Beethoven’s 5th Symphony was written from 1804-1808 and first performed in 1808 (Schauffler, 1933). Mahler’s 4th Symphony was first performed in 1901 almost a century later after being written in 1899-1900 (Carr, 1998). With the big gap between them, Beethoven was spanning the gap between the late classical and early romantic periods whilst Mahler was a composer from the late romantic period.
Beethoven’s 5th Symphony in C minor is one of the most well-known pieces of western classical music (Schauffler, 1933). Beethoven was revolutionary in many ways from changing the third movement in all his symphonies to a scherzo instead of a minuet which Mozart and Haydn used to using a choir in his ninth symphony. The 5th symphony is not different to his revolutionary streak. Mahler wrote colossal works for giant orchestras but had a rather small catalogue of works even though he wrote the same amount of symphonies a Beethoven. Mahler was not as critically praised for his works but he did like Beethoven inspire a new generation of composers (Mitchell & Nicholson, 1999).
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn in Germany on the 16th of December 1770. He came from a line of musicians in on his father’s side. He was first taught by his father and at the age of eight, he performed his first concerto. He had…show more content… Both conform to the four movement in a symphony, however, their order differs. Beethoven sticks to the Fast-Slow-Dance-Fast whereas Mahler goes with Moderately-Medium (Dance)-Slow-Medium. Beethoven sticks to the Sonata form in the first and last movements, theme and variations as the second movement and a dance, the scherzo and trio, as his third movement. Mahler uses Sonata form in the first movement, a dance, the scherzo and trio, as his second, theme and variations as his third movement and strophic form in the last movement. In this task, I will be looking at the 1st movements in both