Who does not like riddles? After all, the world of musical history is full of them, just to mention medieval and renaissance canons or baroque rhetorical figures hidden at various levels of the score. There are also musical-philosophical puzzles for which there is no simple answer. Perhaps this kind of test was what Gustav Mahler had in mind when he wrote in a letter to an Austrian writer and musicologist:

My 'Sixth' will become a riddle, and its solution will be undertaken only by that generation that accepts and completely understands my first five symphonies.

Seemingly classic, four-part. Monumental in every respect. Written for the largest ensemble among the composer's purely instrumental works, Symphony No. 6 in A minor demands great commitment from the performers and the conductor, but does not spare the listener in any respect either. One does not find here too many easily memorable melodies familiar from Mahler's previous works.

There is another unresolved mystery connected with the piece, concerning the order in which the successive movements should sound. Originally, the gloomy first movement was to be followed by a frenzied Scherzo and then by a melancholic Andante moderato. However, the score published on the basis of the version from the premiere contained an arrangement of the inner links reversed by the author. After Mahler's death, his wife, Alma, pointed out that the order of the work's sections should allegedly have been reversed!

Performers:
National Philharmonic Orchestra
Christoph König conductor

Programme
Gustav Mahler
Symphony No. 6 in A minor [77′]