How music has aided me in my recovery from cultism

I have recently discovered the genius of Gustav Mahler and other great classical composers. Listening to their music on a regular basis has really helped me in my psychological and spiritual recovery from cultism. Trotsky, despite his greater appreciation for art than Lenin, was still ultimately a philistine who judged art by its relationship to politics and reduced great geniuses to their social context. As a Nietzschean-Emersonian-Carlylean, I reject such crude reductionism and believe very much in genius that surpasses the mediocrity of its own time. Such men were Beethoven, Mahler and Bach. Mahler’s brilliance was not fully acknowledged in his lifetime and he was forgotten after his death, before Leonard Bernstein spearheaded a post-war Mahler revival. His symphonies have been with me for a good part of this year, but I listened to him in earnest this summer.

What can be said about Mahler? A man of world-historical ability, whose music contains everything – life, death, pain, suffering, euphoria, love, hate, bitter struggle as well as blissful appreciation, the banal as well as the sublime. I see him as the musical counterpart to James Joyce – or rather, Joyce is the literary counterpart to Mahler. Mahler told Sibelius that a symphony should contain the universe, and Mahler does this in his symphonies when he places schmaltzy folk tunes and dance music alongside military marches and pounding hammer blows of fate, whilst Joyce, in his Ulysses, designs his novel to incorporate even the most vulgar aspects of human activity like defecation, masturbation, urination and menstruation alongside more elevated activities like funerals and state processions.

I first encountered Mahler as a 13-year-old who became obsessed with the 1974 BBC Fall of Eagles TV series, which I watched on YouTube. The theme tune, I later learned, was in fact the first movement of Mahler’s Fifth. I would not know who Mahler was until years later. I always enjoyed listening to it. It was very appropriate for a period drama about Europe on the eve of WWI, and the relationship between the different dynasties that would soon be mortal enemies, music that evokes feelings of foreboding, a sense of approaching doom, a funeral march before anyone has died or a shot has been fired – the passing of old Europe as it lies on its death bed.

It took me some time to appreciate the whole thing. I always found the other movements less exciting than the first one. But now I love the whole symphony. The first movement goes from a funeral march to sounds of battle, evoking a sense of titanic struggle between something dying and something struggling to be born. As ever, I identified myself with the struggle of the music, my soul’s struggle against the forces that kept me captive for so long as a brainwashed cult member, and the funeral march represented for me the sound of mourning what I had lost in throwing my life away to become part of this monstrosity. The second movement continues this theme and even accentuates it, but this is then interrupted as the blaring bars of torment and despair in C-minor transition into a warm, golden, triumphant D Major of hope and love and victory, almost like what you would associate with a wedding combined with that of a military parade in the capital of a conquering nation. The sound of celebration sees this movement draw to a close, the stentorian brass resounding with joy – which is also the joy of my liberation and my reunion with the world that I had lost – the cymbals crashing mightily, the strings screaming with exhilaration, the sound of a gong drowning everyone in its empire of sound. The scherzo of the third movement is a nice break from the intensity of the first two movements, and gives us a chance to just relax and enjoy the feeling of being alive. The playful banality of it is utterly charming and quenches our thirst, turns anger and hatred at the injustice of the world and what it takes from us to joyful gratitude for our existence, as we whirl and twirl and around the dance floor in a 19th-century Viennese ballroom. Then follows the most famous movement, the Adagietto of the fourth, which I think is actually inferior to the Andante second movement of his Sixth Symphony, but is nonetheless a masterful piece of heart-rending music, said to be a love letter from Mahler to his wife Alma, who never truly loved him and who he was desperately trying to keep. This is then succeeded by the final movement, a triumphant recapitulation of everything that has happened before – death and loss and struggle followed by banality followed by the pain of unrequited love followed by a victory over all of these things in favour of a reaffirmation of the value of our existence, despite all of its pain and sorrow. The Adagietto is replayed but in a happier key, as love conquers all, including death. This ‘flipped’ Adagietto is incredibly powerful on both a musical and an emotional level, and takes me to another plane of existence. So he’s done it! The master has taken us from the greatest depths of despair to the highest heights of joy and gratitude! Ah, truly Mahler, you are great! My favourite recording of this Mahler symphony is perhaps Pierre Boulez’s – it is the first one I ever listened to.

I talk about the Fifth first because it is the first Mahler I ever heard, but it is not, in fact, my favourite, though it is quite possibly my second-favourite. My favourite of all of Mahler’s symphonies is in fact his Third, and largely because of its killer first movement, ‘Pan Awakes’. My favourite version is conducted by Gustavo Dudamel, the Venezuelan conductor. Mahler was directly inspired by ancient Greek mythology, the philosophies of Nietzsche and Schopenhauer, and aspects of Christianity, in creating this symphony, his longest and, running to almost two hours, one of the longest symphonies ever made in the history of classical music. The first movement represents the awakening of life in spring, embodied in the Greek god Pan, a god of nature and of the wild. The resonant, authoritative brass of the opening bars, punctuated by the martial drums, heralds the coming of the new season and a struggle between the new and the old, the living and the dead. (Not a lot of people know that the opening theme is actually taken from the German nationalist hymn ‘Ich hab’ mich ergeben’, which the Jewish Mahler, excluded from being part of the German nation in the eyes of most German nationalists, mischievously appropriates anyway.)

The French horns cry with ecstasy as the music swells into a military march calling Pan’s legions to battle against the old, dead world. A solo tenor trombone resounds over a thawing earth freeing itself from death’s cold, icy grip. This is followed by some frivolous pastoral music which sees a transition from D Minor to F Major. This section of the movement is recognizable for being ripped off by Disney for the song ‘Be Our Guest’ in the film Beauty and the Beast. I love this part of the movement for the beautiful woodwind that lends to these bars their frivolous character, which is still punctuated by ominous drumming, so that the military march section and the frivolous light-hearted music combine into one confusing but entertaining mass. We then gear up to my personal favourite part of the symphony, about 12 or 13 minutes in, with a roaring climax, a powerful crescendo, that restates the opening bars of the movement and culminates in a fantastic BOOM and CRASH of drums and cymbals as Pan’s legions, representing life and summer, heroically throw themselves into battle with Winter and Death. The horns wail alarmingly all the while. The tempo of the piece rises, and this whole section gives me the feeling of being in a train, specifically one of those armoured military trains that was used in the Russian Civil War, that is rushing along at breakneck speed into the heat of battle, as bullets and shells are whizzing all around. The percussion in particular sounds to me like a steam engine. It is unclear to me whether this was intentional on Mahler’s part.

The climax ends triumphantly, as Pan triumphs over the forces of darkness and barrenness. The music then becomes calmer and more light-hearted, a veritable triumphal march for Pan’s legions through the mountains and valleys of the awakening earth. The movement ends with a return to the frivolity of the earlier bars, as a happier version of the ‘Ich hab mich ergeben’ hymn (now in F Major) with which we opened the symphony in the first few bars of the Third make their return. The triumph of Pan is complete. The whole orchestra – the drums, the horns, the strings, the percussion – booms and cries aloud with with joy at the victory of life and summer. For me, this movement is a guaranteed adrenaline-booster. It reminds me of my own titanic battle with freeing myself from the cold, dead hands of Ted Grant and the brainwashed mediocrities who follow him, and the fight of my youthful intellect and passionate spirit, which yearns to learn and grow and exert itself, over the outmoded, conservative, barren doctrine with which I was indoctrinated in the International Marxist Tendency.

The second movement is a nice, calm minuet, which provides us, which Mahler, in the original program, described as ‘What the Flowers in the Meadow Tell Me’. The lush strings are dominant in this section, as the struggles of old come to an end and we can now focus on admiring and enjoying the natural beauty all around us, and appreciating life in all its glory. The last few bars are particularly beautiful. The third movement, ‘What the Animals in the Forest Tell Me’, is calm in places, in others stormier, evoking a stampede of a multitude of exotic creatures. Everyone from the chirruping birds in the trees to the restless lions and tigers is included in this powerful tribute to the diversity of the animal kingdom. The fourth movement, ‘What Man Tells Me’, features a soprano singing ‘Zarathustra’s Roundelay’ from Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra to sparse orchestration. These are the full lyrics translated by R.J. Hollingdale from the original German:

O man! Attend!
What does deep midnight’s voice contend?
‘I slept my sleep,
‘And now awake at dreaming’s end:
The world is deep,
‘And deeper than day can comprehend.’
Deep is its woe,
‘Joy—deeper than heart’s agony:
‘Woe says: Fade! Go!’
But all joy wants eternity,
‘Wants deep, deep, deep eternity!’

I get emotional every time I listen to this movement, which is possibly my second-favourite in the whole symphony. The one immediately after is perhaps my least favourite – it sees a choir of boys singing the lyrics to a song Mahler wrote as part of his Das Knaben Wunderhorn song collection, based on a 17th century German hymn. Perhaps it is the overtly Christian theme of the song, or the slightly irritating boyish warbling combined with church bells, which seems a little overly sentimental to me. Mahler did instruct that this movement should be played Lustig im Tempo und keck im Ausdruck (Cheerful in tempo and cheeky in expression), so perhaps its intent is in fact satirical. The final movement provides a powerful summing up of the symphony. It is arguably the emotional high-point of the symphony. The opening bars remind me a bit of Elgar’s Nimrod. But it should not be misinterpreted as a mourning tune (as Elgar’s Nimrod has been misinterpreted), but as a ‘deeply felt’ (as Mahler himself puts it) tribute to the power of love (this section of the symphony being given the title ‘What Love Tells Me’ in the original programme written up to accompany the music). This movement is a tribute to love and life and summer, and marks the rebirth of the earth, of the human race, of the animal kingdom, of the plants, the sun and the sky, after a long period of darkness and dormancy. The last few minutes see a tremendous crescendo of sound as the strings wail with tears of gratitude for this life and this earth, accompanied by the roaring French horns and the booming percussion instruments. In the very last bars we hear the drums mimicking the sound of church bells (BOOM-BANG, BOOM-BANG, BOOM-BANG in place of ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong), as if church bells were indeed being rung in thanks and praise to the Creator for the wonder of that is the Universe. I think it is an incredibly life-affirming symphony and certainly some of the most Nietzschean music I have ever heard.

I also love the Sixth Symphony (named the ‘Tragic’ Symphony) for its rousing first movement in A Minor which announces the hero marching into battle against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune against the backdrop of a military march, and its chaotic and devastating final movement with the ‘hammer blows’ of fate (represented by an actual hammer in the performance). I also love the gorgeous Andante second movement, which in my view is even more beautiful than the Adagietto of the Fifth. Mahler initially intended for the Andante to come after the Scherzo, but conducted it the other way round for fear of the public response to such an emotionally overwhelming piece of work. I prefer the versions that play the Andante in the order Mahler conducted it. Claudio Abbado and Sir Simon Rattle both do this in their versions of Mahler’s Sixth. The finale of the Second Symphony (the ‘Resurrection’ Symphony) fills me with emotion every time I listen to it (Sir Simon Rattle’s is the best version), as does the finale of the Ninth (Herbert von Karajan has the finest version of this particular symphony). The choir in the finale of the Second Symphony sings of how our pain and suffering is not in vain, that we shall be reborn one day, when we are reunited with God in heaven. I am not a Christian (nor was Mahler) and so cannot buy into the literal meaning of this symphony, but I embrace its symbolic meaning – that despite all our suffering, life is worthwhile and our suffering means something, that we will forever leave a mark upon the human race that no evil force can destroy. When I listen to it, I think of how the IMT subjected me to suffering and tyranny, and of my own personal resurrection from the forces of slavery and totalitarianism. I also think of my late father and of how his sufferings were not in vain because I, his son, am alive to continue his legacy. The First Symphony is also remarkable, in particular for the haunting version of Frere Jacques Mahler put in the third movement, and the stormy and triumphant finale. (I favour Claudio Abbado’s version.) The only Mahler symphonies I strongly dislike so far are the Fourth and Seventh.

Beethoven is another composer I have explored a lot lately. I am torn between his Third ‘Eroica’ Symphony and his Fifth, but I would say I have a slight preference for the Third as my favourite symphony. I also adore the Sixth ‘Pastoral’ Symphony and the Seventh. His Fourth Symphony is also a favourite and in my view underrated. Its third movement is particularly good. Herbert von Karajan is my go-to conductor where Beethoven’s symphonies are concerned. Brahms has thus far mostly left me cold, though I like his First Symphony (Herbert von Karajan’s version in particular). Herbert von Karajan’s rendition of Holst’s The Planets is another gem I have recently discovered. Elgar’s Cello Concertos are also recommended listening, as is anything by Bach or Handel (his Water Music in particular).

I know that I could never be a Marxist partly because of my tastes in music. Music, for me, is fundamentally un-Marxist, because it cannot be fitted within the crude laws of dialectical materialism, but speaks to something more elemental in man. The idiotic strains of ‘Solidarity Forever’ do not move my heart. ‘Bella Ciao’ does not stir my soul or bring my blood to boiling point. It is the music of heroic individualism and resistance to the forces of conformism and mediocrity in man, the triumph of life and love over the forces of darkness and hatred – i.e. Marxist totalitarianism – that moves me most. Beethoven’s Eroica, his Fifth and his Sixth, Mahler’s First, Second, Third, Fifth and Sixth, are all examples of life-affirming music that celebrates heroic struggle against dangerous adversaries and exalts life in spite of all its challenges. I am glad that my ordeal has given me the ability to appreciate these beautiful pieces more than I otherwise would. Onwards and upwards! To life!