Life, death, and rebirth. Mahler’s modest ambition to express the totality of the human condition journeys through love, hope, nostalgia, humor, despair, a face-melting shriek of death, and finally a glorious resurrection. Does it succeed? Alasdair Neale recalls his first hearing at age 13: “It rocked my world – I had never imagined music could have that level of visceral, emotional impact.”