Mahler Symphony No. 6 - 4th Movement - Listening Guide
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The last movement is an extended sonata form, characterized by drastic changes in mood and tempo, the sudden change of glorious soaring melody to deep agony. The movement is punctuated by three hammer blows. Alma quoted her husband as saying that these were three mighty blows of fate befallen by the hero, \\u201cthe third of which fells him like a tree\\u201d.
She identified these blows with three later events in Gustav Mahler\\u2019s own life: the death of his eldest daughter Maria Anna Mahler, the diagnosis of an eventually fatal heart condition, and his forced resignation from the Vienna Opera and departure from Vienna. When he revised the work, Mahler removed the last of these three hammer blows so that the music built to a sudden moment of stillness in place of the third blow.
Some modern performances restore the third strike of the hammer. The piece ends with the same rhythmic motif that appeared in the first movement, but the chord above it is a simple A minor triad, rather than A major turning into A minor. After the third \\u2018hammer blow\\u2019 passage, the music gropes in darkness and then the trombones and horns begin to offer consolation. However after they turn briefly to major they fade away and the final bars erupt in minor.
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A listening guide of Symphony No. 6 - 4th Movement with Lew Smoley.
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