At the beginning of the summer of 1895, Mahler moved back to the small inn in Steinbach am Attersee, where the daily ritual had already been well developed for two years.
In the small 'Häuschen', which he had built on the lake shore, he settled from 6.30 am and spent most of his days there, sometimes until late in the afternoon.
By this time he had already devised an overall plan, which is undoubtedly one of the most ambitious ever conceived by a symphonist.
Starting from matter, from rocks, from motionless nature, he already glimpses that the immense epic will climb one by one the steps of Creation, the flowers, the animals, to reach man, then the angels, before ascending to Universal and Divine Love as supreme transcendence.
The Third Symphony is conceived as a great poem of nature and creation: "Do not look at the landscape, it is all in my symphony," the musician advised his disciple and friend Bruno Walter.
Gustav Mahler: "Once again, I will not earn a penny with my Third Symphony because people will not understand or want to know about this gaiety. It hovers over the world of struggle and pain of the First and Second (Symphony) and can only be seen as their result.
The fact that I call it Symphony does not mean much, because it has nothing in common with the usual form. The term symphony means for me: to build a world with all the technical means available. What I want to express is changing, always new, and this content itself determines its form.
In this sense, I have to start again and again to create my own means of expression, even when I am perfectly master of my technique as I believe I am today. »
In order to rectify the imbalances between the movements, Mahler introduces here for the first time units (called "Abteilungen" or "parts") which are placed above the individual movements themselves.
In this work, only the first movement corresponds to Part 1, while the remaining five movements are grouped together as Part 2.
Although the four inner movements adhere roughly to the structure of Symphony No. 2, the two outer movements offer a major contrast:
the first movement is of such size and structure that it is impossible to bring it within the bounds of conventional concepts, the sixth and last movement being a boldly conceived slow movement.
Moreover, Mahler's titles in the score indicate that the arrangement of these six movements was designed to represent a gradual ascent through the cosmic hierarchy.
The work begins in a cold and rocky tone suggesting inorganic rock, the second movement represents plants, the third movement animals, the fourth movement man and the fifth movement angels, reaching the culmination of reaching Divine Love in the sixth movement.
Mahler himself wrote: "I could also title the (last) movement: 'What God Told Me', in the sense that God can only be understood by being love." (1 John 4:8 "God is Love)
This arrangement is based on a philosophy of synthesis of the thoughts of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Wagner, who were the masters of the Austrian progressive youth at the end of the nineteenth century.
Man, who appears in the fourth movement as a being gradually subjected to 'consciousness', seeks redemption among the 'morning angels', redemption which finally comes about through Divine Love.
This incomparable final movement of more than 20 minutes makes us shudder and puts us in a state of inner exhaustion, but also of intellectual and moral fulfillment: a state of perfect happiness.  END
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
