MAHLER: MAXIMALIZING THE SYMPHONY
The quintessential representative of Weltanschauungsmusik and the man whose work most justifies the coining of the term was the composer who professed as his aim the writing of a symphony “so great that the whole world is actually reflected therein—so that one is, so to speak, only an instrument upon which the universe plays.”6 The author of these words was Gustav Mahler, whose ten finished symphonies (the next-to-last disguised as an orchestral song cycle called Das Lied von der Erde, “The Song of the Earth”, composed between 1908 and 1909), plus a fragmentary eleventh called the Tenth, left unfinished at his death in 1911, brought the line of Austro-German symphonic composition to a climax—and conclusion. After Mahler, as we shall see, there has been no German-speaking symphonist of comparable prominence; the important twentieth-century “schools” of symphony writers have been Scandinavian, Russian, and Anglo-American.
- Citation (MLA):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 1 Reaching (for) Limits." The Oxford History of Western Music. Oxford University Press. New York, USA. n.d. Web. 6 Dec. 2023. <https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-001004.xml>.
- Citation (APA):
- Taruskin, R. (n.d.). Chapter 1 Reaching (for) Limits. In Oxford University Press, Music in the Early Twentieth Century. New York, USA. Retrieved 6 Dec. 2023, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-001004.xml
- Citation (Chicago):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 1 Reaching (for) Limits." In Music in the Early Twentieth Century, Oxford University Press. (New York, USA, n.d.). Retrieved 6 Dec. 2023, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-001004.xml
