Customer Reviews

Mahler: A Biography

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I strongly disagree with the Kirkus review that the author is a die-hard Mahlerian who can't write objectively. The author is not ashamed to write about Mahler's character flaws.

Most of the book is about Mahler's biography, but there are two chapters which discuss Mahler's symphonies and the "Das Lied von der Erde" song cycle. The musical discussion is great except for the very sketchy treatment of Symphony #9.

The biographical details of Mahler's life were interesting, and here the author pulls in data from many sources, not just the diary of Alma. He argues in this book that the Mahler symphonies are not reflections of Mahler's personal struggles (for example, Symphony #6, the "Tragic" symphony was written during a happy period.), but the character of Mahler's music reflects his thoughts and personality (the rapid mood changes present in his music and personality.)

Altogether a good read.

Jonathan Carr's excellent new biography of Gustav Mahler brings a breath of fresh air to Mahler criticism. I have read just about everything written in English that I could find about Mahler, including the massive de La Grange volumes, Alma's memoirs, and Bruno Walter's reminiscences. Never, however, has Mahler, the Man, been portrayed so well as in Mr. Carr's book. I was also gratified to see Mr. Carr debunk the pernicious myths concerning Mahler's abrupt resignation from the Vienna State Opera (I always thought there was more to it than what other biographers reported), and correct the misinformation about what really happened in New York. What Mr. Carr says makes sense on both accounts. The book is well documented; the writing style is lively and highly literate; even the recommendations at the end of the book are well done. I usually turn instant curmudgeon when someone recommends buying a complete set of any CD collection, especially for a composer whose music is interpreted so controversially as Mahler's. However, Mr. Carr's "short cut" recommendation to purchase the complete set by Solti or Kubelik is an excellent one. (I would recommend Solti and the Chicago Symphony.) In short, Mr. Carr should be highly commended for producing this excellent biography. I look forward to further books by this excellent writer.

The Author describes, at appreciable length, why Gustav Mahler was widely misunderstood both as man and musician. More than 50 years after his death his works were left apart until, restored to life prompted by interest and performance, Mahler took his deserved place in the repertoires.

Mahler's tempestuous marriage to Alma Schindler is of particular interest. Alma claimed she was for decades the main authority of Mahler's works, values, character and his day-to-day actions and movements.

For many years, Alma's various publications quickly became the central source of information and references for Mahler scholars and music-lovers alike.

But, unfortunately, many writers have treated her accounts as unreliable, false, misleading and often impaired soundness. It is a fact that these imperfect accounts have nevertheless had a great influence upon several generations of music-lovers, hence the legend: "Alma's Problem"".

Mahler's youth, as described in the first two chapters is fascinating, like the reader's watching a live short resume cast by History Channel. There begins Mahler's occupation as summer composer "" in isolated huts in the country, and his revolutionary achievements as director of Vienna Opera. In 1907 Mahler resigned his post, many claimed he was driven from it, and went with Alma to America. Four years later his health in ruin and his marriage crumbling, he returned to Vienna and died there on the 18th of May 1911, a few weeks before his 51st birthday. He was buried four days later in Grinzing cemetery next to his daughter Maria (died in 1907)""

""On the day he died, that teeming rain on that blustery Monday afternoon, hundreds of ordinary Viennese crowded outside the little church where the service was held and the coffin blessed. Only minority had come to pay tribute to Mahler the composer. His gigantic Symphonies had rarely gone down well in Vienna and not a single one had been premiered there. But Mahler -the Opera Director- that was another matter. In a few stormy years he had lashed the institution at the heart of the city's cultural life to a peak of excellence it might never reach again. Many Viennese had acknowledged as much while Mahler was still at the helm. Now some erstwhile critics were starting to do so too. As one contemptuous Mahler fan put it, `'the same sneering somebody's'' who had attacked every Mahler production were now `'keen to belong to the exclusive circle of Mahlerites'""

The talented, ambitious and ruthless conductor is often degenerated in Alma's memoirs as a sickly and cerebral recluse; Arnold Schoenberg called him a `saint'. For some of Mahler's friends and disciples, he was a great creative artist. Mahler was even suicidal, often called `the Jewish Monkey'' because he was committed to his interpretations of Wagner, Mozart, Beethoven, Dvorak, Berlioz, Brahms, Bruckner, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Debussy, even Georges Bizet and many more. His violent conducting gesticulations had been subject to laughter from his peers, pupils, viewers and musicians. The man was simply very absorbed (committed) in his work; for instance he believed he made-up for Beethoven's deafness by offering interpretations that he felt was necessary in the Ninth Symphony which Beethoven must have had in mind. Yet one described Mahler's dynamite conducting `'Like a cat with convulsions"' He had many clashes with fellow conductors, theater directors, and even composers; something else, early on Mahler had a row with Brahms .While at the university, he worked as a music teacher and made his first major attempt at composition with the cantata Das klagende Lied. The work was entered in a competition where the jury was headed by Johannes Brahms, but failed to win a prize. (Did he feel the brunt of Jewish curse?? It could be!!)

(In later years, however, Brahms was greatly impressed by Mahler's conducting of Don Giovanni.). Similarly Mahler had noisy discussions with Richard Strauss on Strauss's tone poem `'Sinfonia Domestica'', Mahler simply couldn't hold his row.

Now, the author pinpointed inscriptions that go: To the `'holy Gustav Mahler'' and the `'immortal example of his works and deeds'' dedicated on one of the hundreds of wreaths lay beside the route between church and graveside. ""It came from Arnold Schonberg, often helped Mahler with cash and counsel, and other pioneers of the atonal school, including Alban Berg, and Anton Webern. Arnold Schonberg was one of those who, huddled under the umbrellas, trudged slowly behind the coffin as it was borne away from the church. So was the conductor Bruno Walter, destined to fight for wider recognition of Mahler's music on two continents over the half a century. So was Anna Bahr-Mildenburg, Mahler's greatest love before his marriage and transformed by him from a promising young singer into a dramatic soprano without peer. ""

Many more attended, there too was Mahler's revolutionary stage designer Alfred Roller, the poet and dramatist Hugo von Hofmannsthal and the painter Gustav Klimt, one of Alma's old flames. Alma herself did not attend - on doctors' orders, it was said. How cruel of Mahler's wife not to attend her husband's funeral! Had she really loved him? Had she really respected him despite all his flaws? Alma wrote two books (memoirs) - My Life, My Loves, and My Diaries 1898-1902) - and their impact on Mahler's studies was great for at least some 40 years.

Alma was a graceful, well-connected and influential woman who outlived Mahler by more than 50 years. (This reminds me of Cosima and Wagner. Cosima outlived Wagner by 47 years). How trustworthy is any story laid by women who outlive their notorious husbands for so long? Shouldn't they be given credence, though there may not have been full and final grain of truth in it?) - The greatest difficulty in writing one's memoirs is to keep a certain detachment at a time when passions were running high. True in her old age Alma wouldn't admit that her apprehensions with the past `'husband and wife"" days had been influenced with the benefit of hindsight when she now perceived the significance of events after they have occurred. Within 50 years Alma's reminiscences of past events couldn't pass without nostalgia or without an urging wistful desire to return, at least in written thoughts (modified and garbled), to a former time in one's life when young.

Enigmatic, though, was Mahler's meeting with Freud:

Gustav and Sigmund were Jews by birth. They had much more in common. Their thoughts had no relation to religion and did not oppose it. They were very strict, thoughtful and rigorous in observance of moral matters, often excessively so; rigidly austere Viennese gentlemen - by adoption.

When Freud had been a medical trainee in Vienna, Mahler was a student at the Conservatory. When met for the first and last time in the summer of 1910, Freud was 54 and Mahler at 50. With his heart troubles Mahler had less than a year to live. The time of the encounter was in the middle of a significant event in Mahler's life: the composer's marital problems with the young and beautiful Alma. Mahler was then very busy with his Tenth Symphony (he left it unfinished) and suddenly found Alma in total defiance and reticence towards him although he always wanted to be `good and loving husband''. Alma had, she complained in her memoirs" submitted to his tyranny and neglect long enough; she felt used, drained by his self-absorption"". (Music) The truth of her rebellion is perhaps accentuated by Mahler's chronic inability to attain an erection for the performance of their sexual act. Mahler had in him duel sense of guilt and panic - panic that was painful in the presence of Walter Gropius on the scene. Mahler therefore decided to take immediate action and he conceived Freud as his only savior.

During that summer of 1910, Sigmund Freud was spending his vacation in Leyden, Holland when he received a telegram asking for an appointment. The following day Herr Doctor received another telegram cancelling the first one. Mahler was in a state of indecision, unsteadiness and fluctuating mood. This was well drawn by his unbalanced behaviors in dispatching too many telegrams before he managed to get over his ever-present opposition to any attempt to bring his repressed thoughts into consciousness. Mahler and Freud met in a Leyden hotel and spent some four hours loitering about the town. Freud, the thickset and trusted doctor and Mahler, the slender, ailing and vehement composer - were devouring their cigars as they walked and talked. The Doctor conducted a brief analysis of the conductor's grievances: ""A mother fixation "" Freud ruled. On the one hand "" Mahler was attracted by his wife's youthful beauty but resented the fact that she was not old and careworn like his mother"". Alma, on the other hand, ""had a father complex and found her husband's age appealing"". Mahler was twenty years her senior.

Jonathan Carr describes this episode with additional clarity: ""Gustav's father, Bernhard, had a travelling sales job too but he went one better than his mother (G. Mahler's Grandma) and got hold of a horse and cart. Reckoning that knowledge was power he read books voraciously, even studied French, in spare moments on trips. It was no love match on either side when in 1857 he married Maria Hermann (usually called Marie), daughter of a soap-boiler and, at nineteen, ten years his junior. She limped and had a weak heart but arguably it was a step up socially for Bernard and he would have got a dowry. The first child, Isidor, died soon after birth in 1858. The second was Gustav.

An authoritarian father, a suffering, constantly pregnant mother (14 children) brothers and sisters borne off regularly in coffins; that, alas, was still an all too familiar picture in the 19th. Century. It did not necessarily mean that children grew up psychologically maimed, still less that the pressures turned them into great creative artists. All the same, Mahler's family background makes it sorely (for many irresistibly) tempting to try fathom him and his music via the psychiatrist's couch. None other than Sigmund Freud did just that; at least, he made a stab at analyzing Mahler during a few hours stroll round the Dutch town of Leiden in 1910. The outcome was predictable. Freud concluded that Mahler had a Holy Mary complex (mother fixation) and unearthed an early incident which seemed to explain much about the character of Mahler's work. Mahler is said to have remembered that after a `specially painful scene'' between his parents, he ran out of the house and heard a passing barrel organ grinding out popular tune Ách du lieber Augustin. Hence, we are told, the stark contrast between the tragic and the banal became fixed in his mind for life. According to Freud's biographer, Ernest Jones, Mahler even `suddenly said that now he understood why his music had always been prevented from achieving the highest rank through the noblest passages... being spoilt by the intrusion of some commonplace melody".""

Freud's comment about a `Holy Mary complex'' has helped sustain a distorted view of Mahler's relation with his parents. Despite the `dreaming'', which Alma reports, Mahler was under no illusion about how things really were between Bernard and Marie. (His father and Mother) `'They were as ill-suited as fire and water", he told a lady-friend when he was in his mid thirties. ""He was all obstinacy, she was gentleness itself". Blunt words but not enough to justify the frequent claim Mahler hated his father and so identified with his mother that throughout his life he unconsciously imitated her limp. Demonstrably there were much of both his parents in Mahler, of Bernard certainly no less than Marie. He needed no barrel organ incident to fix the pain of stark contrast in his mind. It was already there. The battle between fire and water, as it were, was implanted in Mahler at birth and it never ceased to rage.""

This reminds me of the relationship between Mozart and his father- Leopold. Mahler's father encouraged his son to pursue piano lessons, hoping his son ""would become money-spinning virtuoso, and who later let him study at Vienna conservatory, though certainly not helping him much to pay the fees.""

Bernard was protective. ""when young, Gustav was mistreated by a family with whom he had been sent to stay in Prague, a wrathful Bernard descended, packed his son's things and took him straight home"" from his father, Gustav inherited, among other things, voracious ambition and unshakable will. ""At six or seven he was already giving piano lessons for about 5 crowns an hour and boxing his pupils sharply on the ears whenever they played a wrong note.""

The Austrian physician and founder of psychoanalysis - who theorized that the symptoms of hysterical patients represent forgotten and unresolved infantile psychosexual conflicts-, befitted Mahler's eccentricities. But, who was complexed of whom? Perhaps history would have been fairer had Alma went to see Freud as well.

Alma was a beautiful young lady. Like many people, I saw her picture in other publications, indeed she was very beautiful. Alma claims that Mahler 'feared women' and that their relationship was never really without danger, arguing that he had almost no sexual intercourse right up to his forties (he was 41 when they met). In fact, Mahler's long record of prior love affairs-- including a lengthy one with Anna von Mildenburg -- suggests that this was not the case. Whereas Alma's flirtation and first kiss was in her teens - as she boastfully said so. ".In her memoirs she must have been looking for an edge over Mahler. For instance, Alma Mahler (then Schindler) played piano from childhood and in her memoirs reports that she first attempted composing at age 9. Was that false or true??(She knew that Mahler's parents had arranged piano lessons for him when he was six)

During the emotional instability in their marriage after Mahler's discovery of the affair (Alma's infatuation with Walter Gropius 1883-1969 - a German architect and founder of Bauhaus and is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of "modern" architecture) Mahler took a sincere interest in Alma's musical compositions; completely regretting his earlier attitude when he dropped her talents out.

Upon Mahler's endeavoring, and under his coaching and assistance, Alma prepared five of her songs for publication (they were issued in 1910, by Mahler's own publisher, Universal Edition). His meeting with Freud couldn't have been to discuss Mahler's dynamite style of conducting because by 1910 his style changed and he eschewed all expansive gestures on the podium. But was `'Alma'' the ONLY crises they discussed? What else could they have had as sincere discussion and why? Backlog of hard feelings I believe; they had watched with apprehension the gradual encirclement of the Jews !! At the Opera, Mahler stubbornness in artistic perfection had created enemies, and he was subject to perpetual attacks from anti-Semitic circles in the press. His resignation from the Opera, 1907, was hardly unexpected. (Incidentally: Dreyfus affair divided France from the 1890s to the early 1900s and its repercussion continued until well after WWI)

The hard feelings of anti-Semitism must have adversely impacted his marital relationship with Alma? It could also have been ""the curse of the ninth"" - Mahler knew he would not live long after his composition of the Ninth symphony that he completed in 1908 (perhaps!).

By the way, Pages 227, 228, 229, 230 refer to RECORDINGS, but there is no mention of Herbert Von Karajan. This is strange indeed!! Symphonie No.9, and Das Lied von der Erde, are remarkable interpretations, performed in 1982 and 1975. The only reference is made on page 94 "" For comparison's sake,in his first five and a half years (1956-62) as Vienna Opera director, Herbert Von Karayan led just 168 performances - and he was no slouch"" whereas Mahler, in four years between his arrival in Vienna and his break with the Philharmionic, he conducted some 370 opera performances including nearly thirty premieres......

Mahler by Jonathan Carr is a frustrating book. It certainly debunked many of the myths that have grown up around this composer, particularly those relating to his relationship with his wife. None of the other works of comparable length did as well. On the other hand his discussion of the composer's music was more of the awe-struck fan variety and would provide no new insights into what, for most people, is the most important aspect of his life. As to Carr's writing, it is light and easy reading. At the same time, it does seem occasionally to reach too far to speculate on some aspect of Mahler's life that, as a good researcher, he admits, can not be documented. Every Mahler fan will have to read this book, but none will feel that it can begin to compare with Mitchell or de la Grange. Others, looking for a light gossipy life of Mahler will enjoy a few hours with Carr.

In the `Recommendations' chapter at the end of this biography, Jonathan Carr admits that more than 2500 books and essays have been published about the life and music of Gustav Mahler. "Keeping abreast of Mahler literature and recordings is no job for the faint-hearted (or impecunious)," the author states, and it can be conjectured, with so much available research, what need have we for yet another history of the composer? Yet Carr, a devoted fan for some forty years, has a deep-seated desire to shake up and disrupt the ever-expanding mythology surrounding Mahler, to counteract the long-held assumptions about the composer's life, creative output and reputation. Drawing upon unpublished letters, diaries, scores and other material unavailable in English, Carr focuses his scholarly scalpel upon the last decade of Mahler's life, contesting the perception of the man as a sickly, impotent tyrant, superstitious of death and therein obsessed; an account given by Mahler's widow, Alma, whom Carr - between the lines, and sometimes outright - sketches as a foolish young woman, alternately consumed with contempt, respect and jealousy for her husband, who distorted the record in order to protect her ego and enhance her own role in Mahler's tumultuous career. This autobiography, despite its sometime lurid, gossipy tone, does an effective job of re-examining the composer's lifework, and the legacy he imposed upon the 20th century.

Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) is today firmly situated among the pantheon of the Romantic Era, but during his time the composer was a figure of mixed admiration, ridicule and indifference, especially in regard to his own music, which polarized opinion then, as now. Audiences applauded his normal conducting for its passion and control, but struggled to comprehend the symphonies that, with their grandeur and attention-demanding length, often left listeners feeling elated or exhausted, with little compromise between the two. Constantly tinkering with the rules, Mahler fused profundity and banality, classical technique and rustic folk-strains, seriousness and parody - sometimes at abrupt transition - and his tonal writing predicted and inspired the revolutionary dissonant triumvirate of Shonberg, Weber and Alban Berg. Moreover, Mahler was a philosopher, and in his compositions ever approached the contrast of life, in all its seasons of happiness and despair: "Why do we live? For what do we struggle?" Heady stuff, all in all, and rather dense for the 19th century: Leonard Bernstein once suggested that Mahler could only be truly appreciated by a more experienced audience, one whom, having endured the cataclysmic clash of two World Wars, could then find the pain and rage, the gentle whisper and the thunderous retort, as apt testament to the storms of modern existence.

Jonathan Carr disputes the popular notion that Mahler was unappreciated, displaying much evidence to the contrary. Celebrated as a conductor, Mahler was in constant demand for the last twelve years of his life, in Europe and abroad: his renditions of Wagner were often hailed as sublime, and by all accounts he left his family with a substantial amount of money. And even though his symphonies were largely the target of critical scorn and/or misrepresentation, Carr notes that more than 200 performances were staged during Mahler's lifetime; and the influence he would have upon the next generation, ranging from Stravinsky to Vaughn Williams, is incalculable.

To reach the heights, however, Mahler had to fight tooth, nail and claw, and occasionally fail. A target of anti-Semitism, Mahler renounced his Jewish faith and was baptized in a cunning maneuver to gain the Vienna Opera's top director post. His battles with his orchestras are the stuff of legend: Mahler had a short fuse and could not abide anything less than the absolute best: his reputation preceded him as a fiery perfectionist, quick to replace unsuitable players, given to pubic tongue-lashings of the errant. Carr recounts all of this, following the composer from his humble origins, through the upward crawl to fame and fortune, to the summit of his creative powers and, conversely, his greatest sufferings. For the biographer has a gimlet eye toward the figure of Alma Schindler, Mahler's wife and unlikely muse, and though Carr tries to attain unbiased accounting, his partiality is keen and occasionally transparent. It is obvious the two were not really suited for each other - besides the twenty-year difference between them, Alma admitted to Mahler that she did not like his music, while he in turn forbade her from composing, claiming there could only be one artist in the family. After his death, Alma compiled her letters and diaries and wrote a `definitive' account of her husband, doctoring passages that were not flattering to her, and making many mistakes on particulars. Carr goes to great lengths to show the inconsistencies and flat-out falsities that exist in her portrayal.

Certain lurid elements, such as Alma's affair while Mahler was dying of heart disease and his tortured response, are made prominent in the text: and although this in-depth examination of their relationship is interesting, it ultimately reads a bit superficial. Carr attempts to show how the events of this decade influenced Mahler's late-period symphonies, but therein, the music suffers: the later symphonies are given sketchy and arbitrary coverage. Carr expends nearly twenty pages on the subject of Das Lied Der Erde and barely a page and a half on the eighth symphony, so-called 'Symphony of a Thousand', which Carr simply dismisses, claiming Mahler utilized the wrong part of Goethe's *Faust* and thus crippled the dramatic tension of his work (!!). The Seventh and Ninth are similarly neglected, while symphonies 1-5 are adequately covered and, such as the case of the Third, given a good deal of attention.

This book serves its purpose as an introduction to Gustav Mahler, titan of the Romantic Era. However, the uneven coverage of his work and the faint tabloid aura permeating the later passages force me to dock a star. A good start - for a deeper examination, I recommend *The Mahler Companion*.

Jonathan Carr has done a great service to Mahler fans by debunking some of the romantic myths that have distorted our view of this genius. This warts-and-all biography makes Mahler seem all the greater by making him seem more real and human. The unsentimental look at Alma is also a breath of fresh air. Bravo!

Having some time to kill at the Illini Union Bookstore one dark December day, I found myself browsing through Carr's biography of Mahler. On flipping through the pages, my eyes lit on a wonderful photograph, worth a thousand words or even pages, one I'd never seen before. It showed Mahler's parents, and what I already knew intuitively rushed over me like a wave. I was struck by the apparent energy and volatility of the father, and by the spirituality and speaking suffering of the mother (though she looked like a pig). As we all know, these left a permanent mark on young Gustav. Indeed, no man was ever truer to the impressions of his childhood, or flew straighter throughout his whole life like an arrow to its goal. Even the salmon struggling up rapids to spawn and die in their native pools could take a lesson from Mahler in early imprinting.

This is an excellent book for those seeking a manageable and balanced short introduction to Mahler's life and work, and I recommend it highly. Why then only four stars? Well, the competition is stiff. For one thing, there's the huge and scholarly biography by Henri-Louis de la Grange in four volumes at last count, and even this gets only four stars according to some assessments. But the main reason is that the ultimate biography of Mahler is the Works themselves, and they are off the scale.

I agree with the reader reviewer who stated that Carr's presentation was balanced and portrayed Mahler "warts and all" - therefore, also putting a human and sympathetic face on this titan for me (not much sympathy for Alma though!). I found the book facinating and as a new "Mahlerian", an excellent guide and entry point for his work. Bravo Jonathan Carr!

This is a great book for those who do not have the time to plod through the de La Grange tomes on the life of Mahler. Carr shows another face of Mahler, and that while he was a giant in the late 19th century music world, he had extremely poor taste in women! Carr's writing style is interesting and engaging. The only criticism is that he gives short schrift to the Ninth Symphony, including only 1 paragraph of analysis for such an important work!!

Mahler had parents who did not get on, even though they had many children. I suppose that is the case with many marriages. Gustav was one of 14 children, only seven survived, of whom he was the eldest.He grew up in Iglau, Moravia. Here he heard the military tunes from the local barracks, Saturday night dance tunes, folk music,and he could roam the quiet countryside. Carr destroys the myth that Gustav rushed outside after his parents were arguing and heard an organ grinder playing a kitch tune. This so the story goes had an effect on his symphonies. In fact,Carr suggests he had part of his gentle mother and go ahead father in him, this is why he wrote the way he did. In fact his father who loved learning, had enough insight to send him to a music teacher, and allowed him to go to the Vienna Conservatory. He later became the Vienna Operas director.

When he met and married Alma, he was 41 and she 22. She was the intellectuals pin up girl.Her father was a artist and her stepfather one as well. She mixed in intellectual company. However,she had an overrated opinion of her intelligence and composing ability. She wanted to be Mahlers muse. He told her what he expected from her, to devote herself to him. She wanted him and got what she deserved. Mahler composed in a hut and did not need her for this activity. There is no doubt he was difficult, but he was honest with her. Later on in life after he died in 1911, she got her revenge in her mostly untruthful books on her life with Gustav.She was no Cosima Wagner, who worshipped at the masters feet.

Mahler liked the works of Wagner, who both believed in reincarnation. A fact often not mentioned in biographies about them. Carr destroys the myths so beloved of many music lovers and academics. He explains what the various symphonies are about and where the influences come from. You could say his 9 symphonies were one big symphony ,each a continuation of the other. His first four, a search for meaning and the rest about him, and mans interaction with his surroundings. He was not preoccupied with himself as Alma asserts.He was extremely fit as Roller wrote. He exercised, swam and was a strong man. This book is a new look at Mahler, which fans will enjoy. It is well written and an easy read. Not written in the dry academic way, which bores the hell out of most readers.