Mahler and Strauss Both Gustav

Mahler and Strauss

Both Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss are renowned composers and conductors, and both reached the peak of their careers during the early twentieth century. Mahler and Strauss are also both classified as late Romantic era composers. Both Mahler and Strauss revealed their musical talent during childhood and enjoyed considerable success during their adult careers. Both had parents and mentors who fostered their musical talents. In fact, Richard Strauss's father was an elite horn player in Germany. However, their backgrounds and approaches to music both differ.

Gustav Mahler was born to Austrian Jewish parents in a town in Bohemia, now in the Czech Republic. He spent most of his life and career in Vienna, Austria. Richard Strauss also spent a good portion of his life in Vienna. However, before he could settle in Vienna with a secure position as a conductor Gustav Mahler lived in Ljubljana, Olomouc, Kassel, Hamburg, Budapest, Leipzig, Prague, and several other cities. His personal life was as tumultuous and tiring as his professional life. Mahler's parents and his sister died in 1888 while he was in Budapest. His younger brother, also a composer, committed suicide in 1895. In 1907 his daughter Maria died of scarlet fever.

Richard Strauss was born in Munich, Germany and had some loose but controversial connections with the Nazis, having been appointed by the Nazi government to the post of President of the State Music Bureau. Strauss's personal writings showed disdain for the Nazis in spite of his having worked willingly for them. Mahler converted to Roman Catholicism in 1897, ostensibly so that he could accept the position of Director of the Vienna Opera. Jews were not allowed to serve in a post of prominence. Thus, both Strauss and Mahler can be accused of making serious compromises to promote their respective careers. Ironically, Mahler would be chased away from his post on the Viennese Opera years later because of a swell in anti-Semitism in Austria; it did not matter that Mahler had converted to Christianity. Also ironic was that Richard Strauss had a Jewish daughter-in-law and grandchildren, all of whom he actively protected during the Nazi manhunts in spite of his professional connection with the Nazi-run state music bureau. Strauss' experiences eluding the Nazis culminated in his hiding out in a small town in Bavaria. Therefore, Nazism personally affected both Mahler and Strauss and undoubtedly shaped themes in their music.

Both men married fellow musicians, but did not play music with their wives. Misogyny and traditional gender roles prevented Mahler and Strauss from enjoying a professional partnership with the women in their lives. Their marriages were both paradoxically stormy and stable at the same time.

Mahler and Strauss focused on opera but their compositions also included instrumental tone poems and symphonies. Mahler's approach to composition was slightly less traditional and occasionally more experimental than Strauss's but both men stretched the boundaries of accepted music. In fact, in 1968 Stanley Kubrick chose Strauss's tone poem "Also Sprach Zarathustra" as the theme music for the science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Strauss's inspiration for the tone poem also happened to be avant garde fellow German philosopher Friedrich Nietzche.

Strauss's and Mahler's willingness to be innovative and creative led to considerable criticism as well as acclaim. The compositions of both Strauss and Mahler are filled with an emotional intensity that reflects the troubled times and political chaos they lived through. Richard Strauss's "Metamorphosen" was purportedly composed as a reaction piece to the Nazi bombings. The emotionality present in the works of both composers places them squarely within the late Romantic tradition.

One of the most noticeable characteristics of a Mahler composition, especially evident in his symphonies, is layering, polyphony, and eclecticism. A Mahler composition wanders through peaks and valleys of different terrains, even shifting key and tonality several times before revealing a core theme. Minor scales evoke Eastern European and Ashkenazi musical sensibilities, especially when played with woodwind and horn instrumentation. Rich, intense crescendos evoke the work of other artists including those Mahler directly drew from like Wagner. Richard Wagner also provided inspiration for Richard Strauss.