Mahler: Symphony No. 6 - Tragic
Here's another of the Mahler symphonies that Leonard Bernstein truly  made his own. His remake, with the Vienna Philharmonic, is magnificent, but this  earlier performance has the freshness of a new discovery. This symphony has  become one of the most frequently performed of all of the Mahler symphonies--a  far cry from the point just a few decades ago when it was considered the most  forbidding of all his works. The subtitle ("Tragic") tells it all: the  symphony depicts the heroic struggle against fate, and although the work ends  with fate triumphant, the music is anything but depressing. In fact, its  defiant, heroic qualities provide an experience that is cathartic rather than  bleak, just as true tragedy should. On this extraordinarily intense CD,  Bernstein leads the world's great Mahler orchestra in the performance that put  the Sixth on the musical map.--David Hurwitz