian dances and the sounds of nature. Conductor Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony are in the midst of a two-week Mahler celebration at Davies Symphony Hall, before heading off on a European tour honoring the Mahler centenary with stops in Vienna, Prague and elsewhere. This comes on the heels of two recent episodes in the orchestra’s ‘Keeping Score’ series on PBS, both about Mahler, with Tilson Thomas walking the streets of Mahler’s youth and obviously feeling very close to the composer whom many regard (to quote Tilson Thomas) as ‘the supreme symphonist.’ ” Scheinin interviews Tilson Thomas at length in the article about Mahler and the Keeping Score project.
Posted May 10, 2011
