Mahler's total eclipse of the heart

Symphonies don't come any bigger than Mahler's Eighth, which opens this year's Proms. But, writes Tom Service, his ode to the universe was rooted in the most private of passionsThere are so many musicians on stage, you can hardly see the conductor in the photo. But right in the middle of the mass of players and singers – 1,030 of them to be precise, one of the largest collections of humanity ever assembled in the service of a symphony – stands the 50-year-old composer and conductor Gustav Ma...

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