The Czech city where Mahler began to study. Biography. Mahler's symphonic epic

Born on July 7, 1860 in the Czech village of Kaliste. At the age of six, Gustav began learning to play the piano and discovered extraordinary abilities. In 1875, his father took the young man to Vienna, where, on the recommendation of Professor Yu. Epstein, Gustav entered the conservatory.

Mahler the musician blossomed at the conservatory primarily as a performer-pianist. At the same time, he was deeply interested in symphonic conducting, but as a composer, Mahler did not find recognition within the walls of the conservatory. The first large chamber ensemble works of his student years (piano quintet, etc.) were not yet distinguished by their independent style and were destroyed by the composer. The only mature work of this period is the cantata “Song of Lament” for soprano, alto, tenor, mixed choir and orchestra.

The breadth of Mahler's interests during these years was also manifested in his desire to study the humanities. He attended university lectures on history, philosophy, psychology and the history of music. Deep knowledge in the field of philosophy and psychology later had a direct impact on Mahler’s work.

In 1888, the composer completed his first symphony, which opened a grandiose cycle of ten symphonies and embodied the most important aspects of Mahler’s worldview and aesthetics. The composer’s work displays deep psychologism, which allows him to convey in his songs and symphonies the spiritual world of contemporary man in constant and acute conflicts with the outside world. At the same time, none of Mahler’s contemporary composers, with the exception of Scriabin, raised such large-scale philosophical problems in his work as Mahler.

With the move to Vienna in 1896, the most important stage in Mahler’s life and work began, when he created five symphonies. During the same period, Mahler created vocal cycles: “Seven Songs of the Last Years” and “Songs about Dead Children.” The Vienna period was the time of Mahler's heyday and recognition as a conductor, primarily as an opera conductor. Having begun his activity in Vienna as the third conductor of the court opera, he took over the post of director a few months later and began reforms that brought the Vienna Opera to the forefront among European theaters.

Gustav Mahler - outstanding symphonist of the 20th century, heir to traditions Beethoven , Schubert And Brahms, who translated the principles of this genre into uniquely individual creativity. Mahler's symphony simultaneously ends a century-long period of development of the symphony and opens the way for the future.

The second most important genre in Mahler's work - song - also completes the long path of development of romantic song among such composers as Schumann, Wolf.

It was the song and the symphony that became the leading genres in Mahler’s work, for in songs we find the subtlest revelation of a person’s mental state, and the global ideas of the century are embodied in monumental symphonic canvases, which in the 20th century only symphonies can compare Honeggera , Hindemith And Shostakovich .

In December 1907, Mahler moved to New York, where the last, briefest period in the composer's life began. Mahler's years in America were marked by the creation of his last two symphonies - "Song of the Earth" and the Ninth. The tenth symphony had just begun. Its first part was completed according to sketches and variants by the composer E. Kshenek, and the remaining four parts, based on sketches, were completed much later (in the 1960s) by the English musicologist D. Cook.

In the summer of 1910, in Altschulderbach, Mahler began work on the Tenth Symphony, which remained unfinished. For most of the summer, the composer was busy preparing the first performance of the Eighth Symphony, with its unprecedented composition, which included, in addition to a large orchestra and eight soloists, the participation of three choirs.

Immersed in his work, Mahler, who, according to friends, was, in essence, a big child, either did not notice, or tried not to notice, how the problems that were originally inherent in his family life accumulated year after year. Alma never truly loved or understood his music - researchers find voluntary or involuntary admissions of this in her diary - which is why the sacrifices that Mahler demanded of her were even less justified in her eyes. The protest against the suppression of her creative ambitions (since this was the main thing that Alma accused her husband of) in the summer of 1910 took the form of adultery. At the end of July, her new lover, the young architect Walter Gropius, sent his passionate love letter addressed to Alma, by mistake, as he himself claimed, or intentionally, as biographers of both Mahler and Gropius himself suspect, to her husband, and later, having arrived in Toblach convinced Mahler to give Alma a divorce. Alma did not leave Mahler - letters to Gropius with the signature “Your wife” lead researchers to believe that she was guided by naked calculation, but she expressed to her husband everything that had accumulated over the years of their life together. A severe psychological crisis was reflected in the manuscript of the Tenth Symphony and eventually forced Mahler to turn to Sigmund Freud for help in August.

The premiere of the Eighth Symphony, which the composer himself considered his main work, took place in Munich on September 12, 1910, in a huge exhibition hall, in the presence of the Prince Regent and his family and numerous celebrities, including long-time admirers of Mahler - Thomas Mann, Gerhart Hauptmann, Auguste Rodin, Max Reinhardt, Camille Saint-Saens. This was the first true triumph of Mahler the composer - the audience was no longer divided into applauding and whistling, the ovation lasted 20 minutes. Only the composer himself, according to eyewitnesses, did not look triumphant: his face looked like a wax mask.

Promising to come to Munich a year later for the first performance of the “Song of the Earth,” Mahler returned to the United States, where he had to work much more than he had expected when signing a contract with the New York Philharmonic: in the 1909/10 season, the committee directing the orchestra obliged to give 43 concerts, in fact it turned out to be 47; the next season the number of concerts was increased to 65. At the same time, Mahler continued to work at the Metropolitan Opera, whose contract was valid until the end of the season in 1910/11. Meanwhile, Weingartner was surviving from Vienna, newspapers wrote that Prince Montenuovo was negotiating with Mahler - Mahler himself denied this and in any case had no intention of returning to the Court Opera. After the expiration of the American contract, he wanted to settle in Europe for a free and quiet life; in this regard, the Mahler couple made plans for many months - now no longer connected with any obligations, which included Paris, Florence, Switzerland, until Mahler chose, despite any grievances, the vicinity of Vienna.

But these dreams were not destined to come true: in the fall of 1910, overexertion turned into a series of sore throats, which Mahler’s weakened body could no longer resist; tonsillitis, in turn, caused complications in the heart. He continued to work and stood at the controls for the last time, already with a high fever, on February 21, 1911. A streptococcal infection that caused subacute bacterial endocarditis became fatal for Mahler.

American doctors were powerless; in April, Mahler was brought to Paris for serum treatment at the Pasteur Institute; but all that Andre Chantemesse could do was confirm the diagnosis: medicine at that time did not have effective means of treating his illness. Mahler's condition continued to deteriorate, and when it became hopeless, he wanted to return to Vienna.

On May 12, Mahler was brought to the capital of Austria, and for 6 days his name did not leave the pages of the Viennese press, which published daily bulletins about the state of his health and competed in praising the dying composer - who, both for Vienna and for other capitals that did not remain indifferent, was still primarily a conductor. He was dying in the clinic, surrounded by baskets of flowers, including from the Vienna Philharmonic - this was the last thing he had time to appreciate. On May 18, shortly before midnight, Mahler passed away. On the 22nd he was buried in the Grinzing cemetery, next to his beloved daughter.

Mahler wanted the funeral to take place without speeches and chants, and his friends carried out his will: the farewell was silent. The premieres of his last completed works - “Songs of the Earth” and the Ninth Symphony - took place under the baton of Bruno Walter.

Gustav Mahler, a great composer, opera director and conductor, lived and worked at the turn of the 19th – 20th centuries.
“To write music means to build a new world...” is how Mahler himself characterized his work. His works showed features of romanticism and expressionism, characteristic of an era of social contradictions.

Gustav Mahler- a great composer, opera director and conductor - lived and worked at the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries.

“To write music means to build a new world...” is how Mahler himself characterized his work. His works showed features of romanticism and expressionism, characteristic of an era of social contradictions. Mahler's music often expressed the composer's personal state, his innermost thoughts. In his work, he always sought to raise large-scale philosophical problems. His talent as a conductor was also great. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, who listened to the orchestra led by Mahler at the Hamburg Opera, called him a brilliant conductor.

The composer was born on July 7, 1860 into a poor Jewish family. The Mahler family lived in the Czech Republic - in the town Kalishte. Gustav's father - Bernhard Mahler— I changed several professions in my life. In his youth he was a driver, later he learned on his own and served as a tutor. In recent years he saved some money and became the owner of a small pub.

There were many children in the family, but six of Gustav's brothers and sisters died in childhood. One sister died later, already an adult; Otto's older brother shot himself. Another brother, Alois, has gone mad. These tragic circumstances subsequently left their mark on the personality of the composer and on the nature of his work. “Inner demons” always tormented Mahler; his life was never calm.

Gustav grew up as a reserved and focused child. He fell in love with music early, but it was difficult to call him a child prodigy, like many great composers of the past. His success could be attributed more to incredible perseverance and diligence than to natural ability.

From the age of six he played the piano. When Gustav turned fifteen, he was sent to Vienna. On the recommendation of the professor Epstein and the young man entered the conservatory. During his years of study, Mahler revealed himself as a talented pianist. He was also involved in symphonic conducting. But his first symphony, which Mahler wrote for a student competition, was a failure - the orchestra conductor refused to perform it, insulting the author.

While studying at the conservatory, Mahler attended the university and attended lectures on history, psychology, philosophy and the history of music. Mahler graduated from the conservatory in 1878; a year later he graduated from the university.

During his student years, Gustav had to work part-time - his parents could not support him. The young man gave piano lessons and went on tour with the orchestra as conductor. In the period 1878-84. he wrote the first serious works: sketches of operas, orchestral and chamber music. In 1885, his first masterpiece was created - the vocal cycle “Songs of the Wandering Apprentice”.

In the fall of 1885, Mahler decided to leave Vienna to find a permanent job as a conductor in one of the theaters. He worked in Prague during a year. There he had the opportunity to conduct operas by Gluck, Mozart, and Wagner. The performances he staged aroused universal admiration; Don Juan was a particularly successful work.

Since 1886, Mahler worked in Leipzig- as second conductor of the city theater. Relations with the main director and the opera troupe did not work out, and at the first suitable offer in March 1888, Gustav left Leipzig for Budapest. At that time he had already written the First Symphony. It opened a future cycle of ten symphonies that embodied the most important features of Mahler’s worldview and philosophy.

IN Budapest the young conductor was appointed to the post of director of the Royal Opera House. Over the course of several months, the theater under his leadership staged several successful performances. However, in 1889, Mahler's father died, and Gustav had to leave Budapest.

In 1891 he became the first conductor Hamburg City Theater. There was a lot of work in the theater, and Mahler often clashed with the intendant, B. Pollini. Nevertheless, the Hamburg period was marked by the creation of the Second and Third Symphonies. Mahler worked in this theater until 1897. In Hamburg, Gustav met his first love - Anna Mildenburg. They began dating, were even engaged, but did not get married. Mahler decided that he could not sacrifice art for the sake of family happiness, and broke up with Anna.

At the end of 1895, the long-awaited premiere of the Second Symphony took place in Berlin. Mahler was offered to head the Vienna Court Opera, but his Jewish origin prevented him from taking this position. Mahler had to convert to Catholicism - after which he was appointed conductor of the court theater. Ten years of Gustav Mahler's work in Vienna Opera became an era of unprecedented flowering of the theater.

Wife: Alma Schindler

In 1901, the composer built a villa in Carinthia. He spent every summer there and composed music in solitude. And in 1902, the composer decided to get married. The chosen one was the daughter of the artist Emil Jakob Schindler - Alma Schindler. Soon Mahler's first daughter was born - Maria. The second daughter, who was born in 1904, was named Anna.

Alma Schindler was a gifted woman, she studied music and even tried to write her own works. However, her despotic and capricious husband forbade her this activity, saying that there should only be one composer in the family.

Marriage had a beneficial effect on the composer's life and work. He began to work a lot and successfully. In Carinthia he wrote new works: the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh Symphonies. Mahler also created a cycle for vocals and orchestra, “Songs of Dead Children,” and this work was prophetic. In 1907, his beloved daughter Maria died of diphtheria.

That year, doctors diagnosed Mahler with a serious heart disease. Then he decided to leave the Viennese theater and move to America. He was offered a position as a conductor at the famous Metropolitan Opera.

In December 1907, Mahler left Vienna. In America, he was offered to head the theater, but he refused the position, remaining as a conductor. New York Philharmonic Orchestra. The composer decided to devote the last years of his life to creativity. In the winter, Mahler lived in New York, and in the summer he went to Germany - there he wrote music. In 1909, the composer completed the tragic vocal symphony “Song of the Earth,” based on poems by Chinese medieval poets. He soon finished his Ninth Symphony and began work on the Tenth, but completed only the first part of the work. (The first part was later finally completed by the composer E. Kshenek; the remaining four parts, based on Mahler’s sketches, were completed by the English musicologist D. Cook.)

The hard work exhausted Mahler's strength. In 1910, the premiere of the Eighth Symphony took place in Munich, but it brought him only disappointment. The work was a success, but did not cause a public outcry. The war was approaching - in Europe at that time there were completely different moods.

In the winter of 1911, Gustav Mahler fell ill with a severe sore throat. Having not received qualified help from New York doctors, he decided to receive treatment in Paris. French doctors were unable to cure the composer - a sore throat complicated his heart, and he began to slowly fade away. Before his death, Mahler asked to be taken to Vienna - there he died on May 18, 1911. Thousands of people came to see off the great composer.

GUSTAV MAHLER

ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: CANCER

NATIONALITY: AUSTRIAN

MUSICAL STYLE: ROMANTIC

ICONIC WORK: “SONGS ABOUT DEAD CHILDREN”

WHERE COULD YOU HEAR THIS MUSIC: IN THE DYSTOPIC POLITICAL THRILLER “CHILDREN OF HUMAN” (2005.)

WISE WORDS: “THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS NOT TO succumb to the opinions of others, but to move persistently along your chosen path, without falling into despair from failures and without reveling in applause.”

Gustav Mahler believed that music is the most important thing in the world. Beautiful music can touch hearts, transform lives and set people on the right path. Wonderful symphonies can express any feelings and experiences. A wonderful performance has a beneficial effect on the lives of listeners.

The only problem is the price Mahler paid for all this beauty. He worked harder than any composer, driving the orchestra to frenzy and the audience to exhaustion, and without caring about relationships with loved ones or about his own health. And each time the question was: either Mahler would fizzle out first, or the patience of those around him would run out.

SOMEONE SHOUT, "FIRE!"

Gustav Mahler's family lived in Iglau (Czech: Jihlava), a German-speaking enclave of Bohemia that was part of the Austrian Empire. The composer's father, Bernhard, owned a brewery and bakery. As a child, Gustav, born in 1860, was fascinated by any music. At the age of three, he was so shocked by the military band that he ran away from the yard and followed the soldiers until he was caught and brought home. Gustav began taking piano lessons, and his parents, Jews, even persuaded the local priest to let the boy sing in a Catholic children's choir.

Mahler began composing as a teenager, but after graduating from the Vienna Conservatory and the University of Vienna, he realized that you couldn’t earn much by writing music. He decided to conduct. His first performance took place in the second-rate resort of Bad Hall, where he conducted a small orchestra and was also responsible for arranging music stands before the concert and collecting chairs at the end of the performance. Bad Hall was followed by Laibach, then Olomouc, Kassel, Prague and Leipzig. In 1888, Mahler became chief conductor of the Budapest Opera House, where the prompter's box caught fire during the first performance of Lohengrin. The fire licked the stage, the smoke rose to the ceiling - Mahler continued to conduct. When the firefighters arrived, he did not let go of the orchestra, but, after waiting for the fire to be extinguished, he resumed the performance from the place where it was interrupted.

Probably, when they first met Mahler, the orchestra members were filled with laughter. The thin, wiry conductor wore thick horn-rimmed glasses that slid down his nose whenever he started waving his arms. Mahler conducted energetically, if not feverishly; a certain critic found in him a resemblance to a cat in convulsions. However, the desire to laugh disappeared completely as soon as Mahler got to work. He reprimanded the performers for the slightest mistakes, and his piercing, withering gaze literally drove them into paralysis, so that they could not take up the instruments. The orchestra hated him, but they never played as well as under his direction.

The pinnacle of Mahler's conducting career was the position of director of the Vienna Opera, offered to the thirty-seven-year-old musician in 1897. However, this “imperial” position implied the strictest restrictions: Jews were not allowed to occupy it. Mahler was never a devout Jew, and before starting his new job, he did not hesitate to convert to Catholicism; he treated the new faith with the same indifference as the old one.

UNBENDING SYMPHONIST

A brilliant opera conductor, Mahler nevertheless did not write a single opera. He also did not write sonatas, concertos, oratorios, overtures, symphonic poems and other genre varieties of classical music. Mahler focused all his energy on song cycles and, mainly, symphonies.

SO GREAT WAS THE CONCENTRATION OF MAHLER THE CONDUCTOR THAT HE DID NOT NOTICE ANYTHING AROUND - EVEN THE FIRE THAT BREAKED UP IN THE CONCERT HALL DIDN’T KEEP HIM AWAY FROM THE CONDUCTOR’S STAND.

And what symphonies! Mahler's works are grandiose in every sense. Firstly, they are very long: the shortest lasts an hour, the longest - almost two. (Beethoven's symphonies never exceed seventy minutes.) Secondly, they require a huge number of musicians to perform them: Mahler's Eighth was nicknamed the "Symphony of a Thousand" because that is how many orchestral players are required to perform it. Finally, they are musically grandiose: flowing themes and overflowing emotions. Critics accused the composer of redundancy, lengthiness and heaviness, and the audience left the concert hall exhausted and confused. Mahler believed that “a symphony must contain everything,” and he poured all of himself into these lengthy works.

ALMA AND ME

Having moved to Vienna, Mahler, while visiting friends, met a young woman named Alma Schindler. Dazzling, charming and impetuous, twenty-two-year-old Alma was nineteen years younger than the composer, but by the time they met she had already acquired a reputation as a woman who attracted brilliant men. Among her “victories” were the composer Alexander von Zemlinsky, brother-in-law of Arnold Schoenberg, and the Austrian artist Gustav Klimt. Mahler and Alma Schindler married on March 9, 1902.

Their relationship cannot be called cloudless - it was not easy to get along with either the grumbling workaholic Mahler or the emotional, mood-prone Alma. In addition, Mahler demanded that everything in the house revolve around his work; Alma even had to give up her music lessons. Before her marriage, she wrote several songs, but Mahler stated that there could only be one composer in a family.

For some time, relative calm reigned in the family. The Mahlers had two daughters - Maria in 1902 (Alma got married while pregnant) and Anna in 1904. However, Alma did not last long: serving a genius is not as romantic an occupation as it seems at first glance. Then the couple suffered a terrible blow: Maria died, contracting scarlet fever and diphtheria, she was four years old. Mahler was soon diagnosed with heart disease.

The following year he resigned as director of the Vienna Opera. This decision was dictated by the losses and sorrows experienced, but the final argument was the offer to lead the orchestra of the New York Metropolitan Opera musical theater. The 1909 season at the Metropolitan Opera was followed by the 1910 season - not only in the opera, but also in the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, of which Mahler became chief conductor: he remained in this post until the end of his life.

BABY COME BACK

In 1910, having arrived in Austria for the summer, Mahler went to the mountains with the intention of working, while Alma went to a luxurious resort. There she met Walter Gropius, a promising architect. Twenty-seven-year-old Gropius was still very far from the buildings that would glorify him, but Alma had a nose for talent. They began a passionate affair.

Alma nevertheless returned to her husband, but Gropius “by mistake” sent Mahler a letter intended for Alma, and the secret became clear. Instead of apologizing, Alma attacked her husband with reproaches: they say that he suppresses her talent and does not value her needs at all. (Since Alma regularly locked herself in her bedroom at night, Mahler could well have made claims about his own needs. On the other hand, Alma complained that Mahler was bad in bed, and often completely worthless.) Mahler fell into despair. He wrote notes of prayer to his wife, cried at night under her door and filled their house with roses. He even dug up Alma's songs in the closet and insisted that she publish them. Alma gave in, or at least pretended to. In October, she and her husband sailed to New York, although the day before departure she secretly saw Gropius, about which Mahler had no idea.

Mahler had been having problems with his throat for a long time, and in February 1911 his throat became so sore that his temperature rose to 40 degrees. Doctors found out that the composer suffers from bacterial endocarditis - inflammation of the inner lining of the heart. Before the advent of antibiotics, this disease was incurable. Nevertheless, Mahler and Alma returned to Europe, or rather to Paris, to try experimental treatment with the serum. The therapy turned out to be useless, and the doctors advised Alma to hurry if she wanted to bring her husband to Austria alive. Mahler died on May 18, 1911 in Vienna.

In subsequent years, appreciation of Mahler's work steadily improved. This music is not easy to love - no one leaves a Mahler concert humming a memorable tune - but his legacy was more than useful to twentieth-century composers, those who, like him, sought to reflect in music the existence of man in all its diversity.

ALMA AND ALL THE REST

After Mahler's death, Alma was in no hurry to renew her relationship with Gropius. First, she began a whirlwind romance with the artist Oskar Kokoschka, who portrayed her in the famous painting “Bride of the Wind.” When World War I began, Kokoschka went to fight and Alma returned to Gropius; they married in 1915. Gropius also served in the army, and during his long absence, Alma began a relationship with the writer Franz Werfel.

As a result, she divorced Gropius and some time later married Werfel. In 1938, the couple fled Germany to escape persecution by the Nazis. Two quiet years in France ended with the invasion of fascist troops, and they were forced to flee further - this time on foot across the Pyrenees to Portugal, where Alma and Franz managed to board a ship sailing to New York. Alma died of a heart attack in 1964. She was a vibrant figure with an amazing gift for recognizing outstanding people. One can only imagine what kind of personal career she could have built if Alma Schindler had been born in a different time.

COMPLETE SILENCE!

In Vienna, going to the opera was considered a pleasant way to spend an evening - until Gustav Mahler came to the city. He demanded absolute silence in the hall - the slightest cough or rustle of the program could cause a fierce look from the conductor. Mahler gave instructions to turn off the lights in the hall, mercilessly leaving latecomers outside the door. And the programs were written in such a learned and ornate language that you couldn’t immediately understand what they were talking about.

The public obeyed Mahler's dictates, but this does not mean that they were satisfied. Emperor Franz Joseph was among those who were confused by the new operatic regime. “Is music really such a serious matter? - he asked. “I thought that its purpose was to please people, and that’s all.”

DO WE HAVE TO INVITE GUSTAV?

Everyone and everyone was gossiping about Mahler’s eccentricity. He was unusually absent-minded; he could stir his tea with a lit cigarette and sit for hours in an empty train carriage, not noticing that the locomotive had long been uncoupled. And his behavior in society was depressing. If you invite Mahler to a dinner party, be prepared to serve him special dishes (wholemeal bread and apples) and be patient. At the table, Mahler either chewed in sullen silence, ignoring everyone around him, or spoke incessantly. It is not surprising that he was not invited to visit often.

GUSTAV AND SIGMUND

Having learned of Alma's affair with Gropius, the shocked Mahler was in desperate need of help. He eventually arranged a meeting with the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud.

They met on August 26, 1910 in the Dutch city of Leiden. During the four-hour walk, the venerable doctor talked only about how Mahler's mother, Maria, had the same name as his wife, christened Alma Maria. When the composer boarded the train back to Austria, Freud noted with satisfaction: “We have achieved a lot with him.” Mahler seemed less impressed by his interaction with the doctor. He telegraphed Alma: “The conversation is interesting. The elephant turned out to be a fly."

LET'S CALL IT "SYMPHONY NO. 10 MINUS ONE"

Alma wrote extensive memoirs about her life with Mahler, and at first her stories were unconditionally trusted - so much so that they helped create a fund that administered a scholarship in Mahler's name. Later, however, biographers discovered numerous discrepancies between Alma’s memories and real circumstances, and now researchers of the composer’s work and life inevitably face the so-called “Alma problem.”

Take, for example, Alma's claim that Mahler had a paralyzing "fear of the number nine"; allegedly he got it into his head that he would die immediately if he created his ninth symphony, as happened with many composers before him (see “Beethoven”). It’s as if Mahler was so afraid to write the ninth symphony that he did not number the new work and called it simply: “Song of the Earth.” And then he finally decided and composed symphony number 9, after which, of course, he died.

Modern biographers doubt the veracity of this story, reasonably noting that if Mahler was so horrified by the Nine, nothing prevented him from calling the work following the “Song of the Earth” the “Tenth Symphony.” However, many Mahler fans believe in this legend. Schoenberg, for example, spoke of Mahler and his Ninth Symphony like this: “It seems that nine is the limit... It seems that the “Tenth” would tell us something that we are not yet aware of, for which we are not yet ready. All the creators of the ninth symphonies came too close to eternity.”

ATONEMENT: ONE PIECE PER HANDS

The always gloomy, self-absorbed Mahler and the cheerful, jovial Richard Strauss made perhaps the strangest pair of friends in the history of music, and yet they promoted each other's work and appreciated each other's talent. This does not mean that their friendship was never overshadowed by anything. Mahler often resented Strauss' perceived heckling and neglect, who in turn found Mahler's sullenness unbearable. But the fundamental difference between them lay in their attitude to music. After the premiere of Strauss's opera The Lights Out, the author, at a dinner in honor of this event, figured out what fee he was owed. Mahler was horrified and later wrote to Alma that “it is much better to live in poverty, eat dry crust, but follow your star, rather than sell your soul like that.”

After Mahler's death, Strauss admitted that he had never really understood the music of his friend Gustav, and especially Mahler's belief in the redemption that musical creativity would grant him. “I can’t imagine what I have to atone for,” Strauss complained.

Gustav Hilger I was present at this Diplomatic Yearbook 1989, M., 1990 Gustav Hilger was born in 1886 in Moscow into the family of a German manufacturer and was fluent in Russian from childhood. Having become a career diplomat, from 1923 until June 1941 he was first an employee and

CARL X GUSTAV 1622-1660 Count Palatine of Zweibrücken. The first king of Sweden from the Palatinate house. Carl Gustav was born into a noble aristocratic family. His mother was Catherine Vasa, sister of the Swedish king-commander Gustav II Adolf. Father: John Casimir

Gustav Mahler Penalty for consultation on horns Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) was an outstanding Austrian composer and conductor. One of the largest symphony composers and conductors of the late 19th – early 20th centuries. The composer knew that his wife, Alma, was deceiving him with

Carl Gustav Jung The Whispering Adulterer I prefer indulgent vice to stubborn virtue. Moliere Karl Gustaf Jung (1875–1966) - Swiss psychiatrist, founder of one of the areas of depth and analytical psychology. In 1903, Jung married Emma

Shpet GUSTAV GUSTAVOVYCH. Gustav Gustavovich Shpet was born on March 25, 1879 into a poor family. He did not have a father, and his mother, Marcelina Osipovna Shpet, belonged to an impoverished noble family from Volyn, from where she left for Kyiv before the birth of her son. The mother raised her son alone,

JUNG CARL GUSTAV. Carl Gustav Jung was born in 1875 in the Swiss town of Keeswil, in the family of a poor village priest. The Jung family belonged to a “good” society, but struggled to make ends meet. His childhood and youth were spent in poverty. Jung got the opportunity

Strauss, Mahler and the end of an era On May 16, 1906, Richard Strauss conducted his opera “Salome” in Graz, Austria, and the crowned heads of European music came to the city. Salome had premiered in Dresden five months earlier, and rumors immediately began to spread that Strauss

Mahler Berlin itself, where Strauss lived at the beginning of the new century, was known as the noisiest and most energetic European capital. Its majestic neoclassical buildings were surrounded by shopping districts, workers' quarters, industrial infrastructure, transport and electrical

HERZ (HERZ) GUSTAV LUDWIG (born in 1887 - died in 1975) German experimental physicist, Doctor of Science, professor. Developed a diffusion method for isotope separation, wrote works on spectroscopy, plasma physics, etc. Foreign member of the USSR Academy of Sciences in the Department

Gustav II Adolf Things have now gone so far that all the wars being waged in Europe have been mixed into one. From a letter from Gustav Adolf Oxenstierne, 1628. Historians do not have a consensus regarding the border of the Middle Ages. Some rightly see serious changes in

GUSTAV MAHLER 7 JULY I860 - 18 MAY 1911ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: RACATIONALITY: AUSTRIANMUSICAL STYLE: ROMANTICICONIC WORK: “SONGS ABOUT DEAD CHILDREN”WHERE YOU COULD HEAR THIS MUSIC: DYUTOPIC COM POLITICAL THRILLER “CHILDREN OF HUMAN” (2005.) WISE WORDS:

Gustav Mahler Parting with Illusions First Symphony The so-called musical investigation is actually a risky business, if only because there are no final judgments or legal evidence, no evidence (neither for nor against anything) we still

Alma Mahler-Werfel (1879–1964) Alma Maria Schindler.Alma Mahler-Werfel. This name still evokes conflicting feelings to this day. The sacred monster, the great, even supernaturally great “waste of love” - in this role she became a legend, or at least a myth.

“Operation Gustav” During the trial, as the reader already knows, many defendants entered into quarrels with each other, sometimes leading to mutual exposure. Keitel and Jodl in this sense were, it seems, an exception. Only once was it observed that Jodl,

Austria is a country that is undoubtedly rich in great musicians. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Joseph Haydn, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Franz Schubert and many others. Gustav Mahler is one of the representatives of Austrian musical culture, who made an invaluable contribution to the musical art of not only his country, but the whole world. He was not only a composer, but also a famous conductor.

Biography

According to his biography, Gustav Mahler was born in the small village of Kaliste in Bohemia, which is located in the Czech Republic, in 1860. He was the second child in the family. By the way, out of fourteen children, his parents had to bury eight.

Gustav's father and mother were absolute opposites to each other, but this did not stop them from living a long, happy life together. Bernhard Mahler, like the grandfather of the future famous composer, was an innkeeper and merchant. Mother, Maria, was the daughter of a soap factory worker. She was a very sweet and flexible woman, which could not be said about Gustav's father, who was incredibly stubborn. Perhaps this contrast of characters helped them become one.

Childhood

Nothing foreshadowed Gustav's musical career. Neither mother nor father were at all interested in art. But the family's move to Jihlava put everything in its place, perhaps deciding the fate of the future composer.

The Czech city of Jihlava was full of traditions. Surprisingly, there was a theater here that staged not only dramatic repertoire, but also opera. Thanks to the fairs where the military brass band played, Gustav Mahler first encountered music and fell in love with it forever.

Hearing the orchestra play for the first time, the boy was so amazed that he could not take his fascinated gaze away. He had to be taken home by force. Folk music fascinated the future composer, so by the age of 4 he was already playing the harmonica given by his father.

Gustav's family was Jewish, but the boy wanted to be closer to music so much that his father was able to negotiate with a Catholic priest so that his son could sing in the children's choir of a Catholic church. Seeing their son’s love and passion for art, his parents found an opportunity to pay for his piano lessons.

Creative path

If Gustav Mahler learned to play the piano well by the age of six, his first works as a composer appeared somewhat later. When the young man turned 15 years old, his parents, on the recommendation of his teachers, sent their son to study.

The choice, naturally, fell on an educational institution where the young Mahler could learn his favorite activity. This is how young Gustav ended up in the capital of classical music of that time, Vienna. Having entered the conservatory, he enthusiastically devoted himself to the work of his whole life.

After graduating from this educational institution, Mahler graduated from the University of Vienna. But, having received a classical musical education in the art of composition, he understood that he could not support himself by composing, so he decided to try himself as a conductor. By the way, he did it not just well, but amazingly. It is as a conductor that Gustav Mahler is known throughout the world. One could only envy the musician’s tenacity. He could spend hours practicing a small fragment with the orchestra, forcing both himself and the orchestra members to work exhaustively.

He began his conducting career with a small group that did not show much promise. But every year he was offered more and more prestigious jobs. The pinnacle of his conducting career was the position of director of the opera house in Vienna.

Mahler's ability to work could be the envy of many. The musicians of the orchestra he directed quietly hated their leader for his persistence and inflexibility. But at the same time it gave its results. Under his direction the orchestra played better than ever.

Once at a concert there was a fire on stage in the prompter's booth. The conductor did not want to stop the performance until the last minute, forcing the musicians to play their parts. Only the firefighters who arrived were able to stop the concert. By the way, when the fire was extinguished, the conductor hurried to continue the performance from where they left off.

Outwardly, the composer Gustav Mahler was somewhat angular and awkward. But as soon as he raised his hands, inviting the orchestra to play, every spectator understood that this man was a genius, that he lived and breathed music. Tousled hair, crazy eyes, and thin figure did not prevent him from being one of the best conductors of his time.

Despite the fact that Gustav Mahler, whose brief biography is presented to your attention in the article, directed the Vienna Opera House, he himself never wrote operas. But he has enough symphonic works. Moreover, their scale shocks even an experienced musician. He believed that a symphony should contain as much as possible - complex parts, a huge number of orchestral players, incredible strength and power of musical performance. Spectators, leaving his performances, sometimes felt a certain confusion from the pressure of sound information that literally fell upon them.

Personal life

Like many great composers, personal relationships and family were not the main thing for Gustav Mahler. Music has always been his true love. Although, at the age of 42, Mahler still met his chosen one. Her name was Alma Schindler. She was young, but she already knew how to turn men’s heads. Being 19 years younger than her husband, she was also a budding musician and even managed to write several songs.

Unfortunately, Gustav did not tolerate competition even with his wife, so Alma simply had to forget about her musical career. She bore him two daughters. Unfortunately, one of them died at the age of 4 after contracting scarlet fever. This was a blow to my father. Perhaps this loss was the cause of the heart disease that he was diagnosed with a little later.

The family life of Gustav and Alma was constantly like a powder keg. Misunderstanding and jealousy took a huge amount of energy. And although Alma was faithful to her husband, he suspected that she was having an affair with a promising architect.

His wife was by his side until his death. In those years, antibiotics were not known, therefore, by diagnosing Mahler with bacterial endocarditis, doctors literally signed his death contract. And even experimental treatment with a certain serum, which the musician decided on literally out of despair, did not help. Gustav Mahler died in Vienna in 1911.

Creative heritage

The main musical genres in the composer's work were symphony and song. Two completely different genres found their response in this talented and purposeful person. Mahler wrote 9 symphonies. The 10th, unfortunately, was not completed at the time of his death. All his symphonies are long and very emotional.

Also, Mahler’s work throughout his life, from childhood, was hand in hand with song. Gustav Mahler has more than 40 musical works. The cycle “Songs of the Wandering Apprentice” is especially popular, the words to which he wrote himself. You can't ignore "The Boy's Magic Horn" - based on folklore. Also beautiful are “Songs about Dead Children” with lyrics by F. Rückert. Another popular cycle is “7 Last Songs”.

"Song of the Earth"

This piece of music can hardly be called just a song. This is a cantata for a symphony orchestra and two soloists who take turns performing their vocal parts. The work was written in 1909 by a composer who was already creatively mature. In "Song of the Earth" Gustav Mahler wanted to express his entire attitude towards the world and music. The music is based on poems by Chinese poets of the Tang era. The work consists of 6 song parts:

1. “Drinking song about the sorrows of the earth” (E minor).
2. “Lonely in Autumn” (D minor).
3. “About Youth” (B flat minor).
4. “On Beauty” (G major).
5. “Drunk in the Spring” (A major).
6. “Farewell” (C minor, C major).

This structure of the work is more like a song cycle. By the way, some composers used this structure of constructing a musical work in their compositions.

"Song of the Earth" was first performed after the composer's death in 1911 by his student and successor.

Gustav Mahler: "Songs of Dead Children"

Already by the title one can judge this work as a tragic page in the composer’s life. Unfortunately, he had to face death as a child, when his brothers and sisters died. And Mahler took the premature death of his daughter very hard.

The vocal cycle for orchestra and soloist was written between 1901 and 1904 based on poems by Friedrich Rückert. In this case, the orchestra is represented not by a full orchestra, but by a chamber composition. The duration of the work is almost 25 minutes.

Symphony No. 10

Gustav Mahler wrote quite a lot of musical works during his creative career, including 9 symphonies. As mentioned above, he started another one. Unfortunately, a serious illness that led to death did not allow another, perhaps brilliant, work to be born. The composer worked on this symphony for quite a long time, then leaving it, then starting work again. After his death, sketches of the work were found. But they were so crude that even his student did not dare to complete his creation. In addition, Gustav Mahler himself was very categorical about works that, in his opinion, were imperfect. He never showed his creations until he finished them.

To present an unfinished composition to the viewer's judgment, even if these were the closest and dearest people, was absolutely out of character for him. From the composer's notes it follows that the symphony was supposed to consist of five movements. Some of them were written at the time of his death, and some he had not started at all. A few years after Mahler’s death, the composer’s wife asked for help from some musicians, inviting them to complete her husband’s last composition, but, unfortunately, no one agreed to this. Therefore, even today Gustav Mahler’s last symphony is not available to the listener. But individual parts of the work were rearranged from orchestration into solo works for instruments and performed at various venues around the world.

Gustav sold his first compositions, written at the age of 16. True, his own parents became buyers. Apparently, even then the future composer wanted to receive not only moral satisfaction for his work, but also financial support.

As a child, the composer was a very reserved child. One day his father left him alone in the forest. Returning for the child a few hours later, the father found him sitting in the same position in which he had left him. It turned out that loneliness did not frighten the child at all, but only gave him a reason and time to reflect on life.

Mahler was delighted with the work of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and even helped produce several of his operas in Germany and Austria. So we can assume that Tchaikovsky’s world fame also increased thanks to Gustav Mahler. By the way, upon arriving in Austria, Tchaikovsky attended a rehearsal of his opera. He liked the conductor’s work so much that he did not interfere, but allowed Mahler to do everything as he intended.

The composer was Jewish. But when it was necessary for mercantile motives to change his faith, he became a Catholic without a twinge of conscience. However, after that I never became more sensitive to religion.

Gustav Mahler was very respectful of the work of the Russian writer F. I. Dostoevsky.

All his life Mahler wanted to be like Ludwig van Beethoven, not only as an outstanding composer, but even in appearance he strove to resemble him. By the way, he did the latter quite well. His tousled hair and half-crazed gleam in his eyes made Mahler look a little like Beethoven. His emotional and overly harsh conducting style differed from the techniques of other orchestra directors. People sitting in the auditorium sometimes felt as if he was being electrocuted.

Gustav Mahler had a surprisingly quarrelsome character. He could quarrel with anyone. The orchestra's musicians literally hated him because Gustav forced them to continue working with the instrument for 15 hours straight without rest.

It was Mahler who introduced the fashion of turning off the lights in the hall during a performance. This was done so that the audience would look only at the illuminated stage, and not at each other’s jewelry and outfits.

last years of life

In his last years, Mahler worked very hard. Being no longer young, he continued to conduct and create his works. Unfortunately, the serious illness was diagnosed too late, and the medicine of that time was far from perfect. Gustav Mahler, whose biography was discussed in the article, died in 1911 at the age of 51. His wife was married twice more after his death and even gave birth to a child, who, unfortunately, also died at the age of 18.

Great master

The music of Gustav Mahler is complex, emotional and not always understandable. But it carries within itself the experiences that the composer experienced when creating his imperishable masterpieces.

Mahler, Gustav(Mahler, Gustav; 1860, village of Kaliste, now Kaliste, Czech Republic, – 1911, Vienna) - composer, conductor and opera director.

early years

The son of a poor merchant. There were 11 children in the family, who were often sick, and some of them died.

A few months after his birth, the family moved to the neighboring town of Ihlava (German: Iglau), where Mahler spent his childhood and youth. Family relations were poor, and Mahler developed a dislike for his father and psychological problems from childhood. He had a weak heart (which led to his early death).

I became interested in music from the age of four. From the age of six he studied music in Prague. At the age of 10 he began performing as a pianist, at the age of 15 he was admitted to the Vienna Conservatory, where he studied in 1875–78. with Y. Epstein (piano), R. Fuchs (harmony) and T. Krenn (composition), listened to lectures on harmony by A. Bruckner, with whom he later became friends.

He was engaged in composing music, earning money by teaching. When he was unable to win the Beethoven Competition Prize, he decided to become a conductor and study composition in his free time.

Work in orchestras

He conducted opera orchestras in Bad Hall (1880), Ljubljana (1881–82), Kassel (1883–85), Prague (1885), Budapest (1888–91), Hamburg (1891–97). In 1897, 1902 and 1907 he went on tour to Russia.

In 1897–1907 was artistic director and chief conductor of the Vienna Opera, which, thanks to Mahler, achieved unprecedented prosperity. Mahler read in a new way and staged the operas of W. A. ​​Mozart, L. Beethoven, V. R. Wagner, G. A. Rossini, G. Verdi, G. Puccini, B. Smetana, P. I. Tchaikovsky (who named Mahler a brilliant conductor), achieving a synthesis of stage action and music, theatrical and operatic art.

His reform was enthusiastically received by the enlightened public, but conflicts with officials, intrigues of ill-wishers and attacks from the tabloid press (including anti-Semitic ones) prompted Mahler to leave Vienna. In 1908–1909 he was conductor of the Metropolitan Opera, 1909–11. conducted the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

Compositions

Mahler composed mainly in the summer months. The main content of Mahler's works is a fierce, most often unequal struggle of the good, humane principle with everything base, deceitful, hypocritical, and ugly. Mahler wrote: “All my life I have composed music about only one thing - can I be happy when somewhere else another being is suffering?” As a rule, three periods are distinguished in Mahler's work.

His monumental symphonies, stunning in their drama and philosophical depth, became the artistic documents of the era:

• The first (1884–88), inspired by the idea of ​​merging man with nature,
• The second (1888–94) with her program “Life-Death-Immortality”,
• The third (1895–96) is a pantheistic picture of the world,
• The fourth (1899–1901) is a bitter story about earthly disasters,
• Fifth (1901–1902) - an attempt to present the hero at the “highest point of life”,
• Sixth (“Tragic”, 1903–1904),
• Seventh (1904–1905),
• Eighth (1906), with text from Goethe's Faust (the so-called symphony of a thousand participants),
• Ninth (1909), sounded like “farewell to life”, as well as
• symphony-cantata “Song of the Earth” (1907–1908).

Mahler did not have time to finish his tenth symphony.

Mahler's favorite writers who influenced his worldview and ideals were J. V. Goethe, Jean Paul (I. P. F. Richter), E. T. A. Hoffmann, F. Dostoevsky, and for some time F. Nietzsche.

Mahler's influence on world culture

Mahler's artistic heritage summed up the era of musical romanticism and served as a starting point for many movements of modern musical art, including the expressionism of the so-called New Viennese School (A. Schoenberg and his followers), for the work of A. Honegger, B. Britten and others. to a greater extent - D. Shostakovich.

Mahler created a type of so-called symphony in songs, with solo singers, a choir or several choirs. Mahler often used his own songs in symphonies (some based on his own texts). In his obituary on Mahler’s death, it was noted that he “overcame the contradictions between symphony and drama, between absolute and programmatic, vocal and instrumental music.”