The Gustav Mahler Test

No, this isn't an examination about the late 19th/early 20th-century Austrian composer Gustav Mahler...not that the works of this important link between romantic and modern classical music aren't worth examining.  Instead, this is more like a litmus test than an academic one...and it indirectly concerns my driving...

I am one of those people who can't keep their hands off the radio dial when on the road...don't worry, I'm looking where I'm going.  My favorite stations are few in number: WUFT/Classical on 102.7, WUFT/NPR News-Talk on 89.1, WHHZ on 100.5 (alternative rock)...and occasionally WIND on 92.5 (classic rock)...I've pretty much given up on WSKY/97.3 with its extremely biased right-wing political talk format. Sometimes I find myself riveted to one station...more often, I'm surfing around on the dial for something interesting.  But for the last couple of weeks, I have been listening to a CD that my friend Rob from work gave me a while back: Mahler's Ninth Symphony in D-Minor, which he composed shortly before his death and was consequently never performed in his lifetime.  But it is widely considered to be one of his best symphonies, and the symphony is the form that he excelled in.  Although Mahler's Ninth is difficult to get my arms around...it seems much less structured to my untrained classical music ears than a symphony by Mozart or Beethoven...I have come to sense more and more that its mood matches mine, almost as if a kind of synchronicity is going on.  As a result, this CD has become a test of sorts regarding whatever is on the radio.  When I'm on the radio the question comes up: does any of this stand up to Mahler's Ninth?  Usually it doesn't and I switch over to the CD, which picks up on the symphony at the point when I left off the previous time.  But lately, I haven't even bothered to listen to the radio and just keep the Ninth playing in the background as I drive...