Walkhighlands

Here's an idea. What lyrics can be changed to refer to the mountains?

I'll go first.

To the tune of Madonna's "Erotic":

Erratic
Erratic
What's that boulder doing in this corrie

To the tune of a well known Elton John hit:

Beinn Eigh and its aretes

To the tune of Wuthering |Heights


er...um.....
Wuthering Heights.

Das Lied von der Fels - Mahler (with apologies)

CharlesT wrote:Das Lied von der Fels - Mahler (with apologies)

You don't even need to change the words to get mountain references in Mahler. The first words of Der Abschied from Das Lied von der Erde (written in the Dolomites) - "The sun departs behind the mountains. Evening descends upon the valleys with its cool, refreshing shadows...". Much mention of mountains, crags and rocks (felsen) in the opening lines of part 2 of Symphony 8. Cowbells evoking Alpine landscapes in Symphony 6. 1st movement of Symphony 3 inspired by the cliffs rising above the Attersee. And so on.

Bruno Walter writes: "In the Third Symphony, [Mahler] raised his eyes from the joy and pain in his own heart to the harmony and disharmony of Nature. He related to it forever in the most intimate ways, from gentle contemplation to a shatteringly mystic unification. This feeling for Nature provided the major source of all his works, at every level of intensity."

And Arnold Schoenberg writes to Mahler about his experience of the same symphony: "I have seen your soul naked, stark naked. It lay before me like a wild, mysterious landscape with its terrifying abysses and ravines and, beside them, smiling, charming, sunny meadows, idyllic places in which to rest."

More than any other major composer, Mahler was, in spirit, a man of the mountains.

One we came up with at Easter 2019, to the traditional "Over the Hills and Far Away"


Over the hills to where they’ll float

G C
Here's 40 dry bags and a pan
G D
For Pirates who volunteer to come
G C
Take corn beef and custard and the odd canoe
G D
Over the hills to where they'll float


Chorus
G C
O’er the hills and o’er the bogs
G D
With whisky, wine and lots of logs
G C
We heave and haul canoes all day
G D
Over the hills to where they'll float


Past mountain, lochs and loads of rocks
We struggle and stumble like knackered old crocs
Through heather filled with a million ticks
Over the hills to where they'll float.

Chorus

And when we finally reach a loch
The wind will blow us to a stop
So once again we'll lift our boats
Over the hills to where they'll float

Chorus

We don't know why we choose these routes,
Paddling is enough for normal folk
But why just paddle when you can drag canoes
Over the hills to where they'll float

Chorus Twice


Apologies for the quality!;

dav2930 wrote:

CharlesT wrote:Das Lied von der Fels - Mahler (with apologies)

You don't even need to change the words to get mountain references in Mahler. The first words of Der Abschied from Das Lied von der Erde (written in the Dolomites) - "The sun departs behind the mountains. Evening descends upon the valleys with its cool, refreshing shadows...". Much mention of mountains, crags and rocks (felsen) in the opening lines of part 2 of Symphony 8. Cowbells evoking Alpine landscapes in Symphony 6. 1st movement of Symphony 3 inspired by the cliffs rising above the Attersee. And so on.

Bruno Walter writes: "In the Third Symphony, [Mahler] raised his eyes from the joy and pain in his own heart to the harmony and disharmony of Nature. He related to it forever in the most intimate ways, from gentle contemplation to a shatteringly mystic unification. This feeling for Nature provided the major source of all his works, at every level of intensity."

And Arnold Schoenberg writes to Mahler about his experience of the same symphony: "I have seen your soul naked, stark naked. It lay before me like a wild, mysterious landscape with its terrifying abysses and ravines and, beside them, smiling, charming, sunny meadows, idyllic places in which to rest."

More than any other major composer, Mahler was, in spirit, a man of the mountains.

Very erudite, and welcome to another Mahlerian. I just liked the wordplay of Fels for Erde. My personal favourite is the sixth, but Das Liede von der Erde has a special place in my heart, being the first Mahler to which I gave serious attention.

nikcster wrote:Here's an idea. What lyrics can be changed to refer to the mountains?

I'll go first.

To the tune of Madonna's "Erotic":

Erratic
Erratic
What's that boulder doing in this corrie

I very much like Mahler, but my contributions to this thread are less inspiring

Mamore Than A Feeling
Stuc in the Middle With You
You’re So Vane

Stopping there before it gets any more embarrassing

You're so Gulvain-Carly Simon
Heart of Beinn Ghlas-Blondie
Saileaging -Rod Stewart
Sgur Ban'd on the Run-Wings

HalfManHalfTitanium wrote:
I very much like Mahler, but my contributions to this thread are less inspiring

Mamore Than A Feeling
Stuc in the Middle With You
You’re So Vane

Stopping there before it gets any more embarrassing

No, keep them coming, these are what we're looking for!

These are truly poor:

Sunshine on Stob Coire Leith - The Proclaimers
Ring of Steal - Johnny Cash
The Winner Takes Ben More - ABBA
Creise is the Word - Frankie Glen (see what I did there?)
Rock the Ciste Dhubh - The Clach

My HuMPs (and Tumps) by the Black Eyed Peas

dav2930 wrote:

CharlesT wrote:...You don't even need to change the words to get mountain references in Mahler. T

...More than any other major composer, Mahler was, in spirit, a man of the mountains.

GM is my absolute number one. But whereas his Rueckert Lieder seem to me to have a mood/spirit born of agonising experience, his "mountain spirit" feels "theoretical". But doesn't change the fact that he's the greatest (except for JSB.... ).

Alteknacker wrote:GM is my absolute number one. But whereas his Rueckert Lieder seem to me to have a mood/spirit born of agonising experience, his "mountain spirit" feels "theoretical". But doesn't change the fact that he's the greatest (except for JSB.... ).

It seems there are more of us Mahlerians than one might have thought!
I think it has become quite clear in recent years that GM is the composer of our age.

Yes, the agonising experience expressed e.g. in the Kindertotenlieder (poems by Ruckert) is present in all GM's works and surfaces in various ways, often in terms of irony (as in the 3rd mvt. of the 1st Symphony). But equally important to GM is the sense of refuge from the tragedy and tumult of life and from the crassness of an unfeeling society. In the Ruckert Lieder this sense of refuge is expressed in a very contemplative way in Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen ("I am lost to the world"), but for GM himself it was precisely in the mountains that he was able to be "lost to the world". It was in little huts in Styria and the Dolomites that he secured the peace he needed to compose, and much of the inspiration for his works came during his walks in the surrounding mountains. The sheer intensity of his feeling for these environments and all they meant to him is especially evident in the Andante of Symphony 6. This is totally existential, not theoretical.

But this is not to say GM did not theorize about nature and how nature ought to be represented in art. In relation to Symphony 3, for example, GM draws on Nietzsche's distinction between the Apollonian and the Dionysian - nature is not just pretty flowers and tranquil brooks; it is also fearful precipices and awsomely destructive/creative forces. Mahler sought to embrace all these aspects in his works - a symphony, he famously said to Sibelius, should be like the world.

The song that springs to mind most often on the hills is 'Gimme Shelter'.

"She's coming round the Mountains when she comes" sang to loud sniggers...