What program did you use to make this? The MIDI sounds are bit antiquated-sounding at times (of course it can't be helped if that's the only available option)

A noble endeavour this!
In what ways does your approach differ from the Cooke version?

CORRECTION: A noble endeavour, this!

ALSO: Maybe it's just the midi, but some of the textures sound sparse in comparison to the Cooke version. Is this intentional?


On a personal note, I always felt that Cooke was a bit too sparing on the percussion at points. On the other hand, the Barshai version goes to the other extreme, almost high on percussion. Neither version is bad by any means, of course — but a middle road would be great.

Ah, was working on my first response while you posted this one.

My version certainly uses less doubling that Cooke's, as far as orchestration is concerned. I err on the side of doubling only where doing so improves the clarity of a passage, or the character would be wrong without it, rather than, say, because the passage is loud and I happen to have some extra instruments on hand capable of playing it. As for thickness in the sense of counterpoint and harmony, my version is thinner than Cooke's in some places and thicker in others-it's what seemed appropriate to me and, as I say, probably just a matter of taste.

If Cooke is too sparing with percussion, then I'm positively stingey. XD My sense for percussion scoring is much less well-developed than for the rest of the orchestra, and until it catches up I feel that too little is less damaging than too much. I certainly wouldn't want to go as far as the Barshai, over more than just percussion; I get the impression his goal is to match the intricacy typical of Mahler's own orchestration, which is to say, to make intricacy an end unto itself rather than a means to achieve greater clarity.

Ahh, Sibelius. I'm more used to Finale's sounds, so that'd explain it.

Good thinking on the contrapuntal tactics. After all, any doubt in Mahler's mastery of counterpoint is convincingly quelled in the 3rd movement of his 9th.

I look forward to the subsequent movements!

I don't have a dedicated DAW so all of my MIDI comes from Sibelius. These tracks use the best set of sounds I've managed to assemble from Sibelius 7 and Sibelius 6.

My approach is quite close to Cooke's-certainly closer than to any of the other versions I know. Like Cooke, I strive for a minimum of clutter, only adding things where I think what Mahler wrote can't stand on its own. However, I often find the way Cooke goes about this too utilitarian. I understand his desire to draw as little attention to his own additions as possible, but I feel it's better for every aspect of the score to be appealing in its own right, including the parts I add. For example, at 9:40, Mahler writes out only the first measure of the horn fill; Cooke continues it in the blandest way possible, but I give it a little more contrapuntal interest. And at 7:28, all Mahler provides is the violin line and the bass line. Cooke fills in a couple block chords, but the way the lines play off each other is such that very few chord choices would work and none are very satisfactory. I choose to add more counterpoint instead; while this is undoubtedly a less transparent presentation of the original sketches, I think the passage is stronger this way.

Ultimately though, my version probably differs from Cooke's more in details than conception. From 8:32 to 8:51 I follow Wheeler's lead and leave the texture exactly as is where Cooke adds chords underneath, while from 5:51 to 6:01, where I find it necessary to add a horn chord, a contrabass tremolo and a bass drum roll to make harmonic and textural sense of the passage, Cooke adds nothing. There are countless cases like this, which probably come down to personal taste as much as anything.