Mahler Symphony No. 5 - 1st Movement - Listening Guide

The both first movements are in the tragic and gloomy keys of c-sharp minor resp. a minor; The only programmatic indication, Trauermarsch (funeral march), is found in the first movement. The silence is broken by the solitary fanfare of a trumpet which is one of the three main themes of this movement.Out of this comes the melancholy and heavy funeral march dominated by the strings; the woodwind players introduce the third theme in the key of a flat major thus lighting up the gloom in a charmin...