Gustav Mahler
Written by ChrisRick on Thursday 21 February 2008
Gustav Mahler was born 07 July 1860 in Bohemia though his family moved to Jihlava, Moravia (both are in modern day Czech Republic) that same year. He began a musical career quite early with piano lessons at age 6. He went on to study at the Vienna Conservatory at the age of 15 and 3 years later at Vienna University. His first composition was Das Klagende Lied, the Song of Lamentation.
At the age of 20 he began his career as a conductor at Bad Hall and continued on at many others including Ljubljana, Vienna, Prague, Leipzig and Budapest. From 1893 to 1896 he worked on his Symphony No. 1 and Symphony No. 2, started Symphony No. 3 and began a series of songs called Des Knaben Wunderhorn, (The Youth’s Magic Horn.) In 1897 he took on the directorship of the Vienna Opera, the greatest musical position in the Austrian Empire. For ten years he continued on while taking the summers off to compose in which he completed his fifth through eighth symphonies, Songs of the Death of Children (Kindertotenlieder) and Rückert Lieder, songs from Rückert’s poems.
Gustav Mahler married Alma Schindler, stepdaughter of painter Carl Moll, in 1902. They had two daughters, the sculptor Anna and Maria Anna who unfortunately died at age 4. That same year Mahler was diagnosed with a heart disease that would limit his activity in the future.
Mahler’s music was challenged in the 1900s, critics thought his works were disjointed and disorganized though he retained a better reputation among the public. Upon leaving the Vienna Opera he took a position with the New York Metropolitan Opera in 1908 and the New York Philharmonic in 1910-11. During these years he wrote his Symphony No. 9 and The Song of the Earth (Das Lied von der Erde) though he never finished his Symphony No. 10. Sadly, many of his works were never publicly performed before his death in 1911.
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