I love Mahler's music although I only know well his 2nd, 4th, 5th and 9th (Das Lied Van de Erde). For recordings, I recommend those conducted by Bruno Walter who is my favourite conductor of Mahler. However, since this is an audiophile level discussion thread you may prefer more modern recordings by Lenard Bernstein (who is also a much loved conducted of Mahler) because the Bruno Walter ones are quite old recordings therefore may not resonate well with a Lyr2 (just a guess, since I don't actually own a lyr yet)
I love all those. My current Favorites are by Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. My most recent purchase was Mahler's Eighth Symphony (Symphony of a Thousand). Lots of vocals- one several Grammy Awards including best Classical Recording. Fantastic performance and recording! It also has the Adagio of the unfinished Symphony # 10. Quite powerful in it's own right.
I have all but Symphony 9 by MTT and all sound fantastic!
. I have 2,3,4, 5, 6 and 9 conducted by Sir Georg Solti, the audio is not a good to my ears although they are good recordings. I also have # 9 by Pierre Boulez and Zander-the Zander sort of wanders a bit-but sounds quite good. I think Boulez' is a tighter performance.. If you wonder why 3 versions of 9-it's because I was at a used store-and they were cheap! I like it but 1,2, 8 ,5 and 6 are more to my enjoyment.
I have #2 by Bernstein. It seems quite BASS heavy to my ears-but is a fine performance!
Das Lied Von Erde is not the same as Symphony # 9 btw. Symphony 9 is not choral whereas "The Song of the Earth" is. I assume a typo was made? However It WAS next after Symphony 8-some people think Mahler did not call it Symphony 9 because he felt that 10 symphony's was a composers limit.
I have most of them by Solti. Great performances-I heard him conduct the 5th several years ago. I also heard MTT conduct the 5th. Fantastic. I also have Ricardo Muti's Symphony #1 (my introduction to Mahler-and very sweet!)
MTT's are definitely audiophile grade! All of mine are on hybrid SACD's.
I've not heard Bruno Walter although he knew Mahler-and conducted the posthumous debut of Symphony #9 in 1911 or 1912. Side not Mahler conducted Rachmaninov (noff) Piano Concerto #3 with Rachamaninov at the piano- Rachmaninov was highly impressed with Mahler's conducting.
I'll be picking up a recording of Das Lied and 9 by MTT in a month or so when I next attend the Symphony at Davies Symphony Hall is San Francisco, CA.