The author's second book on the life and work of Gustav Mahler focuses principally on Mahler's first settings of Wunderhorn texts, volumes I and II of the Lieder und Gesaenge; his first song-cycle, the Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen; and the later orchestral settings of Wunderhorn poems. The central section of the book explores the extraordinary and often eccentric chronology of the First, Second and Third Symphonies' composition, an often minute exploration which reveals the interpenetration of song and symphony in this period of Mahler's art, emphasizes the significance for these works of imagery drawn from the Wunderhorn anthology, and calls attention to the ambiguous position occupied by much of Mahler's music at this time, suspended as it was between the rival claims - and forms - of symphony and symphonic poem. The final section of the book not only looks at the Fourth Symphony as the final, perhaps most perfect, flowering of Mahler's Wunderhorn symphonies, but also investigates such fascinating topics as the relationship between Mahler and Berlioz, and the influence of Bach on Mahler's later masterpieces. This new edition of the book offers an entirely new preface, in which Mitchell gives a unique account of the influence of politics, nationalism and fascism on the reception and rejection of Mahler's music, after the composer's death until the Mahler Renaissance of the 1950s and 1960s. It also includes extensive corrigenda and amplifying addenda, making it clear that the Wunderhorn influence persisted beyond the end of the period during which the Wunderhorn anthology was a constant source of inspiration. It is completed by an international bibliography which documents chronologically the reception and study of his music both in the past, and the prodigiously different circumstances of the present.

A monument in Mahler studies, this volume concentrates on the composer's vocal music and, in particular, on some of his most famous, most original and best loved compositions: the late Rueckert orchestral songs and Kindertotenlieder; Das Lied von der Erde, one of the composer's supreme masterpieces, and the vast Eighth Symphony. Much new ground is broken but the author bases his conclusions on a meticulous examination of the principal manuscript sources, especially those for Das Lied. He offers an unprecedented exploration of the original Chinese texts for that work and indeed of the whole Oriental dimension of Mahler's last and greatest song-cycle. Time and time again, the composer's sketches back up the author's reading of these massive scores and there will be few among this book's readers who will not find a familiar passage or movement sharply illuminated by fresh insights and information. The scope of the book, despite its concentration, is immensely wide; and so is the readership it addresses: Mahler scholars, performers, and general readers.

First published in English in 1980, this important early memoir of Gustav Mahler is by Natalie Bauer-Lechner (1858-1921), a viola player and close and devoted friend of Mahler until his marriage to Alma Schindler in 1902. She visited him in Hamburg and frequented his circle in Vienna, also accompanying him and his family on a number of the summer vacations during which the Second, Third and Fourth Symphonies came into being, together with many of the Wunderhorn songs. Compiled from Bauer-Lechner's private journal, these Recollections are a vital, invaluable record of Mahler's personal, professional and creative life during the last decade of the nineteenth century. A large part of the book recounts, at first hand, conversations with Mahler concerning his works and his ideas about performance (both in the opera-house and on the concert platform.)