Arts, Faculty of
Music, School of
DSpace
UBCV
Vici, Gabriella
Master of Arts - MA
University of British Columbia
Hybridity in music is most often considered a late-twentieth-century phenomenon. However, for those original turn-of-the-century musical modernists, particularly Gustav Mahler, such heterogeneity can be seen as a central feature of their compositional habits and modes of expression. Mahler’s fin-de-siècle hybridity manifests not only in the vibrant yet underexplored space between quotation and allusion, as in late-twentieth-century polystylism and Charles Ives’ prewar collage techniques, but also in narrative, programmaticism, and hyperbolized use of topic. While analysts of Mahler often note a marked heterogeneity in his works, no theoretical framework has hitherto been applied to interpret this crucial aspect of his oeuvre. In exploring this illuminating analytical perspective, I draw upon a variety of theoretical constructs to interpret several of Mahler’s symphonic movements. Central to this approach is Bruno Alcalde’s framework of mixture strategies; although initially intended for the likes of post- war composers such as Alfred Schnittke and George Rochberg, Alcalde demonstrates that this system can be applied as a flexible, ostensibly neutral tool to any works featuring hybrid environments. Furthermore, since the expression of style and genre in Mahler is often heavily tied to the exaggeration or distortion of topics, I supplement Alcalde’s strategies with both narrative and topic theory, placing particular emphasis on Robert Hatten’s concept of “troping.” Rounding out this core set of techniques is a theoretical repurposing of Theodor Adorno’s concept of novelistic “characters,” which I apply as a construct for understanding how hybrid environments play out on the thematic level. By combining these diverse analytical methods into one, adaptable theoretical approach, my ultimate aims are both to anatomize the mechanisms of Mahler’s hybridity technique and to interpret this prominent compositional feature as an enlightening link between an intricate web of signification and the music itself.
Glorious Disunity through Referential Interplay: Hybridity Processes in Mahler’s Symphonic Works by Gabriella Vici A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in The Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (Music Theory) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) April 2023 © Gabriella Vici, 2023 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommended to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies for acceptance, the thesis entitled: Glorious Disunity through Referential Interplay: Hybridity Processes in Mahler’s Symphonic Works submitted by Gabriella Vici in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Music Examining Committee: John Roeder, Professor, Music Theory, UBC Supervisor David Metzer, Professor, Musicology, UBC Additional Examiner iii Abstract Hybridity in music is most often considered a late-twentieth-century phenomenon. However, for those original turn-of-the-century musical modernists, particularly Gustav Mahler, such heterogeneity can be seen as a central feature of their compositional habits and modes of expression. Mahler’s fin-de-siècle hybridity manifests not only in the vibrant yet underexplored space between quotation and allusion, as in late-twentieth-century polystylism and Charles Ives’ prewar collage techniques, but also in narrative, programmaticism, and hyperbolized use of topic. While analysts of Mahler often note a marked heterogeneity in his works, no theoretical framework has hitherto been applied to interpret this crucial aspect of his oeuvre. In exploring this illuminating analytical perspective, I draw upon a variety of theoretical constructs to interpret several of Mahler’s symphonic movements. Central to this approach is Bruno Alcalde’s framework of mixture strategies; although initially intended for the likes of post-war composers such as Alfred Schnittke and George Rochberg, Alcalde demonstrates that this system can be applied as a flexible, ostensibly neutral tool to any works featuring hybrid environments. Furthermore, since the expression of style and genre in Mahler is often heavily tied to the exaggeration or distortion of topics, I supplement Alcalde’s strategies with both narrative and topic theory, placing particular emphasis on Robert Hatten’s concept of “troping.” Rounding out this core set of techniques is a theoretical repurposing of Theodor Adorno’s concept of novelistic “characters,” which I apply as a construct for understanding how hybrid environments play out on the thematic level. By combining these diverse analytical methods into one, adaptable theoretical approach, my ultimate aims are both to anatomize the mechanisms of Mahler’s hybridity technique and to interpret this prominent compositional feature as an enlightening link between an intricate web of signification and the music itself. iv Lay Summary Musical hybridity—the combination of references, allusions and other such signifying components in musical work—is a concept most often associated with late-twentieth century compositional practices. However, this heterogeneity can also be seen as a central feature of Gustav Mahler’s turn-of-the-century symphonic works, manifesting in music that features patterns of fragmentation, exaggeration and discontinuity. Yet, these characteristics are often downplayed to secondary parameters, and as such Mahler’s hybridity techniques are yet to receive dedicated theoretical attention. This thesis addresses this gap in knowledge by combining a variety of analytical techniques into an adaptable theoretical approach aimed at recognizing, anatomizing and interpreting hybridity in Mahler. In so doing, I hope to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of Mahler’s music, that deemphasizes a long-standing aesthetic and analytical focus on musical unity to instead showcase the complex disunity that lies at the core of Mahler’s compositional style. v Preface This thesis is original, unpublished, independent work by the author, Gabriella Vici. vi Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iii Lay Summary ................................................................................................................................. iv Preface ............................................................................................................................................. v Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................... vi List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... vii List of Examples .......................................................................................................................... viii Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... x Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1 ...................................................................................................................................... 11 Chapter 2 ...................................................................................................................................... 47 Chapter 3 ...................................................................................................................................... 80 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 130 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 132 vii List of Figures Figure 1.1. Overall form of Mahler’s Symphony No. 1/III………………………………. 26 Figure 1.2. Formal outline of No. 9/II……………………………………………………. 29 Figure 2.1. Seth Monahan’s sonata form interpretation of No. 3/I………………………. 49 Figure 2.2. Monahan’s staged development of the Pan theme…………………………… 55 Figure 2.3. Fixed referential space for Symphony No. 3/I……………………………….. 57 Figure 2.4. Fixed referential space for the Development of No. 3 /I, depicted in black…. 68 Figure 3.1. Seth Monahan’s interpretation of the sonata form of No. 7/I (excluding Development)……………………………………………………………………………... 84 Figure 3.2. Referential space for No. 7/I…………………………………………………. 91 Figure 3.3. Referential space for No. 7/II………………………………………………… 104 Figure 3.4. Referential space for No. 7/III……………………………………………….. 109 Figure 3.5. Alternative interpretation of the referential space of No. 7/III that considers the trio a signifying entity…………………………………………………………………. 110 Figure 3.6. Referential space for No. 7/IV……………………………………………….. 112 Figure 3.7. Referential space for No. 7/V………………………………………………… 119 Figure 3.8. Referential space for the entirety of the Seventh Symphony………………… 128 viii List of Examples Example 1.1. Combination of “Bruder Martin” with signifiers of the funeral march in the opening of Symphony No. I/III (mm. 1-23)………………………………………... 13 Example 1.2. Introduction of the Klezmer melodic material over the continuation of the funeral topic (mm. 39-44, with pickup)……………………………………………. 16 Example 1.3. First instance of Klezmer material proper (mm. 46-51)………………... 17 Example 1.4. Central section of the No. 1/III, expressing characteristics of both folksong and lullaby (mm. 83-9)………………………………………………………. 20 Example 1.5. Climactic triple application of clash, featuring the direct overlap of “Bruder Martin” and Klezmer material (mm. 138-49)………………………………… 23 Example 1.6. Ländler material, including the opening gesture, main theme and some associated motives (mm. 1-16)………………………………………………………… 30 Example 1.7. Further Ländler motives introduced in the opening section……………. 32 Example 1.8. Beginning of the first waltz section, introducing the W1 theme and the waltz-associated motives (mm. 90-106)……………………………………………….. 32 Example 1.9. W2 theme (mm. 147-154)……………………………………………….. 33 Example 1.10. First Ländler/waltz clash (mm. 167-76)………………………………. 36 Example 1.11. The first Tempo III slow Ländler (mm. 218-25)……………………… 38 Example 1.12. The second Tempo III slow Ländler, which additionally incorporates waltz motives (mm. 252-60)…………………………………………………………… 39 Example 2.1. Weckruf theme (mm. 1-10), written pitch)……………………………... 53 Example 2.2. Expositional hybridity episode (mm. 315-40, with upbeat). Clash between Pan 3.1. and the major-mode Weckruf………………………………………... 62 Example 2.3. Excerpt from “The Rabble,” starting from the carnival-associated woodwind interruption (mm. 539-53)………………………………………………….. 65 Example 2.4. Onset of “The Battle Begins” (mm. 583-91, with pickup)……………... 71 Example 2.5. Fragmented opening of the Recapitulation proper (mm. 737-58)……… 74 Example 2.6. The first instance of alternating metrically-aligned and staggered-overlap clash in the Recapitulation (mm. 759-71)……………………………………... 76 Example 3.1. Opening of No. 7/I, featuring the funeral march and mystical topics (mm. 1-4)………………………………………………………………………………. 83 Example 3.2. The pseudo-waltz P2 theme in the Exposition (mm. 79-88)……………. 86 Example 3.3. Breakthrough “dream” episode at the end of the Development (mm. 317-21)…………………………………………………………………………………. 89 ix Example 3.4. Interjections of dream material in the Introduction reprise (mm. 352-63)……………………………………………………………………………………… 94 Example 3.5. Opening of No.7/II, featuring the horn call, birdsong and nature references (mm. 1-21)………………………………………………………………….. 96 Example 3.6. Carousel episode in No. 7/II (mm. 106-15)…………………………….. 101 Example 3.7. Schattenhaft material in the first main section of No. 7/III (mm. 13-28). 108 Example 3.8. Opening of No. 7/IV, establishing the circus topic, march and procession (mm. 1-13)…………………………………………………………………. 117 Example 3.9. First clash of Movement I material with Movement V (mm. 455-61)…. 123 Example 3.10. Ultimate overcoming of Movement I material (mm. 506-14)………… 126 x Acknowledgements I would primarily like to thank Dr. John Roeder for his patience, guidance and wisdom throughout the supervision process; his expertise has been invaluable to my development as a theorist. I am also very grateful to Dr. Leigh VanHandel for her generous mentorship throughout this degree, and Dr. David Metzer for his detailed feedback on this thesis. I am further indebted to Rafael Echevarria for our many conversations about Mahler and topic theory; Adele Marsland and Jason Lee for our study sessions and your support; and most of all, my friends and family for their ceaseless encouragement throughout all my studies. 1 Introduction Hybridity in music is most often considered a late-twentieth-century phenomenon. For such composers as Alfred Schnittke and George Rochberg, where it is specifically understood as polystylism, it is a concept apt for recognising and analytically interpreting the stylistic variegation manifested so prominently in many of their works.1 Yet, defined generally as the combination of referential or signifying elements in a work,2 hybridity is arguably not a recent postmodern invention, with the collage constructions of Charles Ives perhaps representing the most prominent pre-war example. However, for European musical modernists in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, such as Gustav Mahler, such heterogeneity could also be seen as a central feature of their compositional style and technique. Mahler’s fin-de-siècle hybridity is in many ways more subtle than Ives’ collage techniques or postwar examples of polystylism. It manifests in the vibrant yet underexplored space between quotation and allusion, as in late-twentieth-century polystylism, but also between narrative, programmaticism, and hyperbolized use of topic. It is due to this marked variety in referential components that I favor the term “hybridity” throughout this thesis, as it presents as a more generalized concept than alternative terms such as polystylism or collage. Yet, while analysts of Mahler often note a marked heterogeneity in his works and have studied his use of genre, no theoretical framework has hitherto been applied to interpret this crucial aspect of his oeuvre.3 In developing such a framework, I aim to show that this form of variegation 1 As per Alfred Schittke’s original definition of the term in his 1971 UNESCO lecture, titled “Polystylistic Tendencies of Modern Music,” reproduced in full in: Peter J. Schmelz, Sonic Overload: Alfred Schnittke, Valentin Sylvestrov, and Polystylism in the Late USSR (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), 355-8. 2 Bruno Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity: An Analytical Framework for Pluralist Music” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2017), 349. 3 This repertoire-wide heterogeneity has been observed by a number of authors, most notably in: Theodor W. Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1992), 31, 35, 46, 49; Theodor W. Adorno, “Mahler,” in Quasi una Fantasia, trans. Rodney Livingston (London: 2 in Mahler can act an invitation for further exploration rather than a negatively-coded phenomenon, antagonistic to a desire to find unity. Through the lens of hybridity, I intend to anatomize and interpret the fragmentation, referential conflict, patterns of exaggeration and stratification that are so integral to Mahler’s compositional fingerprint; as a result, links between complex webs of signification and the music itself can finally be explored. Of the many scholars who have discerned marked hybrid tendencies in Mahler, there are two in particular who discuss it at length: Julian Johnson and Theodor Adorno. Johnson’s 2009 book asserts that a perceived “opposition of plural voices defines Mahler’s music.”4 He further notes the sometimes “perverse” exaggeration of voice and genre which he claims distinguishes the heterogeneity in Mahler’s symphonies and songs from the typical generic variety found in these forms.5 Combined with instances of “constructed and self-conscious” borrowing (and indeed, self-borrowing),6 and episodic or “hybrid” treatment of form,7 Johnson observes overall characteristics of Mahler’s music that align with our understanding of later music. These are abrasive juxtapositions; “false simplicity” and “deliberate archaism” of the kind with which Stravinsky would later engage;8 generally chaotic depictions of the “polyphony of sounds in nature” that can be linked to Ives;9 and an often ironic treatment of borrowed materials that evokes an “historical tension” between past and present more typically associated with later artistic movements. It is my Verso, 1992): 87; Max Paddison, Adorno’s Aesthetics of Music (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993): 119-120, 152, 174; Julian Johnson, “Analysis in Adorno’s Aesthetics of Music,” review of Adorno’s Aesthetics of Music, by Max Paddison, Music Analysis 14 (1995): 309-310; Julian Johnson, Mahler’s Voices: Expression and Irony in the Songs and Symphonies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). For a consideration of genre, see especially Vera Micznik, “Mahler and ‘The Power of Genre’,” Journal of Musicology 12 (1994): 117-151. 4 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 5. 5 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 164; 102. 6 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 98. 7 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 106, 132. 8 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 149. 9 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 132. 3 intention to add a more analytical layer to this research, to better understand the compositional traits, mechanisms and processes created by these plural voices. At several points in his writings, Adorno highlights the fractured nature of Mahler’s music, which he attributes to multiple causes. One is the use of borrowed folk and popular material—“sand in the mechanism of purely musical construction”—a “brokenness” caused by the juxtaposition of high and low forms of art, the parading of the “vulgar” where it seemingly does not belong.10 This is closely tied with the idea of “potpourri” symphonic forms, works built from the “scattered elements” of contrasting motives, styles and allusions, and operating under their own, individual logic;11 for Adorno, this, in turn, inclines towards a “bottom up” approach for both listener and analyst, as he believes this best reflects Mahler’s compositional approach of building the “whole” from individual parts.12 At times, Adorno characterizes this relationship between the part and the whole as “aporetic,” often forming a deliberately unresolvable relationship between Mahler’s heteronomy (his forced potpourri technique) and the Viennese classical tradition,13 as well as a disillusioned Romanticism.14 For Adorno, the technical implication of this heteronomy is the idea that Mahler thinks not in terms of motive and archetypal form, but rather “complexes” and “fields,” with novel-like characteristics resulting in an episodic structure—all of which broadly aligns with Alcalde’s understanding of other hybrid works, which he breaks down into stratified spheres of material that coalesce into successions of “chimeric environments.”15 10 Theodor W. Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1992): 31, 35. 11 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 35. 12 Theodor W. Adorno, “Mahler,” in Quasi una Fantasia, trans. Rodney Livingston (London: Verso, 1992): 87. 13 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 49. 14 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 46. 15 Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 127. 4 From a broader philosophical perspective, Max Paddison, in his book on Adorno’s theories, relates the heterogeneity and disintegrative tendencies Adorno observes in Mahler to the concept of “handed-down genres and forms,” as well as the “second-hand” quality of his exaggerated use of topics. For Paddison, Mahler’s treatment and amalgamation of generic material deliberately exposes the seams within eighteenth- and nineteenth-century forms and practices; this undisguised patchwork construction of materials in movements and symphonies results in the formation of a “fractured whole.”16 This, in turn, ties in with Adorno’s suggestion that Mahler’s music is ultimately “dialectical” rather than “discursive,” the interaction of the “disordered voices of living things,”17 which Paddison believes manifests in the “mediation of form and content.”18 In his commentary on Paddison’s book, Julian Johnson makes all these obversions slightly more tangible, noting that this “exaggeration and overuse” of recognizable gestures is emblematic of mannerism, which, he suggests, might act as a useful tool in dissecting both the horizontal and vertical juxtapositions found in Mahler’s works. This perspective keeps the central tension between past and present at the fore and thus foregoes an ahistorical analysis in favor of recognizing the interplay between modernity and tradition so distinctive in Mahler’s works. Overall, Adorno’s writings on Mahler place greater emphasis on the abstract components imbued in the composer’s hybrid textures: the general intersection of compositional “fields” with individual voices, individual voices with each other, high and low, and the diametrically opposed manifestations of traditional and modernist material. By incorporating these nuances into my analysis I aim to deepen the relevance of hybridity analyses of Mahler’s works. 16 Max Paddison, Adorno’s Aesthetics of Music (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993): 119-120, 152, 174. 17 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 13-14. 18 Paddison, 156. 5 Throughout the course of this thesis, I invoke a variety of theories, which will be combined in various ways to meet the analytical needs of the music at hand. However, at the theoretical core of all my analyses are Bruno Alcalde’s mixture strategies. The appeal of Alcalde’s analytical framework is that it remains untethered to any one composer’s techniques. It takes the form of four dynamic processes in works containing hybrid environments.19 These are “clash,” an abrasive juxtaposition or superimposition (“overlap”), defined by sonic and conceptual “friction” that evokes “discontinuity, displacement” and “disjunction”;20 “coexistence,” where styles or genres combine smoothly via shared characteristics, sometimes creating a “third, compound identity”;21 “distortion,” where a topic or style is distorted by an agent with an undefined referential identity;22 and “trajectory,” which involves the gradual transformation from one style (or set of styles), to another, following an audible process that can include the other three mixture strategies along the way.23 However, rather than viewing the resulting form of Mahler’s works as the succession of hybridity episodes, I will argue that there is often a tension between the behaviour of hybridity episodes and the expectations of the generic formal and tonal designs of symphonic movements, such as sonata and rondo.24 The nature of these complexities differs tremendously between movements and works, and will be discussed in turn. 19 Bruno Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies: An Analytical Framework for Musical Hybridity,” Music Theory Online 28, no. 1 (2022); derived from Bruno Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” “Patterns of Hybridity: An Analytical Framework for Pluralist Music” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2017). 20 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.4-2.10. 21 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.13-16. 22 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.19. 23 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.27. 24 More specifically, Alcalde allots each process a diagrammatic symbol, and then combines these techniques in “hybridity plans” that visualize how individual episodes of mixture interact on a section- or piece-wide scale. Such diagrams interpret form as a succession of “chimeric environments,” where structure grows from the bottom up, out of the interaction between signifying entities. Due to the complex nature of hybridity in Mahler, I will use alternate methods to represent a movement’s referential landscape that are less contingent on there being a constant stream of hybridity episodes and that leave room for consideration of late nineteenth-century symphonic forms. Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 127. 6 Although Alcalde posits that trajectory is a distinctly late-twentieth-century technique, he invites the application of this theoretical construct to any works featuring hybrid environments,25 even encouraging the blurring of boundaries between categories, thereby enabling a sufficiently flexible framework for explicating a range of works over varying time periods.26 Indeed, Mahler’s turn-of-the-century hybridity techniques necessitate this theoretical pliability. Perhaps the most obvious alteration I make is the expansion of genre and style to a broader “referential entity.” This term—which I define as musical material with signifying properties (in Alcalde’s terms, “signification potential”)27—can additionally comprise topics (often exaggerated in Mahler), allusions and quotations, and material that signifies programmatic elements. At certain moments, I also wilfully reinterpret certain aspects of the strategies as Alcalde defines them; at others, it is necessary to supplement his strategies with additional theories, in particular Robert Hatten’s concept of troping.28 In his dissertation, Alcalde does mention Hatten’s troping, but he does not clarify its relationship to his four strategies.29 Hatten defines it as the combination of two highly juxtaposed, unrelated topics into a new topic carrying, in Alcalde’s terms, a “signification potential” different from the component parts left un-melded.30 However, the definitional boundaries Alcalde has set for his strategies make it difficult to uncomplicatedly align troping with his mixture categories. Troping cannot strictly be “coexistence” because this requires the absence of referential friction in 25 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 1.10. 26 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.3. 27 Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 125. 28 See, for example, Robert S. Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven Markedness, Correlation, and Interpretation. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994; and Robert S. Hatten, “The Troping of Topics in Mozart’s Instrumental Works.” In The Oxford Handbook of Topic Theory, edited by Danuta Mirka, 514-536. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. 29 Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 125. 30 Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven Markedness, 170. Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 125. 7 the formation of a “utopian” state.31 It cannot be “distortion,” as Alcalde stipulates that this involves the disfigurement of a recognizable style/genre by an entity not recognizably aligned with any allusion or allegory. In fact, in both his article and dissertation, Alcalde goes to great lengths to emphasize the difference between the two. “Overlap clash,” as the caustic layering of referentially dissonant sources also doesn’t fit, since it describes the simultaneous stratification of genres, and not their fusion. Going forward, I will consider Hatten’s troping as an intermediary technique, applicable to styles and genres as well as topics. It would allow for the disjunction associated with “clash,” the synthesis implied by “coexistence,” and the disfiguring tendencies of “distortion,” to be considered combined into a fifth category, for moments where the treatment of these concepts as separate nested strategies might not comprehensively describe compositional processes whose expressive and referential possibilities rely on the seamlessness of their fusion. On a more abstract, hermeneutical level, there also seems to be a pleasing logic in drawing from methods Hatten intended for eighteenth- and nineteenth-century music, as well as those principally intended for the twentieth; perhaps this can help to provide a more complete image of Mahler’s works, better acknowledging their status as bridging these musical eras, both technically and temporally. Although adding troping as a fifth hybridity technique is a simple solution, the difficulty in understanding troping in Alcalde’s terms exposes a fault in his system. Thus, before applying these concepts unquestioningly in analysis, I will first offer a slight critique. By Alcalde’s definitions, strategies can be nested within each other (most commonly distortion within an overall environment of coexistence).32 In designating one process as the overarching strategy and others 31 Alcalde, “Mixture Strategies,” 2.16. 32 Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 234. 8 as contained within it, nesting specifically implies a hierarchy of strategies. However, there is currently no conceptual framework within Alcalde’s system for the equal, non-hierarchical combination of strategies; in the framework as it has been applied, it is becomes difficult to parse instances where lines between mixture strategies are blurred, or where references interact in ways that do not fit squarely into any of the four categories. As the following analyses explore, such referential interactions occur frequently throughout Mahler’s oeuvre. For example, let us consider instances where one allusion is distorted by signifiers of another. Currently, this is a conceptual impossibility within Alcalde’s framework, even if the music is showing clear signs that one topic is distorting another. Since the disfiguring agents in the “distortion” strategy cannot themselves be referential, any interpretation involving distortion would: a) likely involve nesting, even if a hierarchy between strategies is not apparent; and b) necessitate the extraction of non-referential elements of distortion from their originating topic, thereby removing a referential layer from the analysis. This definitional specificity might in turn expose problems with the ostensibly ahistorical nature of Alcalde’s strategies. Alcalde’s definitions involve recognizability and associations of what is normative, established and coded, and thus do rely upon a particular historical context and dialogue. His aim was the creation of a neutral tool to facilitate the analysis of highly referential material—and generally, it seems to do so very convincingly—but in some instances, added definitional specificity hinders objective neutrality by ascribing subjective markers like “recognizability” and “utopian,” which will differ in meaning from person to person, and across cultures and eras. A balanced analytical approach that describes how different materials combine and assesses the effect this has on signification is necessary when dealing with mixture; but a definitional overemphasis on referentiality alone can limit analytical understanding of the 9 compositional techniques involved in hybridity. Thus, in my own analyses I will attend first to how differentiated material is put together, with signification as a secondary parameter, rather than bundling them up together as Alcalde does, on the same level of analytical hierarchy. Moreover, this suggests that Alcalde’s strategies, combinable as they are, might not be sufficient in themselves to understand how hybridity operates in this late-nineteenth-century context. This thesis comprises four analyses, which each present possible ways that Alcalde’s theory can be altered, reinterpreted and expanded upon better to address music of this era. They are apportioned into three chapters of increasing analytical scope. The first chapter comprises analyses of the third movement of the First Symphony (1888) and the second movement of the Ninth (1909). It aims to demonstrate a relatively straightforward application of Alcalde’s strategies, focusing on clash and coexistence. It also begins to explore the role mixture episodes can play in the form and/or narrative of an inner symphonic movement. In addition to identifying the strategies, the analysis of the First Symphony also applies Hatten’s concept of troping, and the discussion of the Ninth introduces a reinterpretation of Alcalde’s categories – that clash and coexistence can be viewed as extremes of a single continuum. This is a perspective on which I rely heavily in all subsequent analyses as well. Chapter 2 presents an interpretation of Part I of the Third Symphony (1896). In addition to troping and the clash/coexistence continuum, I further supplement Alcalde’s categories with Adorno’s concept of narrative characters, in order to acknowledge the role thematic transformation plays in the execution of this movement’s hybridity. This pairing facilitates the development of a new tool for visualizing hybridity: the fixed referential space, which presents referential entities in a network glued together by Alcalde’s strategies, amongst other relationships. Throughout detailed analyses of three hybridity episodes, I further consider Seth Monahan’s interpretation of this 10 movement’s highly irregular sonata form, as well as the interplay between mixture episodes and formal expectations. Lastly, Chapter 3 demonstrates how all the techniques used above can help explicate entire works, through an analysis of the highly heterogeneous Seventh Symphony (1906). It features the expansion of the fixed referential space to encompass entire movements, and introduces the concept of referential network completion. In providing such an interpretation, I aim to show how cohesion at the referential level can bind together the work’s notoriously fragmented surface. It is my hope that together, these four analyses not demonstrate the viability of a theory of hybridity for Mahler’s music, but also expose the interpretative opportunities made possible by this approach. 11 Chapter 1 Symphonies No. 1/III and No. 9/II To explore how Alcalde’s strategies can be directly applied to Mahler’s music, I have selected two inner movements from either end of Mahler’s oeuvre: the third movement of the First Symphony, and the second movement of the Ninth. In both of them, generic allusions and quotations with clearly-defined sectional boundaries interact in a variety of ways, encouraging a variety of applications of two of Alcalde’s categories: clash and coexistence. These analyses also act as springboard for an extension and reinterpretation of Alcalde’s theory to better encapsulate the mechanisms and quirks of hybridity in Mahler’s symphonic works. Symphony No. 1, Movement III The third movement of the First Symphony presents one of Mahler’s most striking instances of both mixture and quotation. Although it is the shortest example analyzed in this study, it demonstrates how allusion, use of topic, program and form can intersect in Mahler’s most heterogeneous music, in this early instance of his disquieting ironic voice. The movement is centered around the alternation of two main sets of material: a somber quotation of “Frère Jacques” (“Bruder Martin,” in German), presented in the manner of a funeral march—and a musical allusion to a “Bohemian band.”33 This conflict takes place in the outer sections of an overall ternary form (Fig. 1.1); at the heart of the movement is a seemingly unrelated, lullaby-like folksong. The rather specific combination of funeral march, children’s song, Bohemian band, and lullaby was explained by the presence of a program, in which Mahler linked the movement to a famous “parodistic woodcut,” “The Hunter’s Funeral Procession.” This was 33 Jens Malte Fischer, Gustav Mahler, trans. Stewart Spencer (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011): 155. 12 well known amongst Austrian children at the time (especially Moritz von Schwind’s 1850 engraving, where the musicians in the band are depicted as animals).34 According to the program note provided for the premiere, the symphony’s hero, having “lost his appetite for life,” watches a funeral procession (the “Bruder Martin” material), which becomes caustically juxtaposed with Klezmer music played by a passing Bohemian band.35 Yet by all accounts, programmaticism for Mahler is to be taken with a grain of salt. Almost immediately, he began to distance himself from this symphony’s moniker of “Titan” and the idea of the program altogether, soon finding it “banal to invent music to fit a program” and just as “unsatisfying and unfruitful to try and give a piece of music a program,” and as such ceased providing them from the Fourth Symphony onwards.36 Whilst extra-musical influences remained prominent in both Mahler’s compositional process and deliberately conspicuous in his music,37 he ultimately proclaimed in 1900: “let all programs perish.”38 As such, I will not make it my task to supply a narrative interpretation centered around the shifting emotions of the “hero.” Here, and elsewhere in this thesis, I will treat programs as paratexts that participate in a work’s web of referential associations, rather than as structures absolutely necessary for the interpretation of referential material. Any focus on extra-musical components will revolve around their signifying potential, the complex techniques involved in their musical interaction, and how these components can be anatomized and more thoroughly understood through the theoretical lens of hybridity. 34 Fischer, 151. 35 Fischer, 155. 36 Stephen E. Hefling, “Mahler’s Todtenfeier” and the Problem of Program Music,” 19th-Century Music 12, no. 1 (1988): 27. 37 Hefling, 27. 38 Fischer, 151. 13 Example 1.1. Combination of “Bruder Martin” with signifiers of the funeral march in the opening of Symphony No. I/ III (mm. 1-23). 14 The opening of the third movement offers a potent example of how referential conflict in Mahler can be found within sections as much as between them; for, perhaps one of the most marked features of the whole movement is the uneasy superimposition of the well-known nursery song and the funeral march topic (Ex. 1.1). The latter is expressed through the f minor key, the steady, plodding tempo (Feierlich und gemessen, ohne zu schleppen—“solemn and measured, without dragging”), the do-sol timpani—and later also contrabass—quarter notes,39 muted string entries, and the pianissimo dynamics, marked in a footnote to be played without crescendo. How might this combination be interpreted? In his short paragraph on the movement, Alcalde himself suggests “distortion,” since the established genre of the children’s song is tainted by a non-generic element, the minor mode; he additionally reads “coexistence” between the nursery rhyme and the march, primarily signified by the bassline.40 This is possibly an instance of “nesting,” which Alcalde describes as one hybridity process embedded within another, commonly coexistence within distortion. Despite its prominence in the literature and performance practice of this piece, Alcalde does not mention the funeral topic, depriving the analysis of an essential referential dialogue between the music, the imposed narrative, and the allusions and topics used to evoke them. Rather than downplay or ignore the aforementioned signifiers of this topic as Alcalde does, I propose an alternate interpretation based on Robert Hatten’s concept of troping.41 The referential interplay in this opening fits Hatten’s definition fairly precisely, as it features the combination of 39 This in itself could be interpreted as the referential repurposing of the Symphony’s opening emphasis on the linear fourth, extracted from its suspended, nature-topic environment and transplanted into a funeral-laden reference. 40 Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 204-5. 41 See, for example, Robert S. Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven Markedness, Correlation, and Interpretation. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994; and Robert S. Hatten, “The Troping of Topics in Mozart’s Instrumental Works.” In The Oxford Handbook of Topic Theory, edited by Danuta Mirka, 514-536. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. 15 two highly juxtaposed allusions—the nursery song and the funeral march—to create a new reference.42 In this case, such a category opens up an understanding of the expressive potential of this passage, formed by the uncomfortable combination of death imagery and children.43 Yet this disquieting opening section is only the first in a succession of hybridity episodes. After an initial eighteen-bar introduction of the “Bruder-Martin”/funeral trope, a countermelody enters in the oboe. Considering its instrumentation, dotted rhythms, crisp staccati and use of grace notes—in contrast to the legato, low-register articulation of “Bruder Martin”—it would seem to subtly presage the woodwind-focused Klezmer material which enters in full force at m. 45. The line itself does not bear enough referential specificity to create an overlap of Klezmer and the trope, but in the simultaneous presentation of musical qualities characteristic of different referential entities, it possibly foreshadows later instances of explicit clash. For now, however, both quotation and countermelody fade, giving way to the six measure passage at m. 39 (Ex. 1.2). This introduces the Bohemian band’s main melody in the oboes in Klezmer-coded thirds and dotted-rhythms, alongside a countermelody in the trumpets. Yet funeral characteristics continue in the original slow tempo marking, soft dynamics and constant quarter notes in the bass; above, is a rhythmic diminution of the initial tonic-dominant alteration, here appearing in eighth notes, but without the d-minor tonal stasis. In other words, Mahler exploits the shared elements of the band music and the funeral topic, especially with the shift from fifth-based bass oscillation to fifth-based 42 Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven Markedness, 170. Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 125. 43 By Esti Sheinberg’s definition, this combination would additionally be an example of the grotesque, as it presents an unreconcilable pairing that merges the “ludicrous with the horrifying” (especially with the uncanny use of a high-register contrabass solo as the opening statement of the theme, and the round-like use of canon, as children might sing it). Esti Sheinberg, Irony, Satire, Parody, and the Grotesque in the Music of Shostakovich: A Theory of Musical Incongruities (London: Ashgate, 2000), 207. Furthermore, Scott Schumann’s research on troping in Stravinsky shows that this combination of “pure” and macabre topics, beginning at least with Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, does continue into the early twentieth century. Scott C. Schumann, “Tropological Interaction and Expressive Interpretation in Stravinsky’s Neoclassical Works,” Music Theory Spectrum 43 (2021): 153-171. 16 oom-pah accompaniment. Klezmer material is thus introduced in a liminal, coexistence space between sections, rather than a juxtaposition clash. A direct juxtaposition occurs at m. 45, where Klezmer material completely overtakes the movement (Ex. 1.3). Marked Mit Parodie (no tempo increase is written although one is generally performed), the dynamic level suddenly surges to mf in the melody instruments, which now include two bassoons and two flutes; Turkish cymbals and bass drum make a sudden entry with an oom-pah pattern; the strings switch to col legno until their pp takeover of the melody at m. 50. Markers of the funeral march material are replaced by signifiers of the Klezmer allusion. These opening sixty measures thus present two main referential entities, but multiple forms of hybridity: Example 1.2. Introduction of the Klezmer melodic material over the continuation of the funeral topic (mm. 39-44, with pickup). 17 troping in the opening; a kind of prefigured overlap clash in the oboe countermelody; and coexistence between funeral march and Klezmer at m. 39, which, although not transitional in affect (mostly due to the complete presentation of a new theme), acts as a hybridity corridor from one referential area to the next. In this sense, coexistence in this movement can be considered to have liminal function, characterizing material that instigates motion from one reference to another by exploiting shared signifying characteristics. Example 1.3. First instance of Klezmer material proper (mm. 46-51). 18 The return to “Bruder Martin”/funeral material at the close of the first overarching ternary section presents another instance of coexistence that is harmonically and thematically much more transitional. Embellishing a descending chromatic line at m. 63 is a new melody in the violins: a melancholically resigned statement motivically derived from band material (considering the three-eighth-note upbeats, downbeat dotted rhythms and staccato), but lacking the vitality of its percussive articulation or the upwards thrusts within its melody. Gradually, further signifiers of the funeral march material replace dwindling representatives of Klezmer, suggesting the ultimate sublation of the latter by the former. The chromatic inflections of the Bohemian band material become languid chromatic lines—initially in contrary motion at m. 63—which heavily contributes to this section’s transitional affect. Here also, the do-sol bassline re-enters in the “Bruder Martin”/funeral-coded timpani, and gradually the new melody and stray chromatic lines morph into fragments of Bruder Martin, which bring this opening small ternary form to a close. However, there is no full restatement of the theme, and the opening two measures are missing: the flute’s chromatic descent concludes with the final two measures of the theme at mm. 70-3, metrically offset by a half note; the bassoons begin on the third measure at m. 71 and conclude the melody, but skip the repetition of the third phrase; at m. 76, the horns sound the last two measures of the theme, again metrically offset, as the material fades into pedal points and the bassline ostinato. The countermelody remains the most intact, appearing in the lower strings at m. 72. Therefore, not only is coexistence in this transition aided by motivic fragmentation and referential integration, but this fragmentation continues into the restatement of “Bruder Martin.” In turn, this suggests that the complete return of thematic material is not necessary for the rearticulation of a recognizable referential area. This flexibility in the expression of signifying material is in part what facilitates 19 the complex variety of mixture techniques observed here, and I will show the same to be the case in the other works I analyze. Having dissipated, the “Bruder Martin”/funeral complex gives way to a seraphic, major-mode central section (Ex. 1.4), as is often typical of funeral-music symphonic movements.44 At first it seems completely new: a pianissimo folksong melody sounds in the strings accompanied by gossamer harp arpeggios; the key has shifted from a d/a sectional alteration to G major approached by a D pedal point; and alongside a tempo shift, the tempo expression reads “very simple and plain, like a folk song.” Not only have we left behind all traces of funeral march and Klezmer music, but the orchestration, p espressivo markings, and simple accompanimental texture also suggest a lullaby. Yet this new referential entity is not entirely free from its predecessors. At m. 91, a second strain of the folk-like theme bears a remarkable rhythmic and contour similarity to the third and fourth measures of the m. 63 transitional melody. At m. 95, the key shifts unexpectedly to the parallel minor, followed by a direct opposition of G major and minor scales leading into 101, unsettling this shimmering major-key oasis despite the swift major-mode recovery at m. 102. At mm. 87 and 101, the harp settles on an oscillating quarter note pattern evocative of the funeral march. Lastly, at m. 104, the three-eighths-to-dotted-quarter neighbor-tone figures in the strings recall the motive that closed the Bohemian band episode at m. 60. One by one, these outside allusions leak into the folksong/lullaby, overwhelming it from the inside out with subtle micro-episodes of coexistence. Thus, like the sections before it, this central referential entity seems unable to sustain itself, dissolving almost completely before the return of “Bruder Martin” at m. 113. 44 Perhaps one of the most well-known instances is the second movement of Beethoven’s Third Symphony. 20 However, this material now appears somewhat ruffled. Rather than mirroring the pedal-point pivot that led into the folksong section, a concluding G minor triad abruptly shifts to eb minor instead of d. The overall dynamic may be quieter than the opening (mostly ppp), but the Example 1.4. Central section of the movement, expressing characteristics of both folksong and lullaby (mm. 83-9). 21 orchestration is far less sparse. The harp continues, reinforcing the tonic-dominant ostinato along with the lower strings, thus coloring it with a newfound complicity with the funeral topic. “Bruder Martin” is now spread across the winds in unison; the countermelody enters immediately, sounding stridently in the Eb clarinet and marked keck (“bold”). Right after it is transferred to the flute at m. 122, an intruder appears beneath, aligned with the harp’s “Bruder Martin” entry: a trumpet melody. Harmonized in parallel thirds with a predictable eight-measure phrase structure, it recalls the melodic and instrumentational tendencies of the band music; this results in an indirect instance of overlap clash, as a (vague) signifier of the Klezmer music appears in the “Bruder Martin”/funeral territory. Retrospectively, this is all that remains of the six-measure referential corridor that first separated “Bruder Martin” from the Bohemian band; for, at m. 132, the Klezmer music returns with otherwise no warning, in a juxtaposition clash. From here, mixture episodes only become more frequent and volatile (Ex. 1.5). At m. 138, “Bruder Martin” returns in its original key—but it retains the trumpet countermelody that was added in m. 124, and it enters before a neighbor-note tail figure in the band has expired. Then, in the very next measure, Klezmer material enters overhead, in forte tutti winds, with a surge in tempo (Plötzlich viel schneller [“Suddenly much faster”]). The alternating structure has now entirely, irrevocably collapsed, in what is technically three instances of clash: a juxtaposition at m. 138, simultaneous with an overlap, followed in turn by another overlap at m. 139. The two poetic descriptions by Jens Malte Fischer to describe this movement can now be heard most plainly: the “brutal juxtaposition” of sections by the use of cinematic “straight cuts,” and a representation of the “implacable polyphony of life,” in the space that follows.45 As the new trumpet countermelody continues, “Bruder Martin,” still troped with the funeral topic and sempre p (with the exception of 45 Fischer, 155. 22 the forte harp), marches along at the Bohemian band’s pace; the Klezmer material, marked “extremely rhythmic,” effortlessly overpowers it. Leading into m. 144, we even hear the eighth-note motive in the violins loosely shared by the folksong and the band-derived, funeral-fused closing melody from m. 63; here, it is complete with the p espressivo marking, exact articulation and violin instrumentation as in the folksong section at m. 92 (except with full violin sections rather than soloists). The only missing element is the original funeral-section countermelody, possibly redundant here if we are to consider its role as a kind of melodic envoy sent on behalf of the band to gently warn of its approach. It is possible that in another context, the simultaneity of all this material might be considered a moment of synthesis—and perhaps from a purely motivic perspective, it is. However, each of these components is weighted with referential signification and the texture remains motivically stratified rather than blended, arguably emphasizing referential friction above thematic cohesion. In any case, it doesn’t take long for even this polyphonic tumult to lose momentum. Following a Tempo I notation at m. 145, the funeral bassline and sustained tonic pedals are once more exposed, while overhead a dwindling Klezmer line in the oboe outstays its welcome. By m. 149, we return to the m. 63 melody before this, too, gives way at m. 158 to our missing theme from the clash climax: the first countermelody from m. 19, now in the bassoon rather than the oboe and appearing for the first time separate from “Bruder Martin.” Eventually, this also evaporates until only the shadow of the funeral topic remains. 23 Example 1.5. Climactic triple application of clash, featuring the direct overlap of “Bruder Martin” and Klezmer material (mm. 138-49). 24 Example 1.5 (cont). Climactic triple application of clash, featuring the direct overlap of “Bruder Martin” and Klezmer material (mm. 138-49). 25 Thus, even in this short movement, it becomes clear that Mahler’s use of hybridity is much more nuanced than Fischer’s “straight cuts” suggest or Alcalde’s categories can wholly describe. Rather than absolute opposition between two main sets of material, there is a push and pull between references as they interact, with the funeral topic twisting band and folk material at some points, and band material warping funeral-related content at others. This kind of dialogue, on the one hand, creates an uneasy tension between allusions. On the other, it facilitates a form-defining use of hybridity, as diagrammed in Fig. 1.1. At a zoomed-out structural level, the small ternary form of the opening 83 measures is reprised after the folksong central section. However, closer to the surface, mixture episodes and the interplay of references muddle the clarity of this structure, most prominently through the series of clashes that deprive the Klezmer material of its own, unimpeded formal space in the large structural A’. Thus, more than a subsidiary, static technique, this analysis implies that mixture in Mahler is a dynamic entity, whose power lies not in the plain assemblage of musical references, but in their vivid dialogue. This suggests that going forward, Alcalde’s strategies, combinable as they are, might not be sufficient in themselves to understand how hybridity operates in this late-nineteenth-century context. 26 Feierlich und gemessen, ohne zu schleppen a tempo Mit Parodie a tempo Sehr einfach und schlicht wie eine Volksweise Wieder etwas bewegter, wie im Anfang Plötzlich viel schneller Tempo I. A (A+B) B (A+B) A C A (A+B’) B A+B’ A+B+B’(+C’) A+B Coda (A) m. 1 19 39 45 63 71 83 91 95 102 113 124 132 138 139 144 149 153 158 key: d A/a d G eb d K k k K K k f 2 f 2 f 1 f 1 f 1 f 1 BM/F F F BM/F F BM/F BM/F F Folksong quotation + troping coex-istence troping/ coex- istence quotation+ troping (coexistence) overlap juxt. overlap juxt. coexistence Figure 1.1. Overall form of Mahler’s Symphony No. 1/III, where “BM” is the “Bruder Martin” quotation, “F” stands for the funeral topic, “f 1” is the countermelody that typically appears alongside the BM/F entity, “ f 2” is the second trumpet countermelody to the BM/F material, “K” represents Klezmer and k is a Klezmer-derived, section-closing melody. 27 Symphony No. 9, Movement II The Scherzo of Mahler’s Ninth dramatizes the juxtaposition between two dance genres, the Ländler—often understood by commentators as a marker of uncivilized rurality—and its sophisticated counterpart the waltz.46 Yet, over the course of the movement these affective forces, rather than remaining separate, increasingly interrupt, infiltrate and intertwine with one another, until both disintegrate entirely. Vera Micznik argues that there are in fact four genres expressed throughout the movement (adding the menuet and Baroque, due to the inclusion of a chain-of-fourths chord progression), making this Mahler’s most ambitious instance of generic juxtaposition.47 I have chosen not to focus on the menuet and Baroque references since their signifiers are not as salient as those for the Ländler and waltz, but Micznik’s discussion is valuable because it outlines patterns of generic negation, distortion and transfiguration that emphasize Mahler’s awareness of how this interaction between different materials plays out on a referential level. Delving even further into the movement’s field of signification, Francesca Draughton explores how the juxtaposition between dance styles could be heard to reflect the articulation of class boundaries, alongside a masculinity/femininity polarity and the ultimately failed musical expression of Körperkultur.48 Whilst these two articles are by no means the full extent of the literature on this Scherzo, they are the most in-depth by far and are the papers to which I will refer most heavily going forward; I hope to both expand upon and occasionally challenge their arguments by offering a more definitively 46 This is given extensive consideration in Francesca Draughton, “Dance of Decadence: Class, Gender, and Modernity in the Scherzo of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony,” The Journal of Musicology 20 (2003); and Vera Micznik, “Mahler and ‘The Power of Genre’,” Journal of Musicology 12 (1994). It is also mentioned briefly in Christopher Orlo Lewis, Tonal Coherence in Mahler’s Ninth Symphony (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1983), 43. 47 Micznik, 148. 48 Draughton, 388-413. 28 music-analytical approach. Given the intricate dialogue between Ländler and waltz, this approach will involve not only the application of Alcalde’s strategies, but a reinterpretation of their strictly categorical nature. I propose that in some cases, it is more fruitful to explore the space between strategies, and consider clash and coexistence instead as two points along the one hybridity spectrum. On a formal level (Fig. 1.2), the Scherzo alternates between three sets of material, each designated with its own tempo: Tempo I is the Ländler, Tempo II is the waltz, and Tempo III is a second, slower Ländler. The overall structure is often described as “rondolike,” presumably with the Tempo I Ländler acting as the refrain, although this doesn’t quite play out, with returns of Ländler material failing to fall between each episode of non-Ländler material.49 Christopher Lewis’s interpretation of the waltz as refrain may result in fewer successive episodes, but is quite atypical, as the movement both starts and ends with Ländler material.50 I instead understand the overall structure as a continually disintegrating rotational form. As defined initially by James Hepokoski (and applied by Seth Monahan to other movements by Mahler), rotational form features the repeated presentation of an ordered set of materials.51 Materials can be added or removed from rotations, but so long as subsections in rotations are never reordered, formal integrity is maintained. With only one exception (a Ländler interpolation at m. 230), the movement could be interpreted as four rotations, wherein the ordering of material stays fixed amid omissions of subsections.52 49 See, for example, Constantin Floros, Gustav Mahler: The Symphonies, trans. Vernon and Jutta Wicker (Pompton Plains: Amadeus Press, 1993), 285. 50 Lewis, 44. 51 James Hepokoski, Sibelius: Symphony No. 5 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 23-6. Seth Monahan, Mahler’s Symphonic Sonatas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), e.g. 177-216. 52 An alternative reading could reinterpret the Tempo I interpolation as a new rotation at m. 230, creating five rotations with no ordering anomalies. I have decided against this due to the brevity and understated nature of the interpolated material and the retrospective, experiential inclination towards reading this Ländler section as an interruption of the Tempo III which sandwiches it, rather than a rotation restart. 29 Rotation 1 2 3 4 Tempo I II III I III II III I II I Coda m. 1 90 148 168 181 218 230 252 261 333 369 423 523 541 566 578 key: C E Eb F A F D F C Eb C L L L L L W1 W2 W W1 W2 W SL SL SL SL clash (overlap) clash (juxt.) clash/ coexistence, neutralization Figure 1.2. Formal outline of No. 9/II, where L stands for “Ländler,” W represents the waltz (either representative motives or its two themes, W1 and W2), and SL stands for “slow Ländler.” Overlaps shown between sections represent transitions leading into the new tempo; all other sub-sectional boundaries I am interpreting as simple juxtaposition. 30 The first of these rotations has an expositional function, featuring the presentation of all three sets of material, which each comprise a distinctive theme (or two, in the case of the waltz, labelled W1 and W2 in Fig. 1.2), and a fairly extensive set of associated motives. According to Draughton, the Ländler (m. 1, Ex. 1.6 and 1.7) is signified by a straightforward use of diatonicism, Example 1.6. Ländler material, including the opening gesture, main theme and some associated motives (mm. 1-16). 31 moderate tempo, emphasis on all beats of the bar (see especially m. 40), and other elements of rusticity, such as the instruction for the violins to be played “like fiddles,” and the consecutive downbows indicated in the Ländler’s main melody (m. 9).53 While by m. 83 the Ländler has dropped to a pianissimo dynamic—its motives dropping out one by one—the onset of Tempo II at m. 90 marks the first of many juxtaposition transitions (Ex. 1.8). As another triple-time dance, the waltz shares much in common with the Ländler, however this section undergoes a series of changes that bring about a generic shift. For Draughton, the waltz is most clearly marked by the sudden increase in tempo, use of the “orchestral” violin, more intricate harmonies and decreased emphasis on the downbeat. Identifying other generic differences, however, risks exaggerating the contrast between sections: the “smoothness” of orchestral violins and the “nuanced” treatment of beat demarcation in the accompaniment are countered by a continuation of consecutive downbows and sforzandi; an initial lack of legato lines could be heard to continue the percussive qualities of the previous section; the ornaments and flourishes that Draughton interprets as signs of “virtuosity” and “sophistication” are also present in the trill-laden Ländler.54 Overall, at its fortissimo dynamic, this “urban” waltz is almost as heavy-footed as the preceding country dance; if anything, the “Haydnesque” opening of the Ländler carries more delicacy than the first few bars of this second dance, which itself varies the Ländler’s 3-2-1 motive until more waltz-associated gestures enter at m. 93.55 Thus, while the waltz does unfurl into something altogether more untamed and grotesque as the movement progresses, Mahler arguably accentuates elements of coexistence between these two genres far more than both Draughton and Micznik suggest. The Ländler may be caricatured, but those same methods of exaggeration also distort the waltz, undermining any sense of higher- 53 Draughton, 394. 54 Draughton, 394. 55 Micznik, 132. 32 class sophistication not only at some later point, as argued by both scholars, but right from its introduction. Example 1.7. Further Ländler motives introduced in the opening section. a) b) c) d) 1.2.3. Ob. 1.2.3. Ob. 1.2.3. Ob. Example 1.8. Beginning of the first waltz section, introducing the W1 theme and waltz-associated motives (mm. 90-106). 33 Example 1.9. W2 theme (mm. 147-154). Example 1.8 (cont.). Beginning of the first waltz section, introducing the W1 theme and waltz-associated motives (mm. 90-106). 34 This distortion, in turn, leads me to reinterpret two of Alcalde’s categories, clash and coexistence. Rather than treating them as separate categories of hybridization, I propose instead that they can be understood as two endpoints of a single spectrum. I still understand the combination of two strongly contrasting allusions to cause a high degree of “referential dissonance” (clash), while topics with referential overlap result in a lesser degree of significational friction (coexistence); however, it is also possible that instances of clash are smoothed over by referential or musical synthesis that is more reflective of coexistence, and vice versa. Accordingly, we can understand Mahler’s use of allusions in terms of how they help maximize or minimize musical disjunction, which often varies with the degree of compositional complexity. Here, and elsewhere, it is difficult to acknowledge this complexity without partly dismantling the black-and-white nature of Alcalde’s categorizations as he applies them; instead, recalling his invitation to adapt his theories as required, I take this as another opportunity to further develop his ideas so they can be more comprehensively applied to Mahler. However we treat this theoretical problem, we can recognize that the waltz begins to unravel further, even throughout its first presentation. At m. 123, in what Draughton labels an “unruly dance,”56 waltz motives start to become hyperbolized: downward leaps begin to emerge as a characteristic feature of this material, here accented in the lower-string accompaniment; sforzandi become even more rampant in the upper-voice motives; and the timpani’s accents on beats two and three of the measure—an overdone reinforcement of this metric quality of the waltz—are negated by sforzandi and fortepiano accents in all other parts, providing the same three-beat accentuation that underscored the Ländler’s crudity. Indeed, it doesn’t take long for Ländler material to breach sectional boundaries. After a new waltz theme at m. 148, complete with a 56 Draughton, 400. 35 “grotesque” bassline melody (Ex. 1. 9), 57 the Ländler’s opening question-and-answer phrases burst through the waltz texture at m. 168 (Ex. 1.10). Musically, this creates a direct overlap of material, with the sixteenth-note Ländler ascents in the horns coinciding with an established arpeggiated waltz motive in the strings. Puzzling over the referentiality of this passage, Mizcnik argues that such a combination “[defies] generic definition,” mostly due to the paradoxically unifying effect of this interruption.58 This sense of generic paradox could also be caused by the fact that, when combined in the one tempo, it becomes difficult to discern between referential features of Ländler and waltz—especially when the Ländler fragment used is not the fiddle-like down-bowed m. 9 theme, but the more polite opening call and response. Musically, any degree of friction is minimized by both the metric and harmonic alignment of fragments, as well as the waltz material respecting the integrity of the “answer” fragment in the winds, which remains uninterrupted by waltz material within both antecedent phrases of the gesture (mm. 170 and 177). Once again, clash and coexistence appear to exist on a continuum rather than in distinct categories, for an episode of ostensible conflict between dances is mitigated by a degree of cooperation. This Ländler interjection quickly dissolves by m. 181, where an intensification of waltz characteristics seemingly attempts to erase the Ländler altogether. The “answer” fragment trails off into waltz-defining downward leaps and, failing to reach the expected cadence, the sixteenth notes do not continue. Yet, the waltz itself begins to atomize by about m. 194 in much the same way as did the Ländler; despite maintaining fortissimo dynamics, the motivic density slackens. This time, however, the following section is not harshly spliced, but rather a three-bar molto 57 Micznik, 137. 58 Micznik, 137. 36 ritenuto provides a softer landing into the slowest tempo of the movement by preparing the new material slightly ahead of time in an overlapping transition. For Draughton, this Tempo III material (Ex. 1.11) lies external to both preceding dance genres, removed from their conflict due to its motivic borrowing from the first movement and failure to adhere to the stylistic boundaries of either dance as they have been presented thus far.59 However, another interpretation is also possible: this material represents the transformation of the established genres into a new referential entity—for, motivically, very little here is actually new. At first, the majority of material recalls the Ländler: the main melody in the bassoons and celli is a close relative to the m. 9 main theme, complete with trills and quickly ascending staccati. This 59 Draughton, 405. Example 1.10. First Ländler/waltz clash (mm. 167-76). 37 reference is further strengthened by the pedal points in the second violin, and motivic gestures such as the descending thirds pattern in the clarinets and viola at m. 229 which recalls the gesture first heard in m. 80 (Ex. 1.7.d), and which will become an increasingly prominent feature of the Ländler as the movement progresses. Yet, all this is also combined with references to the opening of the symphony, in the form of the major-second accompanimental motives in the horns, first violin and viola. I do not regard this as troping, since the Ländler and the pastoral topic share referential elements; nor do I regard it as coexistence, since while common features are exploited, I do not hear their combination to create a new referential entity. Instead, considering the pianissimo dynamic, reduced speed, orchestrational and contrapuntal complexity, combined with the associative characteristics embedded in the first-movement fragments, I hear defining features of the Ländler to become referentially transfigured—not into another heavy dance, but into a much more settled pastoral topic, as reinforced by the soloistic use of wind instruments. This idea predicates that motives alone are not always sufficient in themselves to express a particular reference if the signifying components of that motive are removed or developed beyond recognition, leaving the motive referentially transformed. The referential transformation of themes will be explored more thoroughly in the following chapter. However, this stability is brief: after only nine bars, a ritardando prevents the build-up of momentum despite the addition of instruments; as if to revive the movement, the Ländler interrupts again (m. 230), this time at its original tempo. Bypassing the opening call and response material, this interpolation begins instead at the m. 9 melody and alongside its accompanying motives, now all in A major. However, the instrumental forces have been both altered and reduced: rather than “fiddles,” this is a winds-only rendition (with triangle). Without the downbows, fortissimo dynamic level and constant sforzandi, the Ländler now reaches a delicacy not even achieved by 38 the ostensibly “refined” waltz. Indeed, when the strings re-enter at m. 243, it is with slow-Ländler fragments in the supporting instruments and a first-violin melody reminiscent of the waltz, featuring a general tendency towards arpeggiated motion and borrowing a <dotted-quarter, three-eighth> rhythmic and slurring pattern from the flutes in m. 188. This relaxed interleaving of Ländler and waltz only continues from here. By m. 246, the arpeggiated three-note upbeat, first heard in the oboe in the fourth measure of Tempo III, returns in the flutes and first clarinet, now glued to the trilled figure prominent in the surrounding Ländler material; in the next measure, waltz-associated arpeggiated figures enter in the bassoon. By m. 249, waltz arpeggios and legato merge with the <trilled-quarter, four-eighth> rhythm shared by both Ländler themes; this new gesture takes over in the strings, leading the ritardando back into Tempo III. Example 1.11. The first Tempo III slow Ländler (mm. 218-25). 39 This time, however, the material not only features a transformed Ländler, but a clear motivic signifier of the waltz, in the arpeggiated figures beginning at m. 247 in the winds (Ex. 1.12). While it may have started out as a “pastoralized” Ländler, this continuation of Tempo III material reveals the relatively smooth coexistence of both the original Ländler and the waltz, here interwoven under the overarching framework of the pastoral topic. In other words, this pastoral reinterpretation of the Ländler generates a neutralizing effect: devoid of their clashing signifying characteristics (not least their tempi), motivic representatives of Ländler and the waltz are able to Example 1.12. The second Tempo III slow Ländler, which additionally incorporates waltz motives (mm. 252-60). 40 coexist. This state of unification seems at odds with the overarching narratives of decadent degeneration and destructive, referential disintegration put forward by Draughton and Micznik, respectively. Its elevated status as a space free from deteriorative forces is perhaps emphasized by the consistent use of F major, which it uses exclusively and consistently, unlike the Ländler and waltz, which are articulated throughout the movement in at least two different keys. Technically, this ternary-form section features both juxtaposition, at the onset of the Tempo I, and overlap, upon the entry of the waltz elements—yet, the use of hybridity here does not seem to fuel further conflict, but generates a kind of neutral territory at the a tempo, where motives are set free of the associative shackles of their original class-bound dances. As is fast becoming the trend, the second Tempo III passage is no less fleeting than the last. Perhaps due to the Ländler’s premature entry, we start the second rotation with an iteration of the waltz, devoid of interference from the Ländler but no less volatile for it. Restarting on the waltz causes some retrospective structural ambiguity. While the deletion of a section from a rotation is an accepted formal technique in rotational-form pieces,60 the Ländler episode nestled in the previous Tempo III small ternary perhaps challenges the location of Rotation 2’s onset. I have chosen m. 261 waltz for this moment, since it seems more intuitive to include Tempo III, as new material that ultimately encapsulates the Ländler episode, as part of Rotation 1. Yet this very confusion indicates that processes of large-scale rotational degradation, so characteristic of this movement’s structure, are already beginning to form. By the time Tempo III returns at m. 333, the transition is far more abrupt—a juxtaposition rather than a gentle transition—but like the waltz before it, there are no uninvited disturbances from the Ländler. 60 Hepokoski, 23-26. This is upheld in Monahan, 177-216. 41 Yet within sections, and in contrast with the abrasive trajectory of the hybridity processes in the third movement of the First Symphony, this Scherzo seems to be trending towards sectional cohesion, but motivic disarray. After this second rotation of uninterrupted dances, a quick third rotation, beginning in m. 369, features comparatively lengthy transitions that begin to blur the previously clear juxtapositions between Ländler and waltz material, while internal motives begin to run amok. The m. 369 Ländler very quickly begins to show signs of decay. Once-diatonic motives are chromatically reharmonized, beginning with the “answer” fragments at mm. 373-5 and 376-9, which suggest E and Ab major, respectively, despite the “question” motive remaining in C. The descending thirds motive from m. 229 appears prematurely, invading the call-and-response space by directly overlapping with the sixteenth-note fragment at mm. 375 and 379. This occurs in a manner reminiscent of the first Ländler/waltz clash at 168, but lacking the referential friction. Also displaced is the theme: the three-note cello upbeat at m. 383 leads only to a variant of the original melody reminiscent of the lower-strings statement of the theme at m. 40, underlying a foregrounded countermelody in the solo viola. When the theme finally does arrive at m. 390, its rough, low-register, down-bowed violin tutti is replaced by a solo second violin, lurching from forte to piano and back again, and trailing off before reaching the expected cadence. Overhead, the opening call gesture appears at m. 395 and 400 simultaneous to its answer, beginning to round out a truncated Ländler that never quite assembled itself into the fully-fledged exemplar of its genre that it once was. Moreover, as a few thematic fragments dovetail into the next section, they do so over a lengthy eighteen-bar accelerando, alongside the re-entry of waltz material at m. 404, beginning with the descending arpeggiated figure that coincided with the Ländler overlap episode at m. 168. 42 In fact, by m. 409, recognizable snippets of the Ländler have disappeared completely, leaving the waltz to reform itself in anticipation of the m. 423 Tempo II, in a transition that echoes the approach to the m. 333 slow Ländler. This last waltz section begins not on the first theme, but rather on the second. Even this once-raucous material is here more subdued: the “grotesque” lower brass melody has now been transferred to the violins, with the accompanimental forces also reduced. With its defining downward leaps now exaggerated through glissandi sweeps (m. 429) and excessive jumps down a thirteenth (m. 437), this dance, too, appears instrumentally depleted and motivically unstable. Perhaps this comparative volatility is what leads to a new episode at 445, which Micznik considers to be the all-important moment of generic transfiguration. In her interpretation, external forces of distortion cause this “street waltz” to take on the qualities of a “[mechanized],” “out-of-tune, hurdy-gurdy-type music” distinct from the previous material for its particular vulgarity.61 In this sense, and in Alcalde’s terms, the waltz suffers from a moment of “distortion”; however, I hesitate to allocate this moment the same import as Micznik does. After all, this second waltz theme recovers instantly at m. 466, with renewed instrumental forces and motivic cohesiveness, leading into a return of the first waltz theme at 486 at an even faster tempo. The transition into Rotation 4, however, is far less gradual than the slow exchange of motives that led into this last waltz. After the waltz material’s final cadence, an upper-winds trill carries into 516, under which snippets from both Ländlers appear, in the tempo of the waltz. At this speed—even quicker than the established Tempo II due to the Noch etwas frischer at m. 486—any pastoral associations of their combination are swiftly overshadowed, and the motives themselves (initially a major-second-based fragments in the trumpets and violins, derived from Tempo III), are almost drowned out by 61 Micznik, 119. 43 a rising, fortissimo scale in the bassoons and strings. By bar 520, a cascade of trill figures recalls the opening Ländler, but despite this preparation, the opening sixteenth-notes enter before the Tempo I shift, leading to a lurching fortissimo-to-piano juxtaposition at m. 523. This last full statement of the Ländler shows all the signs of a movement-long trajectory towards decay. The misplaced third motive loses no time interrupting this most thinly-orchestrated iteration of the call-and-answer gesture, entering at a forte dynamic on the first bar, and underlying both “question” and “answer.” The out-of-joint qualities that characterized the last Ländler are now even more apparent. After the third motives exhaust themselves, so too, apparently, does the response phrase: at 536, four consecutive sixteenth-note questions remain unanswered, overlain instead by an incongruous fragment from the scherzo of the Second Symphony. In fact, this Ländler is led so far astray as to neglect a presentation of its main theme at all, and one may begin to wonder whether what remains can still be called a Ländler at all. After all, its once distinctive, simplistic diatonicism was largely attached to the melodic patterns present in its core theme but now absent; country-like rustic touches have long since mellowed; the even stress on each beat is barely emphasized amid the contrapuntal array of motivic cells at c. 550; and the fifth pedal—despite a forced, eighth-note revival that quickly fades to pianissimo at 569—is barely present. All that remains of the Ländler’s initial field of signification is the tempo: despite a continuation of motives, the features that once lent the dance generic recognizability have almost completely dissolved over the course of its alternations with the waltz. Instead, by m. 578, we arrive at the Coda to find not a chaotic overlap of dances, or a revival of the Ländler, but the atomization of both dances into the one, disintegrative, pastoral-inflected close. The tempo may not revert to Tempo III, but the slow Ländler’s pastoral qualities take over from the dwindling country dance. Piano fifth pedals appear, although in the context of 44 c minor, rather than major. Amid the drone are remnants of the waltz: a low-register W2 snippet in the clarinets, the clipped sixths in the solo viola at 581, a chromatic descending scale in the horns from 553, associated with W1 material and muddling the diatonicism. As both the sustained pedal and the waltz components begin to fade, Ländler melodic fragments emerge, first in the bassoons at m. 595, with a gesture shared by both the Tempo I and III Ländlers. At m. 598, the first bassoon recovers the missing Tempo I melody in its proper key of C, and complete with acciaccatura accompaniment figures in the horns, barely a whisper of their first sustained fortissimo occurrence at m. 40. From bar 606 onwards, all that remains are increasingly short, fragile fragments of the first Ländler, all in C. In the end, the sixteenth-note, 1-2-3-4-5 gesture answers its own question, with a hushed #4-5-6-7-8. For Draughton, this movement concludes with the Ländler “succumbing to the degeneracy of the waltz,” and Micznik spends little time discussing the close of the movement except to label it as a Coda, choosing to focus instead on the moment of generic transfiguration that occurs at the center of the final waltz section.62 As for Draughton, we are in agreement that the waltz retains its referential integrity at its last proper appearance far more convincingly than does the Ländler; to oversimplify, her interpretation is a story of class divides, where the waltz, urban and tainted, wins out over the simple rusticity of the Ländler: high trumps low. However, this negatively coded narrative perhaps overshadows the relatively placid C major ending of the movement that seems more a dissolution of conflict than an ironic critique. Instead, it would appear that the pastoral reference at the Coda neutralizes both dances completely, fulfilling the promise of Tempo III material’s optimistic unification of themes. However, the initial, minor-key waltz fragments, estranged from the full force and tempo of the dance, are drowned out by the Ländler-originating 62 Draughton, 406. 45 fifth pedal until the Ländler’s associated motives—now stripped of their dance status—have been set free, to peacefully evaporate. Thus, I agree instead with Stephen E. Hefling’s comments on this close to the movement: it is the combination of the Ländler and waltz that negates their respective significiations.63 Here, I borrow Micznik’s concept of generic negation as the removal of referentiality from musical material otherwise expected to carry a particular signifying function.64 The initial generic transformation of the Ländler into the pastoral, facilitated neutral grounds for the dances to become the one, integrated territory within Tempo III spaces. As both forces weakened, they began to mingle at their sectional borders in Rotation 3; now, in these final moments, an atrophying Ländler gives way once more to a pastoral setting, where both the waltz and Ländler can coexist. This referential complex ultimately dissolves the waltz, whose core qualities are ultimately alien to the defining characteristics shared by both the Ländler and the pastoral. From a hybridity perspective, this movement therefore involves a much more complex interaction between the dances than initially implied by accounts of brusque juxtaposition. Such moments certainly do occur, but sectional boundaries gradually become less sudden and confrontational, instances of overlap are softened by coexistent moments of frictionless interaction within the slow Ländler sections, and by the end, the binary opposition and its significations crumble. This reading, in turn, could offer alternate interpretations to the conclusion of Mahler’s social-class critique. Rather than the victory of a corrupt aristocracy over a battered-down lower class, the dissolution of both high and low signifiers could lead to at least two further options. This 63 Stephen E. Hefling, “The Ninth Symphony,” in The Mahler Companion, ed. Donald Mitchell and Andrew Nicholson, 467-90 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999): 490. Julian Johnson further compares this “maternally connoted pastoral C major” and subsequent fragmentation to the end of the first movement, although he considers this parallelism ironic. Julian Johnson, “The Status of the Subject in Mahler’s Ninth Symphony,” 19th-Century Music, 18 (1994): 120. 64 Micznik, 120. 46 ending could be read without irony, as a distinctly optimistic close: only by leaving behind the societal class system altogether, can any of us truly be free. Yet, with irony, Mahler’s conclusion becomes even more pessimistic than a simple power imbalance between classes: since we cannot leave behind the societal class system altogether, none of us can truly be free. Conclusion Through analysis of both the third movement of the First Symphony and the Scherzo of the Ninth, I hope to have demonstrated both the viability of Alcalde’s strategies as applied to vastly different movements in Mahler’s repertory and the possibility of extending his theory to better encapsulate turn-of-the-century hybridity. In both movements, clash and coexistence are instrumental in explicating central mixture techniques, but in neither are they entirely sufficient to comprehensively grasp the nature of Mahler’s hybridity. To appreciate the analysis the combination of “Bruder Martin” and the funeral topic in the First Symphony required the addition of troping into the mix of strategies. The analysis of the Ninth demonstrated how an arc of motivic and formal disintegration was mirrored in processes of referential dissolution, necessitating the reinterpretation of clash and coexistence as two ends of the one spectrum. Other examples of Mahler’s most heterogenous music, however, provide an even more complicated manifestations of mixture. The following analysis of the Part I of the Third Symphony will require not only troping and my flexible view of clash/coexistence, but two further strategies to better interpret all facets of this movement’s hybridity: Theodor Adorno’s novelistic characters and the introduction of a fixed referential space. 47 Chapter 2 Symphony No. 3, Part I The previous chapter demonstrated how Alcalde’s generic mixture strategies can be applied to Mahler’s work to better recognize and interpret movements in Mahler rife with heterogeneity and generic interplay. However, not all instances of referentiality in Mahler are as clear-cut as the alternation, overlap and integration of signifying blocks of material. Part I of Mahler’s Third Symphony introduces a more complex form of hybridity, that involves autonomous themes that transcend section-specific generic boxes. Accordingly, this reading of the movement will draw from an additional theoretical wellspring: Theodor Adorno’s concept of novelistic “characters.” The amalgamation of Alcalde and Adorno’s theories will then be combined with Seth Monahan’s intricate sonata form analysis of the movement to develop the idea of a fixed referential space and an Adornian theory of hybridity. Adorno’s concept of “characters” provides another perspective on Mahler’s heterogeneity that can help to clarify how individual musical components combine to form a whole. While it is sometimes unclear what Adorno considers to be a “character,”65 the general concept implies the agency of smaller thematic entities—“functional characters” that interact with a high degree of autonomy. By “autonomous,” Adorno refers to his idea that these themes are built “from the stock of traditional music,” but function external to the form, “without regard to their place in the established pattern.”66 Thus, Adorno implies that these character-like themes are autonomous both with respect to each other, and to formal archetypes. When discussing the “novel-symphony,” 65 Generally, he seems to apply it to themes, formal strategies, genres and topics, alike. He does mention characterization in this movement, but ascribes vague entities only in passing (“gloom” and “outbreak” in the development), and makes a generalization about the individuation of instrumental characters throughout. Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 51. 66 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 48. 48 Adorno notes that Mahler’s themes, in particular, are “recognizable, like characters in a novel,” and he treats their development as the “modification of fixed elements” based on a kind of meaningful sequence of thematic variations.67 The treatment of themes as novelistic characters can help us to understand sections of Mahler’s music where extremely differentiated material owes its heterogeneity to the conflict between evolving voices rather than between panel-like sections. When this kind of thematic development interacts with either fixed or evolving webs of signification, this analytical perspective not only provides another way to apply Alcalde’s strategies but can also support a different interpretation of his theory.68 Part I of the Third Symphony is often remarked upon both for its vast scope and extremely variegated surface texture,69 but perhaps its most defining characteristic is the interaction between its program and sonata form. Adorno implies that there lies a kind of dissonance between the extramusical level of program and that of the form, suggesting that the program hinders the manifestation of a conventional sonata structure.70 Monahan, on the other hand, rejects this implied negative coding by reading the movement as an example of Mahler’s “epic” form. He provides two passes through the work: one strictly formal, the other illuminating a more subjective “narrative of integration.” This two-pronged strategy further encourages an emphasis on the relationship between referential and non-referential components in Mahler’s works. 67 Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 72. 68 Adorno’s broader views on heteronomy in Mahler also support Alcalde’s overarching conception of hybrid works. Adorno suggests that Mahler thinks not in terms of motive and archetypal form, but “complexes” and “fields,” with novel-like characteristics resulting in an episodic structure; this complements Alcalde’s understanding of musical hybridity as stratified spheres of material that coalesce into successions of “chimeric environments.” Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 87; Alcalde, “Patterns of Hybridity,” 127. 69 As noted by Fischer, 132, 164-5; Floros, 83-108; Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 36, 77-8. 70 Adorno, “Mahler,” 99-100, 106. 49 For ease of reference, Figure 2.1 replicates Monahan’s interpretation of this movement’s highly atypical sonata form. Displayed are five main sets of material that occur in a tri-rotational overall structure as well as a subrotational level that crumbles with each subsequent large rotation.71 The descriptive labels Monahan uses appear in the manuscript and reference the program for the whole symphony: a six-tiered cosmogenic hierarchy, of which Part I details the 71 Seth Monahan, Mahler’s Symphonic Sonatas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015),190. Figure 2.1. Monahan’s sonata form interpretation of No. 3/I. 50 god Pan’s awakening, triggering the onset of summer alongside a Bacchic procession.72 The material of this part comprises: the Weckruf theme (“wake-up call”), the opening soli horn call that first appears external to the rotational structure and later becomes merged with other material; the Funeral March / Arioso sections that open the introduction proper and feature a consortium of related motives and melodies; “Herald” marches, that appear merged with Pan in the introductory “Pan/Herald Complex” and separately later on; and “Pan” material, which also appears alongside Weckruf. Analyzing the form, Monahan divides each rotation into a sonata space, where all sonata functions are executed, and a non-sonata space that precedes the sonata space, but no sonata-form interpretation of this movement is without its problems. A commonly cited issue is the lack of thematic dualism typically provided by an S theme.73 Monahan prefers his model as it facilitates an interpretation in terms of the expected key structure of an F major sonata.74 He interprets the omission of an “S-protagonist” as a deliberate expressive decision, disallowing an “individual voice to set the heterogenous collective into relief.”75 Arguably, however, there is still a dualism: between the sonata and non-sonata spaces. I like to think of this dichotomy as a continuation of the exaggeration patterns seen in Mahler’s treatment of genre, a notion explored by Julian Johnson, who interprets it as a source of Mahler’s plurality.76 For the Third Symphony, this “‘perverse’ exaggeration of genres” is a method for subverting expectations by hyperbolizing the existing 72 See, for example: Floros, 83-108. The full tiered hierarchy proceeds to flowers for the second movement, followed by animals for the third, mankind for the fourth, angels for the fifth and closing with love (of the eternal, religious variety), symbolizing the highest tier of creation in the sixth and final movement. Further programmatic details of the first movement fluctuated over time and as they were no less broad than the description offered above, I will refrain from including them here. 73 Noted especially in Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 77-78; and Floros, 96. 74 Monahan, 185-193. 75 Monahan, 192-3. 76 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 37, 166-7. 51 contrasts already found within symphonic norms. Thus, this overblown, hodgepodge use of genre is used to destabilize the idea of the symphony as expressing a cohesive narrative voice.77 However one understands the relation of this movement to traditional sonata procedures, it is clear that both the dualism and rotational aspects so central to sonata form have here been so heavily hyperbolized that they exceed the dimensions of sonata space. To borrow Johnson’s logic, in magnifying what already exists in the form, Mahler causes a dislocation between dualism and P/S thematic contrast, displacing the sonata’s rotational qualities from the bounds of the Exposition/Recapitulation parallel. The sonata deformation here is not a rupture caused by “external” forces, like breakthrough, but an internally-driven bloating of the sonata’s characteristic features until they become form-functionally unrecognizable and go beyond their original purpose—much in the same way that simple topics become full-blown generic forces, so deliberately non-cohesive that they, too, generate a form of their own. This exaggeration, then, creates hybridity. Differentiation between topical material is so heightened that allusions are elevated to the level of referential fields of the kind observed by Alcalde; at the formal level, the interaction between these fields combines with the over-amplified rotationalism and dualism to override sonata form’s essential narrative. In other words, this exaggeration-derived hybridity threatens to destabilize our sonata-form expectations of where certain motives should occur and how they should behave and interact. The destabilization arises in turn from the autonomous, character-like nature of the themes themselves. 77 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 164-5. 52 Symphony No. 3, Part I The following analysis will proceed in three main sections. First, I give a summary overview of the themes presented in the first rotation, with a focus on their signifying characteristics. This will be followed by an alternate perspective on Alcalde’s theory of mixture that incorporates Adorno’s concept of musical characters; this combined framework will then be applied to three key hybridity events, each situated in the sonata space of one of the three rotations. Overview of Material The opening Weckruf theme immediately establishes the symphony’s overemphasizing tendencies, as eight horns enter in unison, with all notes accented at a ff dynamic (Ex. 2.1). With its emphasis on the perfect fourth and absence of any other material, it could signify a militaristic use of the horn call.78 Yet, the longer it goes on, the more volatile this allusion becomes. A focus on fourths soon shifts to thirds, and as the reference disintegrates, so does the texture. The eight-voice solidarity splinters into four parts by m. 14, where an undirected alternation of low thick chords eventually fades by m. 23 to reveal a solo bass-drum line. This bears the funeral-march rhythm that begins Rotation 1—a collection of pp motives alongside a low-register triplet march rhythm, all marked “heavy and dull.” As a topic, the march itself is to become the movement’s most unifying feature, playing a unique role in its interaction with other referential fields.79 In this case, it marks a clear shift in allusion, and I will label the technique involved a “disintegration transition,” in which the referential features of an allusive passage evaporate rather than progress 78 Monahan also notes that it is often associated with such genres as socialist political songs. Monahan, 193. 79 Adorno goes as far as to interpret the march, here, as the “musical equivalent of narrative time.” Adorno, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, 77-8. 53 rhythmically or harmonically towards a new beginning, leaving a kind of vacuum in which a new allusion can form and fill. Another disintegration transition occurs when this first subrotation shifts to a succession of brass-led ariosi, where funeral rhythms momentarily disappear. Binding these two sets of material is perhaps what scholars have called the “ombra” topic. Initially developed in the context of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century opera, ombra was used as an instrumental topic from the second half of the eighteenth century to express death, the mysterious, supernatural and ominous.80 Of particular relevance here is the “ceremonial” variety, which includes processions and funerals. On the surface, this manifests in a “somber” style: flat minor keys (here, d minor); pedals and ostinati (e.g., 27-36); low-register, dark timbres (especially trombones, later to appear at m. 164, but here we have horns, much use of lower strings and winds, and timpani); dotted rhythms (i.e., funeral-march motives); general chromaticism; chromatic stepwise movement in the bass (e.g., 71-75); and “sigh” gestures (perhaps most clearly exaggerated in the tritone-plus-an-octave glissandi at 91).81 The pervasive use of trills and tremoli also contribute to the motivic instability 80 See especially Clive McClelland, “Ombra and Tempesta,” in The Oxford Handbook of Topic Theory, ed. by Danuta Mirka, 279-300 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014) and Clive McClelland, Ombra: Supernatural Music in the Eighteenth Century (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2012). In eighteenth- and early nineteenth- century instrumental music ombra most commonly appears in slow introductions in symphonies by Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert. McClellend, Ombra, 220-239. 81 McClelland, “Ombra and Tempesta,” 282-7. Example 2.1. Weckruf theme (mm. 1-10, written pitch). 54 and tenebrous timbre, and by the next subrotation almost all these characteristics appear intensified. Succeeding this ombra material, however, is a striking shift in material and allusion. At 132 we cut abruptly to the first Pan/Herald complex: an ethereal, major-key triadic section, notably devoid of the march and in a hitherto-absent high register. It features a chorale-like succession of half-notes in the winds, intermittent harmonics in the celli and a solo oboe melody at m. 136, associated with Pan. Its lilting triadic arpeggiations and sustained lyrical line possibly suggest both the pastoral and folk-music topics, which I will henceforth treat as a single complex, as they never appear strictly untangled in this movement. I will, however, still maintain a distinction between pastoral and the folk throughout this chapter and the next. Raymond Monelle casts a wide definitional net in which “folk”—and at one point, specifically Mahler’s use of it—is synonymous with “pastoral.”82 However, most discussion of the folk in Mahler does not establish or suggest links to the pastoral.83 I would argue that glossing over differences between folk and pastoral in Mahler deprives the analyst of a great deal of nuance, since many instances of the folk do not evoke characteristics typically associated with the pastoral. Therefore, in invoking a folk/pastoral complex, I hope to more accurately acknowledge the referential profile of passages that contain characteristics of both topics as distinct from moments elsewhere in Mahler, which feature only one or the other. As far as the m. 132 Pan/Herald complex is concerned, I interpret the allusion here as folk/pastoral combined with “mystical,” as the overall texture could perhaps be associated with representations of fantastical, dream-like states. In all, the abrupt shift from the ombra-laden Funeral/Arioso to this new allusion is a clear instance of Alcalde’s juxtapositional “clash.” 82 Raymond Monelle, The Musical Topic: Hunt, Military and Pastoral (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006). 258-61 for discussion on Mahler specifically. 83 Such sources notably include but are not limited to Johnson, Mahler’s Voices; Fischer, Gustav Mahler and Vera Micznik, “Mahler and ‘The Power of Genre’.” 55 This first glimpse at this sonata-space material thus presents a blend of allusions later to be deserted or untangled—yet, not all components of the preceding ombra material are abandoned. The trill/tremoli undercurrent is here continued by tremolandi in the upper strings, perhaps a reinterpretation of the aggressive middle-register clarinet tremolandi at m. 99. Thus an essential component of this “mystical” allusion in the first Pan/Herald complex comes not from some externally-sourced rupture, but from the transformation of existing elements that are simultaneously crucial to the signification of a contrasting reference. In any case, a clarinet tolling gesture associated with “Herald” material swiftly breaks this mystical texture at m. 148, triggering the transition to sonata space, where the Herald and Pan material are separated in a sequence of marches that continue uninterrupted until the final climactic sweep and resultant collapse that draws this first rotation into the second. Figure 2.2. Monahan’s staged development of the Pan theme. 56 The only “raw” material left to discuss is the treatment of Pan’s theme throughout the Weckruf/Pan marches, and its seemingly autonomous development away from its folk/pastoral origins and towards an apotheosized heroic topic. This theme undergoes several variations across the two Weckruf/Pan subrotations in the Exposition (concisely summarized by Monahan, Fig. 2.2).84 Each developmental stage tracks changing referential associations. The folk/pastoral triadic flourishes in Pan 1.1 and 1.2 give way to increased linear motion and expressive upward leaps in Pan 2.1, which begin to loosen the original folk/pastoral associations. When we reach Pan 1.2.3 and 3.1, Pan absorbs Herald rhythms, expressing the march topic. By the time we reach the final version—the “telos” theme, Pan 4.1—we shift again, to perhaps a ceremonial or processional manifestation of the heroic style. This hearing is suggested by this variant’s status as a goal, its powerful low/middle-register, stately presentation, and perhaps even its Straussian sweeping leaps.85 In other words, the theme seems to possess a certain degree of referential mobility: varied but remaining essentially intact, it moves through a spectrum of signifying characteristics, a referentially coded series of thematic developments. An Adornian Perspective on Alcalde’s Mixture Strategies As a theme that undergoes transformation without true development, passing through a range of references with seeming autonomy, the Pan melody, along with the other material, may be understood as Adornian “functional characters.” Moreover, since varying signifiers tend to 84 Monahan, 196. 85 In applying this designation, I refer to both Julian Horton’s compiled list of Romantic-Era topics, which includes the “heroic style,” but also his notion that nineteenth-century topics are often evoked in the context of previous works understood to have engaged with them (in this case, given allusions to Beethoven’s “Pastoral” and a later Götterdammerung quote, it might be fair to assume that Mahler’s sources of for the heroic in this case might be of the Beethovenian or Mahlerian variety). Julian Horton, “Listening to Topics in the Nineteenth Century,” in The Oxford Handbook to Topic Theory, ed. Danuta Mirka, 642-664 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 57 come in and out of focus while themes retain their core identity, I will consider these thematic characters as executing agency within a fixed referential space. This space is a representation of all the areas expressed in the movement, visualized as a network. Conceptually, this network allows for connections between referential entities to be drawn and qualified, and for thematic characters to be understood as occupying points or tracing paths along the network. Musically, this helps us understand the degree to which simultaneous or successive signification entities are referentially connected. For this movement, the fixed space might look something like the chart in Figure 2.3. Boxes enclose the four principal topical fields expressed throughout the movement: march and folk/pastoral most prominently, but also the horn call and ombra. Every solid line indicates what Alcalde would call a “coexistence” between the topics it connects. For example, the mixture of march elements and horn call can form the military topic; it is not the only way to do so (recall the march-less opening Weckruf), but since components of the march are generally complicit with the military topic, the military can be considered as referential connective tissue between the horn call Figure 2.3. Fixed referential space for Symphony No. 3/I. 58 and the march. Dashed lines, on the other hand, indicate Robert Hatten’s concept of “troping,” the combination of two otherwise incompatible topical fields, whose overlap creates a new entity, such as the troping of march and ombra to create the funeral march.86 This is not to say that the funeral topic is not a recognizable entity in its own right or that it necessarily must be generated in this way, but that in the context of the movement’s referential space, it can be seen as emerging from the intersection of ombra and the march. The dotted line that connects march and folk/pastoral represents a non-topical but programmatic entity (the Bacchic Procession). The heroic “telos” theme is treated as a special case, given its prominence as a goal-theme and the qualities of teleological genesis embedded in its arc. An essential precondition for understanding these themes as characters is hearing a theme’s referential past as influencing its present interpretation. Thus, “telos” expresses a ceremonial heroic topic nonetheless built from the fabric of an original folk/pastoral melody, voiced in the horn, and settled within a processional, march-permeated context. It therefore sits within the upper triangle, as a combination of the march, the horn call, the Bacchic Procession, and its folk/pastoral origins. Passages invoking any two unconnected boxes cause “clash” when manifesting simultaneously or in close proximity (such as when the funeral march cuts to the mystical/folk/pastoral conglomeration of the Pan/Herald complex). Clash can also occur when these topics appear stratified rather than blended, as we will encounter below. Thus, through this diagram, I aim to demonstrate a continuum along which any given theme/character can exist at any given moment. As in the Scherzo of the Ninth, this conception seeks to reshape the relationship between clash and coexistence as two ends of the same spectrum, where most instances of 86 Cf. Robert S Hatten, “The Troping of Topics in Mozart’s Instrumental Works,” in The Oxford Handbook of Topic Theory, ed. by Danuta Mirka, 514-536 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 59 hybridity play out in the complex middle ground between these two categorical boxes. In this case, the aim of this shift in theoretical standpoint is to recognize the autonomy and individualization of Mahler’s themes, and the active role they play in this movement’s hybridity. Three Hybridity Episodes I will now put this theory into practice by focusing on three Alcaldian “chimeric environments”: the second Weckruf/Pan combination in Rotation 1; the Development proper in Rotation 2; and the Weckruf/Pan + Herald overlap in Rotation 3. Exposition: Weckruf/Pan Marches The first Expositional Weckruf/Pan subrotation (mm. 273-97) established a memorable ordering of motives. After a diminuendo of Herald material to pppp (mm. 262-72), it featured a p, major-mode Weckruf fragment (m. 273) appearing in sonata space for the first time, immediately succeeded by the lyrical Pan 1.2 in the upper winds (m. 279). Abruptly, the Weckruf’s m. 273 accompanying dotted-rhythm march figures disappear. Whilst the march is still continued in the tonic-dominant bassline, the energy of this genre becomes dulled by the folk/pastoral tendencies still exhibited by this version of Pan. The second time, however, this ordered succession of signifying elements breaks down. After Subrotation 2’s reordered Herald marches, a newly-formed Pan 3.1 jumps the gun at m. 315, appearing alongside the major-mode Weckruf in a sudden-onset f/ff shift (Ex. 2.2). Here, conflict arises not from the superimposition of different sections but from the overlap of material previously established to comprise the one section. This overlap, in turn, is the first suggestion that structural momentum here is triggered not by any expected dualism between P and S themes but rather by the autonomous interaction of constantly evolving themes, operating independently from any perceived formal function. 60 However, in the grand scheme of hybridity events, this sixteen-measure episode is only a taste of the referential tension to come. The themes themselves are in relatively contained counterpoint (see Fig. 2.2), hypermetrically and often rhythmically aligned, with an initial emphasis on harmonic octaves and fourths later slackening to thirds and sixths. The inclusion of the trumpet in Pan’s opening collection of instruments also creates a timbral overlap that further softens the divide between the themes. However, this is not an equal partnership: the Pan theme’s forces—flutes, trumpet and violins, spread over two octaves—outweigh the four-horn unison of the Weckruf. Initially, this imbalance is only enforced by the supporting instruments, which all rhythmically align with Pan’s half-note, eighth-note gesture; the addition of most remaining winds and lower strings to Pan’s theme only further tips the scales at m. 319, and finally, by 323, the horns abandon Weckruf for Pan 3.2, alongside the very high-register strings and winds. Additionally, the march motives from m. 315 become muddled: the side drum picks up a triplet rhythm from the preceding Herald marches, each time creating cross-rhythms against the strings, trombones and triangle. The march bassline continues, but its defining motives momentarily appear disordered, disorientated by the clash and operating on a separate level, minimally incorporated into the themes. Thus, even for such a short hybridity episode, there is a fair amount of movement within the fixed referential space. Both Pan and Weckruf appear temporarily dislocated from their previous march elements. This may be heard to diminish the Weckruf’s military undertones, placing it closer to the “horn call” bubble in Fig. 2.3, while the lilting arpeggios of Pan 3.1 mostly secure it to its own “folk/pastoral” box (with the soaring, Romantic high register of 3.2 further distancing it from any march associations). Yet, march rhythms overpower Pan by m. 327, demonstrating a shift in motivic and referential prominence as this topic reclaims the movement. 61 Therefore, with each signifying element mostly confined to its own zone in the referential space, this section is another manifestation of clash—even if the tidy interlocking of motives results in a relatively mild, coexistence-like manifestation. Furthermore, the referential push and pull between motives leads directly to a structural anomaly, as the previously-subjugated Weckruf returns in an interpolated statement at 331. Appearing in full force and uninterrupted by Pan, march rhythms in the horns and trumpets realign the theme with its original military associations, with the half-note, eighth-note Pan 3.1 gestures returning in a strictly accompanimental fashion. The Weckruf theme itself appears in the trombones and in D, the major key perhaps promised by the d minor introduction. This may be taken to symbolize a degree of leakage between sonata and non-sonata spaces—an antagonistic rebuttal by the Weckruf of its recent thematic and referential defeat. This hybridity episode perhaps exposes the Adornian novel-form nature of this ground-up sonata form: the themes, seemingly acting outside the realm of form-functional elements, create a momentary conflict and small deformational intrusion that sets the Exposition on a path to fulling non-tonic, D-major closure—itself secured by Pan 4.1, “shorn of its march elements.”87 87 Monahan, 197. 62 Example 2.2. Expositional hybridity episode (mm. 315-40, with upbeat). Clash between Pan 3.1 and the major-mode Weckruf. 63 Example 2.2 (cont.). Expositional hybridity episode (mm. 315-40, with upbeat). Clash between Pan 3.1 and the major-mode Weckruf. 64 Development: The “Rabble”, the “Battle” and the “Storm” The tri-sectional structure of the Development, identified by Monahan as Herald, Weckruf and “liquidation,” aligns with three programmatic signposts left by Mahler in the original manuscript: “The Rabble,” “The Battle Begins”, and “The South Storm,” which all feature the motivic breakdown and evolution generally expected of a Development. At the heart of this series of motivic collisions is chaotic counterpoint caused by the increased individuation of a once-cooperative sets of motives. At the onset of “The Rabble,” motives begin to detach from their untainted expression of the march in Rotation 1, wreaking havoc as the Development moves into a new referential space. As both Monahan and Adorno note, this section at m. 530 begins with the intensified, lower strings recasting the first march (m. 247) as a kind of pseudo-fugue-subject, with the brief Baroque reference supported by use of stereotypical sixteenth-note ornaments. Yet, the promise of ordered polyphony is not fulfilled. The subject seems to unwind without end before snagging on Bb and becoming brusquely overlaid with a sudden burst of woodwind activity in densely-voiced thirds (Ex. 2.3). Johnson associates this episode with Mahler’s use of the carnival topic, with the composer’s “fondness for imitating the rude ensemble of village bands,” further represented by his characteristic inclusion of the Eb Clarinet.88 In the winds, the turn-figure grace-note gestures associated with the Herald tolling figure continue to accentuate the march rhythm; but, together with the oscillating thirty-second-note gestures, perhaps best understood as written-out march-associated trills (themselves originating from non-sonata, ombra space), these once isolated fragments now form a continuous melodic line. Thus, the march becomes troped with the carnival, marking the activation of march motives into an autonomous force of disruption. 88 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 125. 65 Example 2.3. Excerpt from “The Rabble,” starting from the carnival-associated woodwind interruption (mm. 539-53). 66 Example 2.3 (cont.). Excerpt from “The Rabble,” starting from the carnival-associated woodwind interruption (mm. 539-53). 67 Example 2.3 (cont.). Excerpt from “The Rabble,” starting from the carnival-associated woodwind interruption (mm. 539-53). 68 In much the same way, the Pan-associated triadic sweeps nestled in the first-violin “fugue” subject, tear away and swiftly form their own line (m. 541) alongside tambourine trills, which enhance the carnival-like chaos that has erupted from once passive motivic cells. This is no neatly-aligned counterpoint: each motive-turned-theme interrupts the other, in turn, splintering their once unified embodiment of the march topic. We now have three versions of the march: one troped with fugal qualities, another in dialogue with the carnival, and a third which distorts a distinctive signifier of the lilting folk/pastoral while locking it into march rhythms (Fig. 2.4). Untethered from their collective, Rotation-1 march identity, these formerly inert fragments now become Adornian characters in their own right. Moving freely through this new referential space, they create both overlap and juxtaposition by independently and contrastingly engaging with the march topic they once collaboratively expressed: a motive-driven heterogeneity that comes from within. The disordered nature only intensifies as the section progresses and the motives refuse to remain static. By 543, the oscillating lines switch to neighbor-note figures, but their accented quarter-note accompaniment is now trilled; the “fugue” restarts at 544 in the strings, only to Figure 2.4. Fixed referential space for the Development of No. 3/I, depicted in black. 69 become stuck on its defining turn gesture, before restarting three measures later on the wrong beat; the horns and trombones further the village-band reference with an accelerated oom-pah rhythm at 545 marked “raw.” When the Herald tolling re-enters in the trumpets at 552, its grace notes marked “as fast as possible,” a brief moment of alignment occurs between all parts. At the same time, the contrapuntal potential of the “fugue” subject is played out in a brief canonic entry (although at the fifteenth, not the fugue-defining fifth); yet, as soon as the violins enter, the lower strings and winds repeat their first bar, immediately aligning both parts. Overhead, the Herald tolling continues alongside the developed triadic fragment in the horns, before they proceed together onto a new second half of the phrase, as if both arriving at the same melodic conclusion despite their differing motivic origins.89 The last motivic entry is what Monahan labels the “battle fanfare” in the trumpets at m. 565, loosely derived from the Weckruf theme,90 but whose second measure features the rhythms and arpeggiated triads of the “fugue” subject. All this material begins to repeat, with staggered ff entries misaligned with the hyperdownbeats, seemingly without end until a “proto-cinematic jump-cut” at m. 574 takes us to a sparsely orchestrated p/pp rendition of the Weckruf proper in the trumpets, accompanied in the oboe by the battle fanfare and an ombra/mystical-level abundance of trills in the strings.91 As “The Battle” approaches at m. 583, where in a “palpably physical collision” it is restated in counterpoint with the “fugue,” the Weckruf’s reference to the military horn call is perhaps now fully realized (Ex. 2.4).92 This second section of the Development is comparatively coherent, with more sustained march fragments held together by greater metric and rhythmic cooperation between 89 This itself perhaps takes contour, articulation and gestural inspiration from a brief, two-bar cadential idea at 277, in the first Weckruf/Pan Expositional subrotation. 90 Monahan, 198. 91 Monahan, 198. 92 Monahan, 198. 70 parts. Nevertheless, two measures before the “The South Storm” (m. 603), the “Herald dislodges the march,” its chimes aligned with a liquidation in the strings to twenty-eight measures of legato sixteenth notes.93 The sudden lack of cooperation from the flood of scales dilutes the march topic, which now survives only in Herald-related motivic fragments in the eight fff horns pulled along with and apart by the undercurrent in the strings. This complete collapse leaves only the contrabass in its wake at m. 631, before the side drum forcibly revives the march. With eight measures of funeral-march triplet rhythms now preceding the Weckruf’s impending pre-rotational solo statement, it receives a march-rhythm framing that only strengthens its ties to the military topic. For Monahan, the Development marks the elevation of “low” marches (the “dynamically recessive, tonally ambiguous” Herald marches) into autonomous “high” marches (the “extroverted, tonally focused” Weckruf- and Pan-derived marches), and is thus an essential moment in his low-high unification narrative.94 From a hybridity perspective, however, this demonstrates how an interpretation of Alcalde’s mixture strategies that incorporates Adorno’s novelistic characters is better suited to explicate Mahler’s hybridity than style-based sectional divisions alone. Here, referential dissonance is expressed via the newfound independence of motives once passively organized within the one section. Compositionally, this takes the form of constantly developing contrapuntal entries that, in turn, evoke referential dissonance via their contrasting engagements with the march topic. We thus have a heterogeneity triggered by multiple marches, a saturation caused by the troping of the march with topics both within and external to the work’s main referential space. 93 Monahan, 198. 94 Monahan, 184-5. 71 Example 2.4. Onset of “The Battle Begins” (mm. 583-91, with pickup). 72 Example 2.4 (cont.). Onset of “The Battle Begins” (mm. 583-91, with pickup). 73 This creates an interesting combination of clash and coexistence: in the first section, these contrasting march elements are clear instances of clash and troping, with a high degree of referential friction; by the second section, the march signifiers begin to cooperate, suggesting a drift towards coexistence on the clash-coexistence spectrum; and by the last section, the march is swept away, losing its grip as all other referential signifiers disintegrate along with the motivic autonomy which fueled their differentiation. By considering these themes as independent characters, this hybridity episode is shown to deeply entangled with the material’s motivic and referential past. More than the interplay of referential fields, the Development can now be interpreted as the anarchic interaction of motives that destabilize the march from the inside out. Recapitulation: Weckruf/Pan + Herald So far, Weckruf, Pan and Herald material have interacted in a variety of ways. In the introductory space, Pan and Herald merged into a coexistence complex, bound together by a major-key ombra variant, the “mystical.” In the Exposition, Herald and Pan became separated, but Weckruf and Pan merged into one structural entity, interacting side-by-side in a low-impact juxtapositional clash before occupying a mid-point on the clash/coexistence spectrum. In the Recapitulation, Weckruf, Herald and Pan now combine in a way not dissimilar to the contrapuntal intermingling heard in the Development. However, the Development is a space specifically allotted for such motivic chaos, while the Recapitulation, as a section intended for consolidation, notably is not; hybrid episodes once again thwart our sonata-form expectations. Furthermore, while the Exposition began quietly but confidently, the Recapitulation starts on unstable ground (Ex. 2.5). At m. 737, only half the cello and contrabass sections are present, beginning with ppp, single-note and dotted-rhythm fragments separated by short pauses. After the tempo resumes at 741, familiar motives begin to appear: the Herald chimes in the oboes at 747, 74 the major-key Weckruf in two horns, three measures later; once again the Herald tolling motive has a unifying effect, when it syncs up with the dotted-rhythm and bassline figures at 758. When the lyrical Pan 1.2 reappears at 762, it does so in the original oboe and flute, highlighting its remaining folk/pastoral elements, and is aligned with the Herald chimes in the winds and march rhythms in the violins. This explicit overlay of march and folk/pastoral now recalls the Expositional sudden-onset clash more than the Development’s disordered referential overlap. Example 2.5. Fragmented opening of the Recapitulation proper (mm. 737-58). 75 At this stage, however, the overall middle-register, p texture creates a timbral blending that diminishes the impact of this referential conflict, and suggests something closer to coexistence. As the entries begin to stagger, the effect of individual voices within a crowd again begins to take hold; but now, Pan remains in its lyrical folk/pastoral referential area, and the march fragments are referentially unencumbered by additional troped genres, as they were in the Development. In the absence of sub-sectional boundaries, the alternation of metrically aligned clash and staggered overlap (e.g., m. 762, and ca. 767, respectively, Ex. 2.6) provides a different kind of structural Example 2.5 (cont.). Fragmented opening of the Recapitulation proper (mm. 737-58). 76 template with which to organize the constantly crescendoing material. Yet these moments of hypermetric cooperation are somewhat paradoxical, since they simultaneously express the greatest degree of musical coordination but the most referential conflict between folk/pastoral and march categories. Example 2.6. The first instance of alternating metrically-aligned and staggered-overlap clash in the Recapitulation (mm. 759-71). 77 The individualism only continues as more motives continue to be extracted and reintroduced, including the Development’s “battle fanfare,” as the motivic pool expands outside Example 2.6 (cont.). The first instance of alternating metrically-aligned and staggered-overlap clash in the Recapitulation (mm. 759-71). 78 the bounds of the Exposition. As Herald-associated march triplets begin to take hold, they do so against the simple-time dotted rhythms at m. 786, as once-ordered march motives no longer wait in line to take turns. Following a chromaticized Weckruf fragment in the second trumpet at 812, we find ourselves back in the Development’s middle section. Here, we return to a major-key overlap of the Weckruf theme in the horns and flutes, with the “fugue” subject in the decidedly un-Baroque, “village-band” Eb clarinets. Thus, this latter theme undergoes a referential shift: the instrumentation combines with Pan-inspired arpeggios to create a more even fusion of march and folk/pastoral elements. It is in this way that signifiers of the Dionysian Procession, as the combination of folk/pastoral and march genres, begin to seep into the texture. The next major alignment at m. 824 brings back both the chorale-like half-notes, heard in the introductory Pan/Herald complexes, and their folk/pastoral/mystical associations; this accompanies a prefigured variant of Pan’s “telos” goal-theme. The march continues, but with its three-part string counterpoint it is no match for a full wind section and eight ff horns. Avoiding its march-signifying variants, the Pan theme works towards “telos” one version at a time, in various keys. By m. 831, both dotted and triplet march rhythms have faded, leaving only bassline march figures in the lower winds and brass, which themselves disappear when the “telos” theme finally emerges in the tonic at 846. Now, a fff sustained tutti texture expresses the heroic topic with almost no referential friction, as the sustained “mystical” trills prepare for the “dream-like” impending sweep that secures the F major essential structural closure. Thus, by recapitulating motives from the entire work and disintegrating the subrotational structure established by Rotation 1 and implied by the rotational patterns of sonata form, Mahler creates not a return to order, but a continuation of the individualistic freedom established in the Development. Motivic and referential conflict here takes place via a series of staggered and 79 simultaneous clashes with minimized coexistence, and by the securing of march, folk/pastoral and horn call generic identities culminating in the expression of the “heroic.” As a character, this “telos” theme has combined its folk/pastoral past with the horn call and march context to organically evolve into a new entity which, at least from a narrative perspective, is the fusion of all three. This all takes place in the context of the “Dionysian Procession,” the ebullient clash of the march with Pan’s folk/pastoral elements, standing in opposition to the Apollonian order established by the rotational sectional divisions of the first rotation. Conclusion According to my account, then, the first movement of Mahler’s Third Symphony is defined by the heterogeneous interplay of its character-like themes. For Monahan, the movement maps a narrative of integration; yet these hybridity episodes trace another arc: one of motivic freedom, as thematic characters constantly drift and settle in areas of a fixed referential space. Mahler employs these generic mixture environments in a way that at times complements, and at others overpowers the standard raison d’être of sonata form. Tension and small-scale form are instead determined by the interaction of these characters in episodes and patterned waves of hybridity, in the form of alternations between simultaneous and misaligned clash. Thus, heterogeneity arguably lies at the core of this colossal symphonic movement, as the intersection between its individualistic use of themes, the cacophonic manner of its counterpoint, its highly deformational sonata structure, and vivid use of topical allusions. 80 Chapter 3 Symphony No. 7 Of all Mahler’s symphonies, the Seventh is considered the most “fragmented” and “heterogeneous,”95 brimming with “disjunctions and paradoxes.”96 Such musical and referential disarray makes this work a prime candidate for hybridity analysis. Yet the overall employment of signifying entities is considerably more complex than the movements hitherto discussed. Unlike the reasonably contained topical spaces of those movements, the Seventh casts a wide referential net, combining seemingly unrelated topics in a successive stream of episodes with comparatively scarce instances of overlap and interaction. This situation is further complicated by quotations and allusions to existing works, notably Wagner’s Meistersinger von Nürnberg in the fifth movement, a connection most thoroughly explored by Anna Stoll Knecht in her recent book on the symphony.97 I do not find all the quotations Stoll Knecht identifies to be equally convincing so I will emphasize this relationship only when potential allusions help articulate a key referential area. Nevertheless, I take to heart her sustained argument for links between movements and her insinuation that in this case, comprehensive interpretation of any one movement requires full consideration of the work as a whole. Unlike Stoll Knecht, I will provide a chronological pass through the work so as to consider an experiential perspective of the shifting referential fields; this in turn, will build on the many existing brief summaries of the piece, using a hybridity lens to formulate an argument that encapsulates the work as a whole. 95 Anna Stoll Knecht, Mahler’s Seventh Symphony (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 2, 38; Peter Revers, “The Seventh Symphony,” in Mahler Studies, ed. Donald Mitchell and Andrew Nicholson, 376-399 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 376. 96 Stephen E. Hefling, “From Wunderhorn To Rückert and the middle-period symphonies,” in The Cambridge Companion to Mahler, ed. Jeremy Barham, 89-127 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 124. 97 Stoll Knecht, 266-293. 81 This zoomed-out perspective necessitates use of both Alcalde’s strategies and the referentially mobile thematic “characters” presented in the previous chapter, but my discussion will also move beyond these approaches to focus on the entire work’s referential space and the network that links disparate referential entities. Thus, I will focus my analysis on the hybridity episodes that do exist in each movement, on localized cases of the referential transformation of motives and on the varying treatment of first-movement material in subsequent movements. Lastly, I suggest a new concept: that, in the overall formation of a complex referential network across movements, gaps between unconnected references are gradually filled, in what might be understood as a process of network completion. Movement I: Ombra and March While the Seventh Symphony as a whole shares many connections with the Sixth (notably its major-minor motive), the first movement’s opening referential space shares a striking resemblance to the introductory spaces in Part I of the Third, with funeral-type marches and brass soli. Yet, prominent here is the broad referential area of the “call,” which acts as referential connective tissue between the march, ombra, and a nature/pastoral complex. Throughout the symphony, horn calls, fanfares, birdsong and bells, prominent throughout Mahler’s entire oeuvre, take center stage.98 We begin with one such call: a tenor horn solo, sounding at forte over low-register march rhythms in the strings and winds (Ex. 3.1). The slow tempo, dense texture, minor sonority and inclusion of this lower-brass solo, suggests the troping of ombra and the march seen in the Third 98 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 53-70. All these entities are linked by Johnson as gestures of calling. 82 Symphony, to create the funeral march topic. But there is one important factor that complicates this allusion: an added major sixth (G#) to the b minor tonic triad sounding in both the march material and the tenor horn call (particularly the opening four-note motive in mm. 2-3). This chord itself, enharmonically a first inversion half-diminished seventh, has been labelled the “mystical chord,” due in part to its harmonic ambiguity and lack of direction, and also to its perceived relationship to the Tristan chord and its relationship to themes of magic in Tristan und Isolde and Parsifal. Strictly harmonically, however, the Tristan chord is voiced differently, and the sonority as a whole better resembles an embellished tonic sonority than a chord with predominant function. Yet, given the high degree of dialogue this symphony has with the works of Wagner, this harmony could be interpreted as a referential marker at least retrospectively if we adduce Julian Horton’s notion that nineteenth-century topics are often evoked in the context of previous works understood to have engaged with them.99 By this logic, it becomes possible for a single chord to at least partially represent a topical field; its definitional limitations could infer that it is a reference with less import and reach than others invoked in the work. Thus, this overall opening sonority could be interpreted as the coexistence of two main entities: the funeral march (which itself could be considered a product of troping), with the “mystical,” in the form of the half-diminished seventh chord embedded into this ombra/march texture. The supernatural themes attached to ombra from its earliest prototypical expression in Monteverdi’s Orfeo, arguably provide enough of an associative link between ombra and mystical to consider their pairing coexistence rather than clash.100 99 Julian Horton, “Listening to Topics in the Nineteenth Century,” in The Oxford Handbook to Topic Theory, ed. Danuta Mirka, 642-664 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 100 McClelland, “Ombra and Tempesta,” 285. 83 Example 3.1. Opening of No. 7/I, featuring the funeral march and mystical topics (mm. 1-4). 84 As the introduction progresses, the balance between these three referential components—march, ombra and mystical—is revealed to be in constant flux. At first, further ombra characteristics, such as trills, tremoli and chromatic embellishments increase, as does the diversity of march rhythms and motives. The temporary withdrawal of ombra and mystical references at m. 19 leaves behind a quicker, higher register march, swiftly swallowed by a fortissimo presentation of funeral march rhythms at m. 27. Here, the trombones carry the genesis of the Exposition’s first P theme, which, with its untainted tonic sonority could be seen to momentarily stabilize the harmonic ambiguity of the opening chord (see Fig. 3.1 for Seth Monahan’s formal overview of the movement).101 Yet, alongside the tempo shift at m. 45, the lower register of the orchestra drops 101 My own sonata form analysis ended up being very similar to Seth Monahan’s, so I have included his outline for ease of reference – note that, since his discussion on the symphony is brief and focussed on the exposition/recapitulation sonata-form parallel, he does not include a Development. I take the Development to Figure 3.1. Seth Monahan’s interpretation of the first movement’s sonata form (excluding Development). 85 out entirely. Languid lower brass solos become quasi-canonic trumpet fanfares, and the funeral march rhythms, now freed from the low-register plodding tempo of the opening, and pared back only to oboes, clarinets and second violins, swiftly evolve into momentum-building triadic licks. Just as in the Third, the first movement proper in the Seventh begins with a march (m. 50), unimpeded by coexistence or troping with other referential entities. Moreover, as this first primary theme (horns and celli) is derived from the falling-fourth trombone motive at m. 27, it could also be considered the work’s first instance of referential transformation, from an ombra-coded arioso to a military-like march, secure in its minor-mode diatonicism. Ultimately, however, this P1 material collapses and is swiftly juxtaposed with P2 at m. 80, as all references hitherto introduced drop out completely (Ex. 3.2). What remains is another thematic transformation as the opening horn solo becomes a disjointed duple-time pseudo-waltz theme.102 Despite the lack of triple time, gestures typical of a Mahlerian waltz are foregrounded: “downbeat” lifts comprised of acciaccatura double-stop arpeggiations, attached to sweeping dotted rhythms occupying what might otherwise be the first two beats of a triple-time bar, triple-stopped accompaniment in the celli, and a general shift to legato lines. This expansion of the opening motivic cell (m. 2), keeps the distinctive seventh span, but divides it into fourths, thus excising any lingering mystical insinuations by removing the half-diminished sonority. Not only is this cut-common waltz metrically out of joint, but the reference, too, seems entirely unconnected to those presented thus far: a point in the referential space that stands separate from the main network. begin at m. 145 and conclude at m. 337. Seth Monahan, “Success and Failure in Mahler’s Sonata Recapitulations,” Music Theory Spectrum 33 (2011): 55. 102 Described by Stoll Knecht as a “clumsy waltz,” 244. This connection to Introduction material is indicated by Monahan’s description of P2 as “INT-based” (see Fig. 3.1). 86 In any case, this incongruity is swiftly overcome as the sonata continues to run its course. P1 material returns in a sudden juxtaposition at m. 99; the main theme is altered to include the contour and rhythm of the opening tenor horn motive, which in this purely triadic context becomes more fanfare-like and thus only strengthens this short return to the march. A gentler transition leads into the referentially unspecific, “hyperexpressive” S theme, before the march returns in g Example 3.2. The pseudo-waltz P2 theme in the Exposition (mm. 79-88). 87 minor, following a failed essential expositional closure at m. 134.103 Here, motivic cells from the introduction appear relatively unchanged from their original appearance but overlap in chaotic entries; the only true mechanism of referential transformation lies in the increased tempo, which allows ombra characteristics to be shed in favor of fanfare-like march qualities. The following multi-section Development (m. 145-337) cycles through existing material and associated references in a quasi-rotational fashion, with consistent returns of the march until the movement’s central section, beginning at m. 255. Following a “waltz” reprise overlapped with fanfare fragments (from m. 247), the tempo slows and the march is replaced by further arpeggiated trumpet fanfares gestures, now pianissimo. These are followed by a repetitive, birdsong-like figure in the flute at 261, and isolated instances of the fourth-based version of the opening cell in the oboe at mm. 262 and 265. Considering the stratospheric inverted pedal in the first violins, this overall texture not only articulates the work’s growing emphasis on the “call,” but is strikingly reminiscent of the suspended opening of the First Symphony. Given the programmatic associations of the allusion, this distant, proclamatory passage perhaps expands the referential space to include the expression of “nature.”104 These few bars in turn herald the onset of a new, arguably related reference—what begins as a kind of folk/pastoral complex, at m. 266.105 The pastoral-signifying English horn sounds a transformation of P1, which here loses its horn-call fanfare quality as the second subphrase repeats, spun out as a motive in its own right; this is accompanied homorhythmically by a folk-like solo violin countermelody.106 103 Monahan, 54-5. 104 See for example, Fischer, 151-4. 105 An interpretation supported by Stoll Knecht, 244. 106 The texture in the violins, from m. 270, where they briefly take over from the English Horn, is also reminiscent of a previous passage in the Development, at m. 196. 88 At m. 296, another jump-cut juxtaposition sees the return of the static call passage from 255, extended and with greater focus on birdcall gestures in the winds. Once again, it proves to be a liminal space, a corridor to yet another new reference: the “dream,” characterized by sweeping harp glissandi and arpeggios, upper register trills and overall hushed dynamic reminiscent of moments in Tchaikovsky’s ballet music. For Stoll Knecht, this is the moment of structural breakthrough (an idiosyncratic interpretation firstly because she does not read a sonata form, and secondly because Adorno classified this moment instead as a “suspension”).107 Formenlehre intricacies of this labelling aside, it does mark a significant referential point of the music: for, much like the “slow Ländler” material in the second movement of the Ninth, this “dream” reference allows a neutral, transformative territory for existing motives to coexist, referentially altered (Ex. 3.3). The 3-2-1 motive first heard at m. 19 is reinterpreted in the horns and celli as 8-7-6 and 6-5-4 patterns in B major, the parallel key of the opening b minor; the repeated birdcall figure from m. 261 continues in the flutes and second violins at 325; the trumpets, which spearhead the breakthrough moments in the first and last movements of the First,108 here play an inversion of the fourth-based opening cell at an unobtrusive pianissimo; and from m. 326, lyrical, S-related material begins to take over the upper strings. In other words, motivic representatives of ombra, march, the call and nature/pastoral entities here undergo referential transfiguration, to exist without friction in a dream-coded space. 107 Stoll Knecht, 241. 108 James Buhler, “‘Breakthrough’ as Critique of Form: The Finale of Mahler’s First Symphony,” 19th-Century Music 20, no. 2 (1996): 125-143. 89 Example 3.3. Breathrough “dream” episode at the end of the Development (mm. 317-21). 90 Example 3.3 (cont.). Breathrough “dream” episode at the end of the Development (mm. 317-21). 91 This episode also marks the final component of the first movement’s referential space, represented in Fig. 3.2. The upper left area of the diagram shows the initial triumvirate of topics, march, ombra and call, which are interconnected in episodes of coexistence or troping by sharing the topical features that label the solid and dashed lines, respectively. The right side of the diagram indicates how this Developmental episode expands the space to include nature, which coexists with the call via birdsong and can itself be seen to share pastoral features with folk. The addition of the “dream” topic suggests interpreting the earlier “mystical” reference retrospectively as the troping of ombra and dream. These three entities share an associative relationship with the supernatural and otherworldly. More technically, their confluence allows one to interpret the movement’s mystical signifier (the b minor triad with the added major sixth) as the combination of ombra’s distinctive minor key with the dream’s characteristic major key. This perspective invites kind of referential harmonic coexistence also found in the movement’s closing key of E major, which could be interpreted as the ultimate stabilization of the opening chord’s distinctive Figure 3.2. Referential space for No. 7/I. Solid lines indicate coexistence, and dashed lines indicate troping. 92 G#. In this sense, preparation for both the breakthrough and the closing key, began not at the allusion to the First Symphony, but right at the first bar. Full consideration of the tonal/structural implications of the breakthrough lies out of the purview of this discussion, but this episode does seem to carry some referential after-effects through the introduction reprise at m. 338, with a series of confrontations between dream and ombra topics. Despite a secure return of the opening tempo and funeral march rhythms, this material is now far less cohesive. Without the added G#, the “mystical” topic is no longer sounded. The ombra reference is maintained through the funeral march rhythms (now in a lower register, lacking the violins and flutes), minor key and lower-brass soli, but overall, the topic appears diluted. The forces articulating the funeral march rhythms are significantly depleted; the opening motive is fragmented and intervallically altered in the upper basses, while a B major triadic figure takes precedence in the trombones. Its major fragments mix with minor scale degrees when the tenor horn enters with motives that appeared much later in the introduction—and then, at m. 354, the ombra topic momentarily succumbs to the sudden reappearance of B-major S material, as it appeared in the dream passage. This interaction is noted by Monahan as a “conflict of INT and S,” further suggesting not only the imposition of S on the Introduction’s space, but their especially contentious relationship in this series of clashes (Fig. 3.1). Two measures later, the major-minor motto heard throughout the movement now becomes a tool for reference switching (Ex. 3.4.). The incomplete chromatic neighbors built into the dream melody allows for the violins and upper winds to slip into minor via a G natural (as chromatic neighbor to F#). The very next measure, the underlying harmony shifts suddenly to minor; accompanied by a resurgence of funeral march rhythms in the lower strings, the upper strings quickly lose their grip on the dream melody, becoming locked on a melodically embellished E# 93 before the tenor horn returns at 358. At m. 359, the mystical briefly returns, as both the tenor horn and English horn emphasize G# over a tremolo b minor triad in the bass. When this S-based melody causes a second clash at m. 362, this G# becomes a pedal underneath an F# minor triad, swiftly losing its signifying status as the main element of the mystical reference, while the ombra continues through tremoli. By the Allmählich drägend two measures later, this version of the material—now better resembling its expressionistic origins—yields to fanfare figures, preparing the climactic onset of the Recapitulation at m. 373. Thus, due to the significant role that harmony and key plays in the referential identities of ombra, the dream and the mystical, these instances of reference switching—technically, clash—are primarily motivated by distinctive harmonic shifts. A comparatively dramatized reprisal of the march topic dominates this next section much as it did in the Exposition, culminating in a militaristic use of upper winds and percussion at the Coda (m. 495). While all components of the dream episode fail to survive past the introduction reprise, overcome by ombra and the march, perhaps an echo of it remains in the final five measures. Not only does a modal shift to E major reverse the major-to-minor motivic/harmonic trend seen throughout the movement, the all-important G# is even emphasized as the melody note on the last cadential downbeat. Referentially, however, the overall narrative of this first movement is not dissimilar to that of the Third, as it traces the victory of the march topic and presents a similar array of referential entities. But there is one primary difference: the introduction of the waltz—a genre that does not belong, and cannot be convincingly connected to the references that comprise the referential space. Going forward, this incompatibility could be understood as analogous to the harmonic journey of G# in this movement: an incongruous entity, requiring resolution. 94 Example 3.4. Interjections of dream material into the Introduction reprise (mm. 352-63). 95 Example 3.4 (cont.). Interjections of dream material in to the Introduction reprise (mm. 352-63). 96 Example 3.5. Opening of No. 7/II, featuring the horn call, birdsong and nature references (mm. 1-21). 97 Movement II: Serenade (Nachtmusik I) That resolution, however, will have to wait. The second movement expands the symphony’s referential space, creating new intersections between the march, nature and the call and presenting referential frictions of its own. This movement also comes with paratext, which has an unclear relationship to the topics explored through the music itself. The designation of “Serenade (Nachtmusik)” to the second and fourth movements is contentious amongst scholars. Some, like Julian Johnson, suggest this is upheld in the “little serenade band” textures of both;109 others, like Floros and Stoll Knecht, seem to ignore “serenade” as paratext for Movement II, favoring Nachtmusik instead, but uphold it for Movement IV, seen as encapsulating both by default of the serenade being music played at night.110 While I hesitate to ignore any potential referential signifiers, I am mostly in agreement with the latter opinion: while one could argue for vaguely nocturnal qualities, the features of a serenade that I will discuss in relation to the fourth movement are far more apparent there than they are here. As such, I will set aside this title and focus instead on the referential entities that are apparent throughout the second movement. In this movement, the idea of the call, often foregrounded in the first movement, is most thoroughly realized. For Johnson, calls exist in liminal spaces, ushering in a “new musical identity”;111 in this sense, the opening of the second movement (Ex. 3.5) is a clear example of one such threshold, the passageway from one march to another. However, this space presents not one type of call, but a complex of topics, triply apportioned into the opening call-and-response horn calls, upper wind bird songs beginning at m. 20, and their musical and referential bridge: Mahler’s characteristic “burbling of nature.” This last reference is represented by the triplet rhythms that 109 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 31. 110 Floros, 198, 203; Stoll Knecht, 161. 111 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 54. 98 enter at m. 10, improvisatory with their meter-blurring extensive phrases, birdsong-like trills, repeated motives and free ornamentation.112 Stephen E. Hefling considers this a “a bewildering abundance of sonic symbols,” which connotes a degree of referential friction that arguably does not yet exist.113 Despite the surface polyphony that might suggest otherwise, this opening could be seen to sit towards the coexistence end of the clash/coexistence spectrum: the references may be relatively stratified in the texture, but there is a great deal of referential overlap between their three topics. Nature coexists with the broad idea of the call via birdsong; the “call” category itself encompasses the horn call, which could additionally be considered adjacent to the march-associated fanfare. Moreover, when this introductory passage returns at 122, it does so alongside the (infamous) addition of cowbells; since these signify the human presence in nature, they suggest the expansion of the nature topic into a nature/pastoral complex, which relates directly to the horn call via allusions to alpine and hunting horns. This is all to say that, at least referentially, these threshold call spaces can be considered highly cohesive entities – the coexistence of three separate topical areas within a single overarching referential unit. This neat package of references, however, is far from the extent of allusions presented in this second movement. In the first of many such gestures, this opening section leads to dramatic collapse at m. 28, arriving at a transformation of the opening horn call into a moderately-paced march theme at m. 30. It is only in the second half of this section that march rhythms become omnipresent (at m. 48), even throughout shifts to and from the minor mode. Yet this episode, too, is short-lived: at m. 62, the transformed horn call returns, simultaneously with a reprise of nature triplets in the winds. Since the horn motive is now more strictly march-associated and the triplets 112 Johnson, Mahler’s Voices, 65. 113 Hefling, “From Wunderhorn To Rückert,” 124. 99 are contained in isolated instrumental layers, this could be considered a fairly straightforward example of overlap, although the end of this mixture episode isn’t nearly as clean as its onset. As this A section begins to dwindle at m. 70, triplet figures continue in the upper winds, atop march themes in counterpoint and interjections of the march-associated horn call from m. 76. When the triplets and trills in the oboe finally cease by m. 78, all that remains of the march are motivic cells, which manage to revive it only in part before they are quickly succeeded by the B section. Both the destabilizing quality of the nature material and its sudden interjection have effectively dismantled the march. While the material at m. 83 is vaguely dance-like in its melody and accompaniment texture, complete with a pizzicato contrabass line, its conventional designation as a “trio” raises larger questions about what constitutes a topical or referential area, most of which will be addressed in the discussion on Movement III.114 Mahler does not label this material as “Trio”—the only such label occurs in the third movement and will be discussed in turn. Given that this passage is not strictly in three voices, and is not in triple time, “trio” seems to have been applied with a great deal of flexibility and little definitional consistency. As such, I acknowledge the generalized dance characteristics embedded in this material, but do not consider there to be enough referential specificity to assign this material its own topical area. All the same, by about m. 96, this material begins to morph upon the reprise of the m. 83 theme. Dotted rhythms once again begin to rise in prominence, building to march-like intensity by m. 100; by m. 105, these shift again, into the first explicit instance of circus music in the symphony (Ex. 3.6). While it is more understated and leisurely than usual for that topic, it is identified by 114 Analysts who designate “trio” include Stoll Knecht, 162, and Floros, 198. 100 Stoll Knecht as carousel music,115 which, by her definition, could be understood as a kind of circus march, since this is in itself a “faster and comical” form of the military march.116 From a hybridity perspective, however, I will treat circus and march as coexistent entities rather than considering all circus material simply as a subcategory of march; circus marches and carousel music manifest the link between these entities. In embracing this perspective, I differ from Stoll Knecht by elevating the circus into its own referential area. This is in part due to the later prominence of the circus in the fifth movement, wherein the circus march is only one form in which it manifests, and also the prevalence of circus signifiers not necessarily shared by the march. Here, carousel music is marked by the overly diatonic, repetitive melody articulated in the flutes, clarinets and horns, partly comprising an uncomplicated melody-and-accompaniment homophonic texture. (Straight diatonicism, repetitive melodies and homophonic textures are not reliable markers of the march, alone, in Mahler’s works.) The accompaniment is a march bassline that quickly becomes excessive, even at this piano dynamic—by m. 110, it sounds in most instruments, underneath an embellished oboe line and new repetitive theme in the flutes and horns. The carousel music and the march may coexist, but the circus is otherwise alien to this movement’s referential environment. However, referential friction is reduced by the lack of tempo shift, steady tempo and unobtrusive dynamics. As such, this reference calls relatively little attention to itself, shortly slipping into the opening call complex by m. 122. 115 Stoll Knecht, 161; listed as a “circus theme” at 167. 116 Stoll Knecht, 51. 101 Example 3.6. Carousel episode in No. 7/II (mm. 105-15). 102 Example 3.6 (cont.). Carousel episode in No. 7/II (mm. 105-15). 103 The return of the call, especially considering Mahler’s typical procedures, may raise expectations of thematic rotation, but those are swiftly quashed as sections begin to bleed into each other in a succession of hybridity episodes. This introduction reprise sees an increase in call gestures, and the introduction of march figures from section A; even the opening call appears with dotted rhythms. Cowbells and the use of solo wind instruments may still evoke the pastoral, but the “burbling” nature triplets appear earlier, already with the return of section A, rather than making a later entrance. Instead of the march, the missing birdsong returns at 161 alongside a pastoral use of pedal-points in the flutes, harp and upper strings. Yet it isn’t long before this pastoral/call pairing is interrupted by signifiers of the march: first come isolated pizzicato sol-do lower-string bassline gestures from m. 155; fanfare motives follow in the oboe at m. 165, then the march rhythm first introduced at m. 48, now in the brass from m. 169. At m. 179, a direct juxtaposition occurs as nature triplets and trills return as they appeared at m. 20, complete with the horn call gesture, now sounded by the trumpets, bassoon and solo violin. The horns themselves now continue the march rhythms, causing a direct overlap clash with the nature/call complex, which, as in the beginning, leads to a dramatic two-measure collapse at m. 187. Rather than leading to march material, as before, we instead arrive at the work’s second instance of an allusion entirely alien to its referential surroundings: a habanera, most clearly identifiable by the bassline gestures in the harp and lower string and the rhythm in the harps—the march rhythmic cell, referentially repurposed so as to no longer express the march at all.117 With the presentation of the movement’s last referential entity, Movement II’s referential space is now complete. As Figure 3 demonstrates, the second movement shares with the first a few referential similarities, namely the upper march-call-nature triangle, and an isolated dance allusion. This 117 Stoll Knecht, 174. 104 movement does necessitate the separation of nature, pastoral and folk, given the absence of any strictly folk-associated qualities, and the near-constant overlap of nature and pastoral signifiers. Now, however, the addition of the circus provides another referential pathway between the march and nature/pastoral (via coexistence between march and circus and troping/overlap between circus and nature/pastoral), creating a closed structure that only emphasizes the habanera’s isolation from the surrounding signifying material. After the referentially discordant interpolation of the habanera, a sudden overlap of nature leads into the next section, now in the form of a protuberant, non-legato passage of high-register triplets in the clarinet at m. 203. Subsequently, the dance deteriorates, and march and birdcalls are troped in a short transitional passage at m. 212 before we leave this more developmental central space for something resembling a recapitulation at m. 223. This material may be more extravagantly orchestrated and contrapuntal, but the pattern of mixture episodes recurs—march, dance, carnival, each interrupted and disintegrated by nature triplets. By the movement’s close, this overpowering characteristic of the nature material is played out conclusively. At m. 318, a musette-like fifth pedal underlies a return of birdsong gestures in Figure 3.3. Referential space for No. Solid lines indicate coexistence, and dashed lines indicate troping. 105 the upper winds, and another variant of the horn’s opening call, initially containing march rhythms. Yet, within the space of a measure, this reference shifts, losing the dotted rhythms and the march reference along with it. By m. 322, this horn line takes over the nature triplets itself. After this five-measure referential shift—from the horn’s sole embodiment the fanfare/call to its succumbing to nature triplets—all that remains is the nature/pastoral complex: pedal points, triplets and trills. Despite unpredictable triplet interjections made by the first violins and celli at mm. 337 and 340, respectively, the movement fades without collapse, in what might be understood as a written-out, partial overtone series: first the fundamental C drops out, leaving behind the upper partials, marked morendo in the flutes, before all that remains is a ghostly echo of the {C, G} fifth: a harmonic cello G5, articulated by the harp. Over the course of the movement, the nature topic’s involvement in moments of referential friction—especially the mid-section overlaps—has systematically broken down the march, carousel music, habanera and the referentially nondescript “trio.” Rather than retaining its synthesis with march signifiers, as established in the opening of the movement, nature alone has gradually overpowered all referential entities distinct from the nature/pastoral space; even the call, ever omnipresent, disappears amid the flurry of triplets, not to rear its head again until the final movement. Movement III: Schattenhaft The third movement is defined by gestures of collapse, disintegration and grotesquerie entangled with a complex reinterpretation of referential entities presented in the preceding movements. While it does not carry any pre-established titles like “serenade” or “Nachtmusik,” it does bear a descriptive expression marking that Mahler otherwise only applied to a short passage 106 in the first movement of the Ninth: schattenhaft (“shadowy”). Considering the opening 37 measures as representative of this paratextual clue (Ex. 3.7), there are broad similarities between this material and the schattenhaft of the Ninth (No. 9/I, m. 254). Both passages are defined by use of a minor key, overall soft dynamic, low register and fragmented use of motive; considering this consistency, it might be possible to consider schattenhaft its own referential entity. Moreover, in this central movement of the Seventh, the opening material (mm. 13ff.) concentrates on triplet figures, which swiftly coalesce into uninterrupted, scurrying streams that permeate the entire movement (with the exception of the Trio section). Considering the strong association of fast triplets with nature in the preceding movement as well as the evocative expression marking, schattenhaft could be considered the subversion of the nature reference established in Movement II. Given how ombra has been characterized in the first movements of the Third and the Seventh, schattenhaft could also be considered the troping of ombra with nature to create a new referential entity. Figure 3.4 displays this troping through the use of dashed lines, making visible that it is the only movement thus far not to involve coexistence relationships between referential entities. This is perhaps one of the central causes for the movement’s general sense of unease and disjunction. Note also, that, similar to how the march and nature/pastoral gained a new referential connection via the circus in Movement II, nature and ombra—referentially unconnected in the first movement—here appear linked by the formation of the schattenhaft topic. In a similar sense, the “Dance of Death” identified with this movement,118 might be understood as the troping of ombra with the waltz material first heard at m. 54. This is supported in a few ways. The opening triplets continue throughout waltz material (especially from the second waltz at m. 116); the pre-existing combination of ombra material with waltz accompaniment and 118 Stoll Knecht, 209-11. 107 countermelody rhythms appear in the introduction (m. 5ff. and first section mm. 28-9); and the insertion of general ombra characteristics into the waltz partly provide grotesque Totentanz qualities, such as general chromaticism, propensity for heavier textures, emphasis on lower brass, and tendency towards collapse. Accordingly, we might hear ombra becoming a kind of referential fulcrum, and also providing the missing link between the waltz and the core referential network thus far established. In other words, the first movement’s “problem” of the referentially unconnected waltz has found resolution in the Scherzo through its troping with ombra to create the Totentanz. I understand this resolution as an instance of what I will call “referential network completion,” which retrospectively explains the incongruous interpolation of waltz signifiers in the first movement. This idea refers to the gradual accumulation of topics over the course of the symphony (or ostensibly, any large, referentially variegated work), here partly generated by the exaggerations of the expected genres of nineteenth-century symphony movements. As each new signifying entity is added, it is usually allied to at least one other topic in the network—either due to referential commonalities or their combination in the music—by such processes as troping or coexistence. Others, like the waltz and habanera, appear as discrete units, unconnected. As new topics are added, more connections are forged. In some cases, these connections (like the circus and schattenhaft) provide new pathways between entities already associated with each other via alternate alliances. However, for genres unassociated with the network, like the waltz, a connection is added for the first time which reveals a new relationship to the whole symphony’s network-in-progress. The addition of a missing link via the waltz’s new association with ombra results in a moment of referential network completion. 108 Example 3.7. Schattenhaft material in the first main section of No. 7/III (mm. 13-28). 109 As neatly contained as Figure 3.4 may be, however, it is not without potential problems. Distinct from ombra, nature and this shadowy waltz is the central Trio (m. 179), which presents a comparatively delicate, major-key triple-time theme. I am uncertain as to whether “trio” in itself can be considered a reference—even if it is specifically labelled by Mahler, and more traditional triple time and chamber music textures are employed. Of concern in this case is partly the referential vagueness and the trio’s lack of rigid definition by the early twentieth century, but also the question of whether it is less a reference than an artefact of the form. That is to say, while the minuet (and the trio was initially a second minuet within minuet/trio form) was considered a topic in the eighteenth century,119 due to its close relationship to the original dance and clearly defined definitional boundaries, one might argue that by 1906 these boundaries had slackened, with the trio perhaps considered less a dance than a formal entity. If “trio” could be considered a topic, it could be incorporated into the network as shown in Figure 3.5, as the troping of the triple-time dance characteristics of the waltz with the woodwind focused, chamber textures typically associated with a pastoral (even though there are arguably not enough pastoral markers here to consider this section a full manifestation of the topic). This, in turn, links back to nature—a connection I have shown as a double line, which indicates a link between topics that might 119 Eric McKee, “Ballroom Dances of the Late Eighteenth Century,” in The Oxford Handbook of Topic Theory, ed. Danuta Mirka, 164-193 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). Figure 3.4. Referential space for No. 7/III. 110 otherwise be considered as one complex, their combination requiring no mediating entity that is the by-product of troping or coexistence. Overall, however, I consider the trio not to bear any signifying function; instead, I hear its referential neutrality to set the contrasting, highly signifying characteristics of the Totentanz in stark relief. Despite the fact that either interpretation comports with the referential network for the entire symphony, this choice of one or the other does affect whether to regard the movement’s most striking conjunction, the simultaneous presentation of the waltz and trio themes at m. 417, as a hybridity episode at all. If the trio is considered a topic, this section would be interpreted as a direct overlap (although towards the middle of the clash/coexistence spectrum, as the triple-time commonality allows for a degree of coexistence, emphasized by the unproblematic sharing of the accompaniment figure in the horns). If the trio is considered a neutral artefact of the form, then this passage is still an important stopping point on the movement’s path to collapse, but could only be read as a strictly musical clash of themes, without any referential baggage. The sense of musical friction between the two themes, both essentially unaltered, is palpable. This is perhaps due to the reorchestration and registral separation of each part (lower brass for the trio and violins and piercing upper winds for the waltz), overall forte/fortissimo dynamic level, differences in metric Figure 3.5. Alterative interpretation of the referential space for Movement III that considers the trio a signifying entity. 111 emphasis between the lines, and the equally obtrusive fortissimo horn and lower string “accompaniment.” A sense of referential dissonance, on the other hand is arguably less apparent. A third option might be to draw on another of Alcalde’s strategies: distortion, which necessitates that the reference-distorting agent cannot itself be a recognizable signifier. If the trio has no signification status at all, then it could be considered a distorting agent to the waltz, which also suffers from the addition of lurching dynamics, glissandi, aggressive articulation, and registral dismemberment in the winds. As the last appearance of the waltz, the out-of-place trio theme could be considered just one component of a battery of distortional forces applied to disintegrative effect; or, if a reference, the trio would be causing clash, which serves the same purpose, much like the nature interjections in Movement II. Either way, this section is undoubtedly the most blatant collision of thematic material in the piece as a whole, firmly securing the movement’s path to deterioration. At the background level of the symphony’s referential space, this movement’s troping of the waltz with ombra carries an essential unifying function through network completion—yet, it is the very combination of these topics that results in a movement defined by degeneration and collapse. Movement IV: Serenade (Nachtmusik II) The fourth movement is perhaps the most referentially consistent in the entire piece, featuring no apparent hybridity episodes or signifiers that contrast with the opening reference. Kofi Agawu suggests a handful of quotations and allusions to other works (most notably the connection of the opening “once-upon-a-time” gesture to first bars of Robert Schumann’s “Träumerei” from 112 Kinderszenen), but these interfere little with arguments for hybridity as they do not necessarily express any referential identities, let alone contrasting ones.120 More relevant is an interpretation of the movement’s distinctive signifying markers, most notably the inclusion of the guitar and mandolin, articulating a “serenade atmosphere,” with the solo woodwind focus also evoking pastoral connotations.121 Stoll Knecht considers the fragmented texture as presaging the practices of the Second Viennese school, and thus in conflict with the idea of the serenade. As an alternative, she suggests the guitar and mandolin, combined with the “Andante amoroso” expression marking and chamber music setting, suggest “nocturne.”122 To these signifiers, I might also add the constant arpeggiation in the harp especially, near-omnipresence of the melody and accompaniment texture, and paratextual associations of the “night music” subtitle. Jens Malte Fischer suggests a third alternative: Schrammelmusik, a type of Austrian folk music typically played in coffee houses and involving three instrumentalists—two soloists and an accompanying instrument, often involving violin and guitar.123 Considering the later prominence of the solo violin throughout the movement and consistent—if ever changing— 120 V. Kofi Agawu, “The Narrative Impulse in the Second Nachtmusik from Mahler’s Seventh Symphony,” in Analytical Strategies and Musical Interpretation: Essays on Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Music, ed. Craig Ayrey, 226-41 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 121 Agawu, 236. 122 Stoll Knecht, 183. 123 Fischer, 459. Figure 3.6. Referential space for No. 7/IV. 113 chamber music orchestration, this interpretation seems equally plausible. More importantly, since none of these opinions seem inherently contradictory and all are nocturnal in origin, I consider Schrammelmusik in this context as the troping of the nocturne and the folk (Fig. 3.6). I further consider this to be expressed throughout the movement without referential conflict, as signifiers of all three entities remain constant throughout the movement. Movement V: Circus and Theatre While the fifth movement may be considered by its critics as a shallow trivialization of what has come before it,124 it plays an essential role in the symphony’s overall referential space, providing not only the key to ultimate network completion but also placing a minor reference from Movement II—the circus—center stage. Unlike the fourth movement, this final act of the symphony features a highly episodic structure that frames existing references within this boldly stated and historically unpopular evocation of the circus.125 The circus reference here is not so straightforward as the carousel music heard in the second movement. Instead, I argue, it is entwined with a broader array of stage-music allusions that express a more generalized circus/theatre complex; this, in turn, leads to an ultimate confrontation with the first movement’s minor-mode march. For Stoll Knecht, the final movement evokes the kind of spectacle where “clowns, lion tamers, French cancan dancers, and Turkish characters interact and share the stage.”126 While I will not make it my task to hunt for such specific signifiers, it is certainly the case that both content and structure in this movement are highly variegated and that this degree of miscellany is perhaps 124 Stoll Knecht, 2, 89-90. 125 Stoll Knecht, 2, 89-90. 126 Stoll Knecht, 51. 114 supported by a metaphor of the circus. Entangled in this reference is a broader idea of theatricality, which Stoll Knecht perceives in the ostentatious use of brass and percussion, “gestures of announcement” and “spectacular endings.”127 She also observes much more specific musical allusions to theatrical music. For the opening, and at several cadences, she draws rough parallels with the opening march of Meistersinger (although the Prelude to Act III of Lohengrin also bears equal passing similarity);128 a three-bar motive first heard at m. 186, she considers an allusion to the chorus of the Janissaries from Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, later occurring in a more distinctly alla turca orchestration at m. 368, with strings, bass drum and cymbals; lastly, and more explicitly, is an allusion to the “cancan” of Jacques Offenbach’s Orphée aux Enfers (m. 434).129 Arguably, none of these references are free-standing and separate from evocations of the circus. Meistersinger allusions are relatively unspecific and mostly confined to cadences that are very much attached to their surrounding material. Both Mozart and Offenbach passages may have a sudden onset but prominently share a descending-second motive (first introduced at m. 5), which permeates the entire movement; not substantially altered enough from its circus-associated presentations to be considered a transformation, this motivic similarity instead has the effect of weaving new allusions into an existing referential entity. Thus, we have representatives of German opera, exotic Singspiele, and French operetta, all swirling around within the one circus/theatre referential complex. There are at least two other possible expansions of this complex. The first occupies the first 52 measures (which Constantin Floros understands as one opening section, unlike Stoll Knecht), and throughout which almost all of the material for the movement is presented in a quick, ostentatious succession of themes 127 Stoll Knecht, 50. 128 Stoll Knecht, 266-293. 129 Stoll Knecht, 50. 115 potentially analogous to that of an overture.130 If the opening timpani announcement frames the work within the circus topic, then its progression to an overture-like introduction immediately and seamlessly expands that framing reference as the one, combined circus/theatre topic. Unlike the allusions observed by Stoll Knecht, Mahler’s invocation of the overture is arguably not confined to opera, instead extending to multiple types of stage music, including plays and ballet. In fact, a later moment in the movement suggests both: a delicately orchestrated passage at m. 332, which could be seen to allude to two existing works. The pianissimo staccato upper-register strings accompanied by mid-register pizzicati and major key is reminiscent of Felix Mendelssohn’s overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream; on the other hand, the overall texture itself is ballet-like, with the soft-dynamic pairing of flutes with mordent figures with ricochet violin gestures, all punctuated by fortissimo attacks, perhaps recalling the closing Presto of Tchaikovsky’s “Waltz of the Snowflakes.” (These connections may be unspecific, yet they are no more vague than the intertextual comparisons drawn by Stoll Knecht, and Agawu for the fourth movement.) However, essential as it may be to the structure and affect of the movement, the circus/theatre complex is only core element within the movement’s referential space; I will now work through the movement chronologically, focusing on the introduction of new references and moments of mixture. The opening six bars themselves provide an important connection to previous movements as well as establishing the circus reference (Ex. 3.8). The timpani’s announcement gesture and its immediate answer with fanfares in the horns could both be considered relatives of the “call,” the former connecting to the circus and the latter presaging the march. Indeed, as the woodwinds chaotically overlap the horns with their own fanfare variants, they do so alongside a third motive in unison in the strings, featuring a string of dotted rhythms that evoke the quick pace of the circus 130 Floros, 207. 116 march. Thus these six bars establish the coexistence of the call, circus and fanfare topics, but also set up a coexistence relationship with the immediate juxtaposition of a circus-free processional march at m. 7. With the temporary disappearance of sixteenth notes and with accents articulating a duple pulse on the first and third beats of the bar, the tempo seems halved. Horns now join with trumpets for a more stately theme in a brass chorale texture. The lack of quick dotted march and anapestic rhythms and a march bassline suggests a slight definitional distinction between the march and the procession. For Adorno, a march is an imposing force, while a procession features the free arrangement of material;131 Stoll Knecht further notes that processions can also encapsulate more solemn or ceremonious qualities, which here I argue is enforced by the brass chorale texture that departs from militaristic fanfare stretto or the isolated horn call.132 I do not claim that the march and procession appear entirely distinct throughout the movement—if anything march and processional qualities have a habit of coming in and out of focus throughout prolonged march/procession textures—but I consider this additional layer of specification a useful way to tease out overarching referential relationships. By m. 27, quicker march rhythms re-enter and by the close of this introduction, the circus-like cacophony of the first six bars returns as all exiting motives begin to fragment into in erratic fanfare entries (e.g., mm. 45-6 in the upper winds, trumpets and trombones), flurries of sixteenth-note legato passagework (first seen at m. 15), and snippets of both the opening timpani line and the quick-march descending motives (e.g. mm. 39-40 in the strings). 131 Adorno, Mahler, 23. 132 Stoll Knecht, 46. 117 Example 3.8. Opening of No. 7/V, establishing the circus topic, march and procession (mm. 1-13). 118 Example 3.8 (cont.). Opening of No. 7/V, establishing the circus topic, march and procession (mm. 1-13). 119 The first true break from this coexistence complex of call, circus, march and procession occurs at m. 53. In a conventional interpretation of the rondo form indicated by the title, this would mark the first episode. Although there are further formal complexities that hinder the interpretation of a straightforward rondo, since the movement does roughly follow a refrain-episode alternating pattern, I will continue using these labels for convenience. Here, an abrupt shift to bVI (Ab major) at m. 51 is the only preparation for this juxtaposition clash with pastoral-coded content, signified by an initial woodwind focus and musette-like pedal fifths in the clarinet, embellished by birdsong-like trill patterns of repeated two-note slurs. The theme itself is also new, and despite the continued fast tempo and simple time, the passage is grouped consistently in duple time, with the motives and pastoral reference maintained for the length of the entire episode. We will eventually realize that this completes the movement’s referential space (Fig. 3.7). Far earlier than the first or second movements by comparison, the signification landscape is marked not by the introduction of new allusions but the strengthening and manipulations of those already presented. This space is the most highly connected that we have seen thus far, with Figure 3.7. Referential space for No. 7/V. 120 circus/theatre situated at the intersection of three smaller closed loops with the march and procession, march and call, and call and pastoral. Overall, this suggests that despite a chaotic episodic surface, one of the movement’s main sources—if not the main source—of cohesion lies in its tightly-woven referential network. The network also visualizes the essential binding role that the circus/theatre topic plays in this final movement of the symphony. While all referential areas may have been introduced, the same cannot be said for musical material. Like many refrain/episode thresholds to come, the juxtaposition at m. 78 is brusque, with a tonally unprepared shift back to C major and the brass chorale texture articulating the theme first heard at m. 15. However, m. 87 marks the first of many complications to a clear-cut rondo reading. Here, the timpani opening and descending-second motive from m. 5 continue but, with the sudden drop in tempo and instrumental forces, the build-up in the previous Pesante measure fails to reach its peak. The extraction of motives and relaxing of the tempo instead mark a gradual preparation for the second episode, marked Grazioso, which recasts the descending-second motive as a delicate bassline countermelody underlying a triple time, wind-focused melody. The specific topical allusion at this point is hard to define. Given the chamber-music texture and slow/moderate triple time, it would seem to meet the definitional criteria of a minuet, even if the striking 3/2 time signature is atypical; but these qualities are unspecific, and by the nineteenth century (let alone the twentieth), movements or pieces labelled “minuet” had become extremely diverse in content and inconsistent with any one definition. As such, I acknowledge a shift here to a slow triple-time dance but have chosen not to include it in the referential space. In any case, after six bars, the meter shifts to duple time, while the same motivic material continues to be developed, very swiftly undermining any referential associations based on the 3/2 time signature. 121 From m. 116, a new formal gesture is introduced: a short proclamatory passage preceding the refrain, labelled by Stoll Knecht as an “In-Between,” but which I consider rhetorically as another manifestation of the “announcement,” which both heralds the return of the refrain proper and juxtaposes its circus/march/procession features with the preceding material. Such a visible seam between sections is not so apparent when material from the first episode returns at m. 153. Rather than a triumphant, fully-orchestrated crescendo, the refrain material this time fragments but does not reassemble, with the quick march in the violins disintegrating into a scurry of sixteenth-note tremoli that overlap with the return of the “pastoral” theme in the violas. All that remains of the previous reference is the theme itself. Now in the lower strings and almost deprived of its former woodwind emphasis, this minor variant drags its feet, quickly succumbing to march rhythms from m. 158, which continue throughout the length of the section. Distorted by the minor key and merged with march rhythms, the pastoral referential identity of this material disintegrates, even amid continuations of its two-note slurred motives and a return of the woodwinds at m. 161. The referential purity provided by the clear boundaries of the form thus begins to fracture. The transition to the fourth episode mimics that to the second, with another anticlimactic shift to the slower Tempo II at m. 197 initiating a refrain-based return to the second episode’s Grazioso theme at m. 220. Along the way, however, an interloper enters in what is technically still refrain territory: the “pastoral” theme at m. 210, nestled in the clarinet amongst other woodwind activity and once again excised from its referential origins. Perhaps due to the continued loss of this referential security, the theme itself now appears somewhat broken: the opening motive appears not twice, identically, but three times, the upper three notes descending sequentially; the trilled slurs also repeat an additional time, as if together articulating a triple meter alien to both its 122 initial context and its current duple-time surroundings; it fades to piano after a single iteration of both these motivic cells. Given that the factors of disintegration here are purely motivic and not referential, this might be another example of Alcalde’s distortion. Despite a clear-cut arrival, the Grazioso material is also subject to referential shift—or in this case, referential specification, with the simple addition of upwards glissandi on the first beat of each bar from m. 233 suddenly suggesting the faint fingerprint of a Mahlerian waltz. It is also during this section that the boundaries between episode and refrain begin to splinter, causing a string of juxtaposition and overlap clashes. At m. 239, the opening announcement reappears without warning as a two-bar interpolation; equally as swiftly, the Grazioso returns, shifted up an enharmonic third from A major to Db major. The next interpolation is not so polite as to wait for the Grazioso to finish its phrase on the barline: entering atop dwindling eighth-note passagework half-way through m. 246, it pre-empts the unison “In-Between” that begins three measures later. In fact, eager as it seems to bypass episode material, it leads instead to a development-like extension of the refrain at m. 269. Then follows directly a sixth refrain at m. 291, characterized by the direct overlap of refrain motives that further melds call, circus march and procession material into the one theatrical statement. Even in the very first measure, four separate motives occur simultaneously: the timpani carries the opening circus announcement; the upper winds articulate a variant of the m. 7 fanfare/chorale theme, while the horns begin the perfect fourth gesture that opened the original version of that melody, in isolation; and the trombones sound the processional theme first heard at m. 23. The “pastoral” material makes one more appearance as the movement begins its final few refrain/episode alternations. At m. 307, the theme returns to a major key in its original phrasing, featuring woodwinds, trills and short drone-like gestures as in its first iteration. Yet, missing is the 123 relative simplicity of the pastoral topic. The section is instead marked by fortissimo passages, sudden shifts in dynamic, accents added to an increased amount of trill notes, the theme entering in canon initially, and fewer of the more passive slur motives. As this develops into the ballet/overture episode at m. 332, circus-like orchestrational features are gradually foregrounded within this episodic space: extended techniques like flutter-tongue and ricochet (m. 355) introduce a percussive roughness to the texture more in line with characterizations of folk music; from m. 351, triangle and glockenspiel ring out over the texture; and when the refrain returns at m. 360, the brass chorale—now extended to include trombones—is supported by bells, echoing the use of cowbells in the second movement. The relatively polite alternation of material, though, is soon replaced by a series of abrasive overlap clashes. After another episodic statement of the Grazioso theme at m. 402, the bells return alongside the eighth refrain at m. 446 and stop abruptly as the first movement’s P1 theme sounds Example 3.9. First clash of Movement I material with Movement V (mm. 455-61). 124 in all four horns (m. 455, Ex. 3.9). In d minor, it distorts the two march-related lines that continue at fortissimo beneath it in the violins, which immediately succumb to the minor mode (indeed, the second violin line is also associated with the Grazioso material, as this motive appears as counterpoint, in a similar form). Two measures later, a third line enters: another march/procession motivic fragment in the trumpets, imitating the first violins. This iteration reinterprets the dominant pedal in the basses as the tonic of a minor, but when this is continued in the upper winds two measures later, it is “corrected” to d. This first clash of minor-mode march with the circus/procession complex proves the former to have a corruptive effect on the latter. Echoing this referential destabilization, the next passage loses its harmonic footing and begins to slip down chromatically as Movement I material gradually overpowers Movement V’s motives. The circus fragment repeats again at m. 462, now in C# major in the strings, before P1 returns in horns three measures later, a semitone lower but significantly longer and continuing as if unaffected by its environment. It now comes fully supported by a c# minor texture in the strings with pizzicati (perhaps derived from the pizzicato second violin accompaniment at the opening of the Exposition proper); all that remains of Movement V’s refrain material is the descending-second motive, now a noodling legato phrase in the flutes. So, the trumpets try again in C# major, marking a dissonant return of the major-minor motive established from the opening. This time, though, they continue a further three measures, supported by a second entrance of this circus motive in the oboes and clarinets, after which they abandon their c# minor passagework. With each successive hybridity episode, the circus fails to dismantle the intruding material. At m. 475, the bassline slides from a G# pedal to a G-natural, as the P1 theme slips another semitone down to c minor, abandoning the horns for the octaves in the violins, amid the background chaos of timpani rolls and bells. March fragments begin to appear a measure later, in the form of a 125 rhythmically-augmented descending second motive (first heard at m. 23 in the trumpets), appearing here first in the trombones, then lower strings and trumpet, all tonally complicit with the concurrent reprise of the first movement melody. The previously interruptive circus motive appears at m. 480, doubly augmented in the winds, horns and lower strings, but without its mode-defining second half, there is no C major here to combat the minor pull of the P1 theme. In the minor key, all three of these confrontations drain the circus/procession material of much of its referential identity, not dissimilar to the treatment of the movement’s pastoral theme. As if the hypermetric dissonance of these unaligned entries of contrasting material, alongside the otherwise out-of-place circus-associated bells, wasn’t enough contrapuntal and referential friction, the section builds to a harmonically dissonant 016 trichord. This vertical emphasis on a tritone then becomes linearized, as at m. 486 a blunt overlap shifts the key from c to F# major and reintroduces the cancan-derived material, complete with gong, bass drum, timpani to be played with a wooden mallet and a metric shift to 3/2. Immediately, we leave behind the somber first movement march for the circus/theatre complex in perhaps its most exaggerated variant yet. However, after only seven measures, this material dims as the meter shifts back to simple duple and the bassline continues to chromatically descend from A to F-natural, as dominant of Bb. Now in bb minor, P1 appears only in the trombones, at a pianissimo dynamic. Its entry is preceded by an equally quiet circus motive at m. 492 whose Bb major continues over the top of the trombones, as major-mode descending seconds reappear in fragments in the strings. It would seem the P1 theme has not yet lost its powers of mode distortion: as the descending-second motive descends through the strings, it does so in minor. Yet, in defiance, the trumpets interrupt with the circus motive at m. 496, in D major, possibly negating the bb sonority by employing the major key built on the major third of the Bb scale. 126 Example 3.10. Ultimate overcoming of Movement I material (mm. 506-14). 127 The next logical step in this pattern would be for the bassline to fall again, to E, but when it re-appears it does so on Db in a breakthrough-like gesture at m. 506. Here, the Grazioso theme—the only motive yet to succumb to the minor key—returns, now in refrain space. Stripped of its triple time meter, orchestrational delicacy and soft dynamic, it fits right in with the circus/procession complex. It appears in direct counterpoint with the P1 theme, now unequivocally in Db major and in the trumpets, who had so forcefully injected the major mode into almost every one of these Movements I/V confrontations. Put simply, the final movement’s circus/procession material has overcome the minor-mode march of the opening movement. The simple conversion to major and the brighter timbre of the trumpets has neutralized the referential friction that has played out over the last fifty bars. Two themes once completely distinct from the referential identity of the march/procession material now solely articulate it. After one last episode, featuring a reversion of the Grazioso to its pianissimo, chamber-music, waltz-inflected origins (m. 517), the final refrain begins at m. 539. It features a similarly erratic overlapping of motives as did the developmental episode earlier, and by the Coda (m. 558), the first procession brass chorale theme (m. 7) comprises the main melodic content for the remainder of the piece; accompanied by both bells and cowbells. With a final six-bar accelerated flourish, the work concludes with a triumphant parade—perhaps affirming the defeat of the minor-mode march—with the last page of the score marked with a highly theatrical “THE END.”133 133 This is at least the case in the following copy of the score: Gustav Mahler, Symphony No. 7 (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1992), 257. This edition is an unabridged republication of: Gustav Mahler, Siebente Sinfonie von Gustav Mahler: Orchester-Partitur (Berlin, Ed. Bote & Bock, 1909). 128 Referential Space in the Seventh Symphony The actions of the fifth movement prove crucial in integrating the Symphony’s referential space as a whole (Fig. 3.8). On the one hand, the circus/theatre complex allows for retrospective network completion by proving a connection point for the habanera in Movement II—for, had this reference appeared in the fifth movement, it might simply have been considered a reference to Bizet’s Carmen, fitting right in with the handful of operatic references already apparent in the refrain material.134 On the other hand, the overall network in Figure 3.8 demonstrates both the possibility for such hybridity strategies to be used across an entire piece and a method for finding connections (and paradoxically, even unity) among a work as vast and fragmented as the Seventh Symphony. 134 This association with Carmen is observed by Stoll Knecht, 173. Figure 3.8. Referential space for the entirety of the Seventh Symphony. Solid lines indicate coexistence; dashed lines indicate troping; dotted lines indicate programmatic connections or allusions to other works; and double-dashed lines indicate referential areas that have elsewhere been considered the one complex, or were directly adjacent in a previous network. 129 Since this network is more complex than that for the first movement of the Third, a hierarchy of referential entities becomes more apparent. This interpretation shown in Figure 3.8 features five core references, marked in the rectangular boxes: ombra, nature, circus/theatre, march and call, at the center of them all, reflective of its prominence throughout the work as a whole. More peripheral references are in the beveled-edge bubbles; of these, only procession and folk share more than one connection with another reference, and as such occupy a hierarchical middle between the boxed references and those on the edges of the network. The separation of nature, pastoral and folk, which otherwise might have functioned as one complex, is necessitated by the specific connection of folk alone to the circus and Schrammelmusik, but also acknowledges the complex relationship between humankind’s presence in nature that Stoll Knecht observes as a recurring theme throughout the work.135 Lastly, the fifth movement also provides a metaphorical frame of reference for both the sheer variety of referential entities and their often incongruous presentations. The overall work could be understood as expressing the heterogeneity intrinsic to the circus—a relationship only made explicit in the final movement. Thus, rather than tactless and flippant, as has often been the critical judgment,136 the fifth movement could be seen to have a unifying, completion-fulfilling function: the final piece in a complex referential puzzle. 135 Stoll Knecht, 45. 136 Stoll Knecht, 2, 89-90. 130 Conclusion Applying a theory of hybridity to Mahler’s symphonic works allows us to not only recognize but also analytically interpret core characteristics of his oeuvre that are often downplayed to secondary parameters, if not entirely ignored. These patterns of exaggeration, episodic structures and vivid referentiality are cardinal features of Mahler’s compositional style. Exploring these qualities has exposed technically complex, referentially rich and constantly evolving landscapes of hybridity episodes that manifest programs, challenge engrained formal expectations and express a variety of musical narratives. This carefully crafted heterogeneity perhaps lies at the heart of Mahler’s modernistic ideals. This study has also explored the immense malleability of Bruno Alcalde’s mixture strategies, offering multiple possibilities for its reinterpretation and expansion. For smaller movements in Mahler, such as the third movement of the First Symphony and the Scherzo of the Ninth, only a few alterations were required. The addition of Robert Hatten’s troping and a new perspective on the categorical nature of Alcalde’s strategies instead invite us to view clash and coexistence as two sides to the one coin. As the scope of Mahler’s music expanded, so too do the wealth of theories required for its interpretation. Part I of the Third Symphony employed not only troping and the clash/continuum spectrum but also the theoretical repurposing of Theodor Adorno’s novelistic characters, which allowed processes such as referential transformation of themes to become fully incorporated into an evolving theory of Mahlerian hybridity. This, in turn, led to the development of a fixed referential space, where signifying entities become linked in a network by the processes already discussed—coexistence, clash, troping—as well as extramusical associations. This tool facilitated the analysis of the entire Seventh Symphony and the introduction 131 of the concept of referential network completion and the idea that despite its high degree of surface variegation, the entire work can be bound together in a cohesive, symphony-wide referential space. Most importantly, I believe that the immense flexibility of this analytical approach encourages the application of an Alcalde-based hybridity perspective not only to other compositions by Mahler but also to a variety of other works composed in this modernist era. Arguably, a nineteenth-century aesthetic and analytical focus on unity is still deeply entrenched in the literature on Mahler and his contemporaries. 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Thesis/Dissertation
eng
Music - Theory
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
Graduate
Roeder, John Barlow
Glorious disunity through referential interplay : hybridity processes in Mahler's symphonic works
Text