Symphony No. 8 in E‑Flat Major

No Mahler symphony divides the crowds like the Eighth (1906). Nicknamed “Symphony of a Thousand” for its gargantuan, colour-enhanced vocal and orchestral forces, it offers an orgiastic, rapturous, total-immersion experience, which some welcome with open hearts while others back off in alarm. Mahler knew that he was doing something different here: Where his other symphonies were “subjective tragedy”, he said, the Eighth was a “great joy-bringer.” The symphony’s two parts set, respectively, the medieval hymn “Veni creator spiritus” (Come, creator spirit) and the final scene of Goethe’s epic verse drama Faust, which takes place entirely in heaven, and ends hymning the Virgin Mary as the “Eternal Feminine”. It might look like Catholicism, but Goethe’s vision of heavenly life is highly unorthodox and the hymn “Veni creator” is strikingly undogmatic. For Mahler, it was all ultimately connected with the Platonic idea of Eros as the driver of creativity, but his obsessive veneration for his wife Alma (which was famously diagnosed by Freud as pathological) evidently played a part, too. Whatever the case, the Eighth Symphony is by no means all massive affirmation. There are also moments of delicacy and exquisite tenderness, and it is there that the ambiguities—so central to Mahler’s worldview and personality—emerge most tellingly. In the end, is this pure joy or is there a deep undercurrent of sadness?