Really?

Well, it has been a spell since we checked in with Scott Cantrell of the Dallas Morning News. In a thoughtful article utilizing actual timings, he puts forth a sort of analysis of speeds of performances of the various movements of Mahler's Fifth Symphony. The following is only an excerpt, the rest is here.

For the most part, Mr. van Zweden's pacing is above reproach.

Well hedged. Let's go ahead and assume we're going to reproach it, then.

But I'm not entirely convinced by tempos in the first and forth movements.

Tempos? Tempi? Tempe? Stadiums? Stadia? Latin? English? Oh, who cares.

But two of the four movements, I guess, counts as "the most part". (Obviously the tempi change inter-movement in Mahler, and I am just...well, you know.)

The first is marked "Funeral March: With measured step. Strict. Like a cortege." Mr. van Zweeden, like Leonard Bernstein in his 1963 New York Philharmonic recording, interprets the opening section at between 58 and 60 beats per minute-- around the speed of a clock's second hand.

You...are telling me...that 60 bpm... is "around" the speed of a clock's second hand?

"Around"?

Really?

I...you...you don't have to be a conductor, or a musician, or a fifth grader, to know that...there are 60 seconds in a minute.

In other breaking news from Dallas: Rain falls from the sky!

Oh, sorry, one last thing.

But, interestingly, there's a 1905 piano-roll [sic?] recording of Mahler himself [redundant--Ed.] playing the movement--yes, on the piano--and he starts at a considerably brisker 72 beats per minute.

A piano-roll [sic?]...played on...the piano? No freaking way! Hey, did you know that a minute has 60 seconds?