Summary: Listen to the Concert Preview! Mahler's Symphony No. 2, cast in five movements, is a monumental work that addresses equally weighty subjects: life, suffering, death, and the uncertainty of what comes after. Like Beethoven before him, Mahler uses sung text in his symphony to directly explore some of these ideas. Completed in 1894, the Symphony No. 2 is the first of three consecutive symphonies to contain vocal elements with text taken from "Des Knaben Wunderhorn" (The Youth's Magic Horn), a collection of German folk poems that was a popular source of inspiration for musicians and artists throughout the 19th century.
