It should be enough just to be hear Mahler's 8th live, anywhere anytime, and it seems lots agree - it always manages to sell out. Last night's Sydney Symphony Season Opening Gala in a bronzed golden dressed Concert Hall was no exception with a sell-out crowd. My problem was that I was more excited about it before the performance than afterwards, unlike last week's Mahler 1 when expectations were lower and I wasn't the only one leaving the hall punching the air with a 'yes..yes' as if we'd just won some football final.
Perhaps it is a bit of a curse with the big one - the expectation that big enough will be good enough and sure to get you to Heaven by sheer size. I think this is the fourth live Mahler 8 I've heard (they don't come around here all that often) with the last being Edo de Waart's (SSO) 2000 Olympic Concert in the vast arena now sponsor-named Acer or similar. And I tried to be ready - I worked through it (my old Solti on vinyl) 3 times in the last week. But it still catches me by surprise, the first movement anyway. There is enough shifting of gears and keys to make it still disturbingly unfamiliar as was Mahler's intent I suppose, the unsettling unpredictable clashing tumultuous conflict of this blighted existence. The second movement's realisation of ascendency and acceptance into the Presence is more digestible at a superficial level but no less dense in its roots from the first (movement).
I didn't get to Heaven; nearly maybe, except that with Heaven there is no nearly. It wasn't because of the lack of some very fine moments. The choral work was beautiful and more than enough in itself to be thankful you were there. Perhaps some of the sound was trapped up the top under the overhang, but how these forces maintained such unison of articulation and balance was a wonder in itself. I wanted the Waldung, sie schwankt heran to go on forever - that would have been Heaven.
And of the femaile soloists, the Russian Marina Shaguch virtually stole the show with a voluptuos rich soprano with the weight to take on the orchestra and Simon O'Neill's Doctor Marianus gave me my one fleeting goosebump heart skip moment with his glorious emotional invocation of the Virgin Mary.
There were a few gremlins nonetheless. The audience behaved impeccably as exhorted but not the poltergeists, who like some defiant moments from the exorcist managed to fling Mr Ashkenazy's spectacles to the floor and then later throw a walking stick or the like to the ground in clatter of outrage at the stillness and beauty of the moment.
C commented afterwards that things sounded very congested where they sat (front stalls) and that on reflection the De Waart Olympic performance was better if for no other reason than it had more air. The issue of venue is pretty relevant. We were front circle and I think that was too close as well. No wonder they built a purpose build venue for the first performance. I wonder what it is like to hear it somewhere like The Royal Albert Hall perhaps.
The orchestra played on, and on, and on, untidy moments notwithstanding Mr A's attempts to keep things together. Olympics is where this exercise belongs. And lots of training. I don't know how much rehearsal time something like this needs, but I think this needed a little more. If I sound ungrateful, I don't mean to be. It is just that Heaven is really hard to get to.
The programme notes mention that "The limited edition recording of the Sydney Symphony's performance with Edo de Waart in 2000 was never released commercially - if you own a copy, keep it well". I'd love to hear that again. I well remember the sopranos, they had the right stuff - Alessandra Marc, Elizabeth Connell, and I think Mater Gloriosa was Shu-Cheen Yu.
