More Than A Journey Across The Lake

On the haphazard journey that I am taking through Mahler's symphonies in this blog, we come to Symphony No 7 played by the Berliner Philharmoniker conducted by Claudio Abbado in a live performance from Berlin. This is one of the Mahler symphonies without any vocal contribution and it is also maybe the most unambiguously affirmative. He was suffering some kind of composer's block when writing it but was apparently kick started by a boat journey across a lake and the sound of the oars which gave him a rhythm for the opening movement. It isn't really the classic journey from darkness into light but the mood and colour of the symphony does lighten progressively as the journey proceeds. Familiar elements from the symphonies are there, the pastoral, the country dances, some more brooding elements. But it is the soaring use of bells in the finale that give the ultimate affirmation that man is capable of triumphing on his journey and there is a point to making the effort. Throughout this particular series of reecordings, the Berlin Phil and Abbado are in excellent form and the live recording ends with applause and the compulsory appearance of braying "bravo" man a millisecond after the final chord.