Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler (July 7, 1860–May 18, 1911) was a Bohemian-Austrian composer and conductor.

Music

Mahler was the last in a line of Viennese symphonists extending from the First Viennese School of Joseph Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Franz Schubert to Bruckner and Johannes Brahms; he also incorporated the ideas of Romantic composers like Robert Schumann and Felix Mendelssohn. The major influence on his work, however, was that of Richard Wagner, who was, as Mahler said, after Beethoven, the only composer to truly have "development" (see Sonata form and History of sonata form) in his music.

Related Topics:
First Viennese School - Joseph Haydn - Mozart - Beethoven - Franz Schubert - Bruckner - Johannes Brahms - Romantic - Robert Schumann - Felix Mendelssohn - Richard Wagner - Sonata form - History of sonata form

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The spirit of the lied (German for song) constantly rests in his work. He followed Schubert and Schumann in developing the song cycle, but rather than write piano accompaniment, he orchestrated it instead. Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer) is a set of four songs written as a rejected lover wandering alone along the earth; Mahler wrote the text himself, inspired by his unhappy love affair with a singer while conducting at Kassel.

Related Topics:
Lied - German - Song - Song cycle - Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen

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Often, his works involved the spirit of Austrian song and dance. Keenly aware of the colourations of the orchestra, the composer filled his symphonies with flowing melodies and expressive harmonies, achieving bright tonal qualities using the clarity of his melodic lines. Among his other innovations are expressive use of combinations of instruments in both large and small scale, increased use of percussion, as well as combining voice and chorus in the symphony form, and extreme voice leading in his counterpoint. His orchestral style was based on counterpoint; two melodies would each start off the other seemingly simultaneously. Choosing clarity over a mass orgy of sound, he never left the principle of tonality, as composers following him, in particular, those of the Second Viennese School of Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg, and Anton Webern, would later do.

Related Topics:
Melodies - Harmonies - Voice leading - Counterpoint - Second Viennese School - Arnold Schoenberg - Alban Berg - Anton Webern

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Mahler combined the ideas of Romanticism, including the use of program music, and the use of song melodies in symphonic works, with the resources which the development of the symphony orchestra had made possible. The result was to extend, and eventually break, the understanding of symphonic form, as he searched for ways to expand his music. He stated that a symphony should be an "entire world". As a result, he met with difficulties in presenting his works, and would continually revise the details of his orchestration until he was satisfied with the effect.

Related Topics:
Romanticism - Program music - Symphony orchestra

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His symphonies are generally divided into three periods. The first, dominated by his reading of the Wunderhorn poems, and incorporating characteristic melodies from his song settings of them, includes his first four symphonies. His second period, including the next three symphonies, focuses on increasing severity of expression, including the Tragic symphony, whose hammer blows shocked Viennese audiences and inspired other composers. His last period is marked by increasing polyphony and includes his eighth, ninth, and unfinished tenth symphonies, as well as Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth).

Related Topics:
Wunderhorn - Tragic - Polyphony - Eighth - Ninth - Tenth - Das Lied von der Erde

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Mahler was obsessed by Beethoven's legacy; he declared that all of his symphonies were "ninths", having the same impact and scale as Beethoven's famous Choral symphony. (Incidentally, Mahler was a firm believer in the curse of the ninth and was terrified of writing a ninth numbered symphony, so much that he referred to Das Lied von der Erde as a song cycle rather than number it as a symphony; the work can be considered to be both a song cycle and a symphony. However, Mahler still died after writing his ninth numbered symphony, leaving his tenth unfinished to be completed from his sketches and designs in the 1970s.)

Related Topics:
Choral - Curse of the ninth - 1970s

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Few composers can be said to have freely intermixed their work and their life so completely; in the manuscript of the tenth Symphony, there are notations to his wife Alma (who was, at the time, having an affair with Walter Gropius, her future husband after Mahler's death) as well as other autobiographical references. He was deeply spiritual and described his music in terms of nature very often. This resulted in his music being viewed as extremely emotional for a long time after his death. In addition to restlessly searching for ways of extending symphonic expression, he was also an ardent craftsman, which shows both in his meticulous working methods and careful planning, and in his studies of previous composers.

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