Mahler remembered today

David Jensen says:

The Haitink recording of Das Lied is one of the few on which the Mandolin can be heard.

David K. Nelson says:

Shouldn’t Bruno Walter be mentioned also as doing “something very important” for Mahler?

I’d also point out that the very nature of the recording medium — 4 minute 30 second 78 rpm discs — made being a Mahler champion a very different thing in the era of Mengelberg and for most of Bruno Walter’s career, except for the very last years. Not just the practical issues of recording the music in small chunks, but the expensive nature of recordings of long works. Our old Fritz Kreisler 78s of the Beethoven Concerto had the original price written on the first paper sleeve, maybe $10 or $12, and my dad pointed out that when his own father bought that recording circa 1927, it represented several day’s wages for many, and close to a week’s wages for some. He marveled at the fact that in the 1960s the local pharmacy (!) sold LPs and he could and did buy Oistrakh playing the Beethoven Concerto for a buck or two (on Vox).

I have at least a portion of my grandparent’s library of music books. So let’s go looking for Mahler in the years up to and including WWII.

Paul Grabbe’s “The Story of One Hundred Symphonic Favorites” (Grossett & Dunlap 1940). Nothing of Mahler, not even a mention (nor of Bruckner). But Borodin’s Symphony No 2, Deems Taylor’s “Through the Looking Glass,” and Ernest Schelling’s “A Victory Ball” are described, at some length. Favorites, eh?

Elie Siegmeister’s “The Music Lover’s Handbook” (Wm Morrow & Co. 1943). A discussion (with no particular insight) of Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 by Pitts Sanborn. That’s better, but still meager: three Shostakovich symphonies (1, 5 and 7) are covered. An essay by Hugo Leictentritt on the Romantic era lists Mahler as a conductor – and again briefly in a list of Jewish musicians and composers (his point being to contrast the era’s increase in cosmopolitan tolerance and liberalism with its narrow, intolerant and extreme nationalism, that is, Wagner).

“The Standard Opera and Concert Guide” by George P Upton and Felix Borowski [Borowski was the program book annotator for the Chicago Symphony] (Halcyon House 1930 edition). Discussion and analysis of Mahler’s first, fourth and eighth (“this so-called symphony”) symphonies. That’s pretty good until you realize that the Mahler discussion is dwarfed by that for Frederick Stock (yes, the music director of the Chicago Symphony; Borowski knew what side of his bread the butter was on), Liadov, or Schuman — GEORG Schumann! (Interesting, but off topic – it appears my father must have clipped a long Milwaukee Journal article about the publication of Arnold Schoenberg’s letters and inserted it into this large book. He never mentioned a particular interest in Schoenberg.)

“The Concert Companion” by Robert Bagar and Louis Biancolli (McGraw – Hill 1947, so after my grandfather’s death). This is a compendium of New York Philharmonic program book notes from 1940 to 1947. The symphonies 1, 2, 4, 5, 9, and “Das Lied von der Erde” are discussed, knowingly, with many quotes by Bruno Walter about his conversations with Mahler.

All in all pretty slim pickings for a would be Mahler listener. The LP record era changed everything.