Gustav Mahler--Richard Strauss: Correspondence 1888-1911 [1 ed.] 0226057682, 9780226057682

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GÜSTAVMAHLER R

I

CHAR D

S

TRAÜ S S

CORRESPONDENCE 1888-1911

ED ITED BY HERTA BLA UKOPF

TRANSLATED bTeDHUND TePHGOTT

ISBN D-2Eb-DS?b7-M GUSTAV MAHLES AND RICHARD STRAUSS got tO kll( each other as young conductors

in

From then until Mahler's death in of the first

kept

in

Leipzig

in 1

191 1 - the y

performance ofDerRosenkaralicr-ll

touch. This

first

publication of their

correspondence (which includes twenty-five previously

unknown Strauss letters) reveals a very different picture of their relationship than that which

is

accepted. For while there

fact that

is

Mahler and Strauss were as

no denying the

generally

antithetical in their musical

means and goals as in their temperaments and personalities,

it is

no less true that each exercised a

Mahler himself described

fascination for the other.

their relationship as that of two miners tunnelling

from

who eventually hope to meet. Their letters show both composers battling

opposite directions

against adverse conditions

turn of the century.

in

the musical world at the

We read of Mahler's energetic

advocacy of Strauss's Symphonia Domestica, which he conducted

in

1904. Strauss,

himself as the

"first

who was proud to describe

Mahlerian,

"

championed Mahler's

music no less vigorously, not least in his efforts on behalf of the Second and Third Symphonies. There are lively

accounts of the "Salome-attair"

at the

Vienna

Opera, where Mahler fought to overcome the prejudice

and censorship that were levelled against the work.

The correspondence, letters

consisting of sixty-three

by Mahler and twenty-eight by Strauss,

annotated and

is

is fully

supplemented by a major essay

in

which Herta Blaukopf puts the Mahler-Strauss relationship into historical perspective with the help of

many previously unpublished documents. Both the letters and the essay tell us much that is new not only about Mahler and Strauss but no less about musical and cultural

life

during the eventful twenty-four years of

their friendship.

Herta Blaukopf, who

lives in Vienna, has

been

publications editor for the International Gustav Mahler

Society since 1976.

volume

The books she has edited

of previously unpublished letters,

Mahler, Unbekannte Briefe, Vienna 1983.

Jacket design by Carroll and

Dempsey Ltd, mcorp< photographs of Mahler in I886_and Strauss courtesy of the Bildarchiv der österreichische!] (

Nationalbibliothek.

include a

Gustav

ßrMV

"ililliiii

MAIN LIBRARY

3 1833 00247 8243

780,92 M27eu 7C877S4 Mahler, Gustav, lShü-lvil!. Gustav Mahler, Richard

Strauss

DO NOT REMOVE CARDS FROM POCKET

ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY

FORT WAYNE, INDIANA 46802

You may

return this

book

to

any agency, branch,

or bookmobile of the Allen County Public Library.

*

^

Gustav Mahler

Richard Strauss

Correspondence 1888-1911

Digitized by the Internet Archive in

2012

http://archive.org/details/gustavmahlerrichOOmahl

GUSTAV MAHLER RICHARD STRAUSS Correspondence 1888-1911

Edited with Notes and an Essay by

HERTA BLAUKOPF Translated by

EDMUND JEPHCOTT

The

University of Chicago Press

First published in

Germany

as

Gustav Mahler Richard Strauss Briefwechsel,

© The

1980, by R. Piper

&

1

888-1 gu

Co. Verlag, Munich

University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637

Faber and Faber Ltd, Translation

Queen Square, London

3

©

WCi

1984 by Faber and Faber

All rights reserved. Published 1984

Monophoto Ehrhardt & Co Ltd Plymouth

Filmset in

by Latimer Trend

Printed in Great Britain by

The Thetford

Press Thetford Norfolk

93 92 91 90 89 88 87 86 85 84

54321

Allen County Public Library Ft.

Wayne, Indiana

Library of Congress Cataloging

in Publication

Data

Mahler, Gustav, 1860-1911.

Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss. Bibliography:

p.

Includes index. 1.

Mahler, Gustav, 1860-1911. 1864-1949. Correspondence.

Correspondence. II.

3.

2.

Strauss, Richard,

Composers— Austria— 4. Composers— Germany

I.

Blaukopf, Herta, 1924-

Strauss, Richard, 1864-1949. Correspondence. English. Selections. 1984.

ML410.M23A4713 1984

III. Title.

78o'.92'2[B]

ISBN 0-226-05767-4

84-8736

7C87754 Contents

Foreword

page

1

Acknowledgements

13

Notes on the Edition

15

Correspondence 1888-1911

17

Rivalry and Friendship

An

Essay on the

Mahler-Strauss Relationship by Herta Blaukopf

Key

to Principal Bibliographical

101

Sources

Notes

159

160

Chronologies: Mahler Conducts Strauss; Strauss

Conducts Mahler compiled by

Knud Manner

164

General Index

167

Index of Works by Mahler

171

Index of Works by Strauss

172

Illustrations

PLATES between pages g6 and gj i.

Mahler waiting Mahler

2.

for Strauss, Salzburg,

1906 {Internationale Gustav

Gesellschaft, Vienna)

Mahler, 1907 (Internationale Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft, Vienna)

3.

Strauss, 1907 (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek)

4.

Autograph

5.

MS page of Feuersnot (Städtische Musikbibliothek, Munich) Autograph MS page of Mahler's Fourth Symphony (Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, Vienna)

6. 7.

The Strauss Family (Alice Strauss) Alma and Gustav Mahler, about 1903

(Archiv der Wiener Philharmo-

niker) 8.

Announcement of Strauss's performance of Mahler's Buenos

9.

First

Symphony,

Aires, 1923 (Archiv der Wiener Philharmoniker)

Facsimile of Mahler's letter to Strauss, 19 August 1905 (Strauss-

Archiv) [o.

Facsimile of Strauss's letter to Mahler, June 1901 (Alfred and Maria

Rose Collection, Ontario) 1.

Announcement of Mahler's performance of

Strauss's

Symphonia

domestica, Vienna, 1904 (Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, Vienna)

TEXT ILLUSTRATIONS Fig.

1.

Fig. 2.

Mahler, caricature and silhouette by Hans Schliessmann page 64 Strauss, silhouette by

Hans Schliessmann

137

Foreword

For almost

a quarter of a

linked by friendship. a great deal to tell us

century Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss were

What

joined

them— and also what divided them— has

about musical

life

from 1887

to 191

1,

in

which both

played a significant part not only as composers but as conductors and organizers.

Until now, without access to their correspondence, the nature of the relationship between the

Although in the

it

two composers has not been well understood.

was known that about

Richard Strauss-Archiv

at

sixty letters

from Mahler

were

to Strauss

Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Strauss's

letters

Mahler were scattered throughout the world. After a long search it has to track down twenty-eight letters from Strauss to Mahler in the original, or copies from the most diverse places. Thus we have at last recovered enough of their extensive correspondence— representing to

been possible

—

perhaps three-fifths of the are

now published

These

letters,

total

— to merit publication. All the known letters

here.

together with existing material and with

much new

evi-

dence unearthed by the Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft, have enabled me, in the essay which forms the second half of this book, to put into clearer perspective than before the 'rivalry and friendship' between Strauss

While tion

this

book was already

from Mahler

undated

letter

to Strauss

in the press, a further written

came

to the editor's attention.

put his

This

is

an

Mahler expresses Second Symphony on the programme of

card which was written early in 1903. In

his delight that Strauss has

and Mahler.

communica-

it

the festival of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein (June 1903) in Basle.

At the same time he declares

that he

is

of the chorus and orchestra, and most of cathedral in Basle where the performance

worried about the positioning

all

is

about the acoustics of the

to take place.

H.B.

Vienna, October ig8j

Acknowledgements

The

Internationale Gustav

Mahler Gesellschaft, under whose auspices this like to thank Dr Franz Strauss and

book was prepared, would particularly

Frau Alice Strauss of Garmisch-Partenkirchen who, as custodians of Mahler's

letters,

gave

much vital information and advice. Without Dr Franz Strauss, who sadly did not live to

generous co-operation of

the see

the book appear, the letters could not have been published.

Our thanks

are likewise

due

to

many

valuable guidance, and to the

Frau Anna Mahler of Spoleto other people and institutions

for her

who have

supplied copies of original letters, or other information. These are listed in alphabetical order below:

Bayerische Staatsbibliothek,

Munich

Gottfried von Einem, Vienna Professor Marius Flothuis, Amsterdam Gemeentemuseum, The Hague

Frau Maria Feuer, Budapest Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna Professor Franz Grasberger, Vienna Internationales Opernarchiv,

Frau Alena Kersovan,

Clemens M. Gruber, Vienna

Hamburg

Henry-Louis de La Grange, Paris The Gustav Mahler/ Alfred Rose Room, The Music Library, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario Professor Eduard Reeser, Bilthoven

Lyman W.

Riley, Assistant Director of Libraries for Special Collections,

Alma Mahler-Werfel Bequest, The Charles Patterson Van CH, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Ernest Rose, Washington

DC

Maria Rose, London, Ontario 13

Pelt Library

Acknowledgements Professor Marcel Rubin, Vienna

Dr

Willi Schuh, Zurich

Staatsarchiv, Leipzig

Professor

Rudolph Stephan, Berlin

Professor Jonathan Sternberg, Philadelphia

Frau Eleonore Vondenhoff, Frankfurt

The present collection must not be regarded as final. Further letters and documents may well come to light from both public and private collections. At the Internationale Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft— the centre for research and documentation on

Mahler— we

are always glad to receive information

about any such material.

While

this

book was already

from Mahler

in the press, a further written

came

to Strauss

to the editor's attention.

the

German music

societies' festival

he declares that he orchestra,

an undated

it

(June 1903) in Basle. At the same time

worried about the positioning of the chorus and

is

and most of

where the performance

is

Mahler expresses his Second Symphony on the programme of

postcard which was written early in 1903. In delight that Strauss has put his

communication

This

all is

about the acoustics of the cathedral in Basle

to take place.

H.B.

14

Notes on the Edition

/Od no other source

If

is

given for the Mahler

letters,

the text

is

based on the

autographs in the Richard Strauss-Archiv. For the few letters that

from other

collections, as for the letters

from Strauss, the source

is

come

given in

each case.

The

layout of dates, numbers, addresses, salutations and valedictions has

been standardized. Underlining— very frequent been represented, as

is

usual,

by

italics,

whether the authors remembered

while

in

Mahler's letters— has

all titles

to underline

have been

italicized,

each one or not.

In the case of the twelve letters and postcards from Strauss which have survived only in a typed transcript by

Alma Mahler (now

Mahler- Werfel Bequest, University of Pennsylvania) the

in the

Alma

reproduced

text

here naturally follows that typescript.

Unlike Strauss, whose

Mahler sent

off

most of his

letters letters

are

dated almost without exception,

undated, and with only a fragment of his

own address, at best. Like all editors of Mahler's letters, I therefore faced a number of difficult dating problems. Sometimes it was possible to determine the exact date on which

a letter

was written, sometimes only an

approximate one could be given. Doubtful cases are discussed

in footnotes.

Dates supplied by the editor are given in square brackets, as are

all

other

editorial additions.

H.B. publishers' note

The

publishers would particularly like to thank

Knud

Martner, Copen-

hagen, for his help in preparing the English edition of this book.

The

extracts quoted

previously

in

Herta Blaukopf 's essay (pp. 103-58) from been newly translated,

published letters by Mahler have

although, to help the reader locate the complete letters, the sources cited in the Notes (pp. 160-3) are tne familiar English-language editions detailed

on

p. 159.

CORRESPONDENCE i

888-191

Mahler

to

Strauss

Hotel Blauer Stern

Prague [August 1888]

1

Dear Colleague Since

my return to Munich is likely to be seriously delayed, would let me know what steps I should take in order to

kind enough to

symphony of mine 2 performed whether there

No works

is

any prospect of

doubt Levy to

in the next concert season in

[sic] is

you be have a

Munich — and

this

not yet in Munich,

3

and

it

seems high time

for

be submitted.

Please, dear friend, give

me

a little

advice and

— help,

if it is possible.

With

sincere regards

Gustav Mahler 1

Mahler spent part of the summer of 1888 in Munich, then travelled to Prague where he rehearsed and conducted his adaptation of Weber's Die drei Pintos at the

German Theatre

in

Prague.

2

Mahler's First Symphony, completed

3

Hermann Levi 'Grey Diary',

5, p. 12,

1888: 'At Levi's original,

in

March

1888.

(1839-1900), Court conductor in Munich. Richard Strauss's

I

humorous

contains the following recollection, possibly going back to

also got to

funeral

know

march

that

IVIahler's First Symphony, with a very we immediately played four-handed from

the score.'

19

Correspondence i888-igii

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Royal Hungarian Opera

Budapest 1

[January 1891]

Dear Friend Permit

me an

inquiry in confidence.

I

whose contract you were kind enough

have engaged Herr Grützmacher, undersign as

to

cellist— under the impression that he was the

2

a witness, as solo

Weimar cellist known

to

me.

3

Grützmacher 4 of whom I know But I Could nothing except that he departed suddenly from Sondershausen. you please let me know very confidentially whether you know Herr G. as a musician and what is your opinion of him. see from the papers that

this

is

a third

—

At the

last

Philharmonic concert here

poem Aus Italien

tone

for the first time,

particularly delightful. as

powerful as

I

The

effect

5

had the pleasure of hearing your

I

and found the

last

two movements

on the audience was, unfortunately, not

should have wished, as the organizers had the incompre-

hensible idea of putting your composition at the end of an over-long concert. I

should very

well)

much

like to

hear more from you

and secretly hope that you may

tell

me

—

a little

(I

mean, personally,

as

about yourself in your

reply.—

With kind regards Yours sincerely Gustav Mahler Second half of January 1891. Aus at the

Italien

was played

for the first

time in Budapest

Philharmonic concert on 14 January.

One

of a family of German cellists whose most important member was Friedrich Grützmacher (1832-1903). Leopold Grützmacher (1 835-1900), conductor of the Weimar Court Orchestra. Friedrich Grützmacher jun. (1866-1919), Leopold's son, at

who began

his career

the Court Orchestra in Sondershausen.

Symphonic

fantasia,

Op.

16, first

performed

in

1887 under Strauss in Munich.

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gii

Strauss

[October 1891]

1

Dear Friend shall,

I

promise you, do everything

I

Ritter operas here,

2

and

my power

in

to instil true life into

possible production. Pollini,

3

however, (who

holds power here but unfortunately wields

it

is

to put on the two them by the most careful away at present) not only

to the full, so that

I

can vouch

only for myself, and not for any undertaking by us both. But as soon as he

back from his travels

doing Tristan gives

pushed

it

shall take the

in

hand.— That you

sincere pleasure, both for you and work up from the foundations.

through here

They were Pyrrhic

matter

me

to be able to build a I

I

last

victories,

standing was lowered.

— Now

month

Tristan.

is

are

now

How

fine

without cuts (ditto the Meistersinger).

however

— in

Pollini's eyes, at

any

rate,

my

good luck with your Tristan 'without tempo

changes'!

My

4

dear friend, I am now consigning to my desk. You do not know what incessant rebuffs I receive with them. To see over and over again how the gentlemen one approaches are overcome by consternation, declaring

'scores',

an impossible audacity

it

unbearable.

— this

perform such things

week ago Biilow 5 almost gave up the ghost while

A them

grows

finally

was playing from

I

to him.

You have that

to

— This endless, fruitless peddling. not gone through anything like that and cannot understand

one begins

Good

to lose faith.

heavens, world history will go on without

my

compositions.

With warmest regards Yours sincerely Gustav Mahler

Could 1

On

I

7

not have a look at your

Don Juan and Tod und Verklärung} 6

September 1891 Mahler, Principal Conductor at the Hamburg StadtMarch 1891, put on a production of Tristan und Isolde

theater since the end of that: 'apart

2

from the opening of the great duet

in

Act

II',

{Hamburger Fremdenblatt, 8 September 1891). Der faule Hans (first performance 1885 in Munich) and

was without cuts

Wem

die

Krone?

(premiere 1890 under Strauss in Weimar) by Alexander Ritter (1833-96). 3

Bernhard

Pollini (1838-97), Director of the

Hamburg

Stadttheater.

Correspondence 4

At

this

1

888-1 gu Symphony and

time probably only Das klagende Lied, the First

Totenfeier (see p. in). 5

Hans von Bülow (1830-94), conductor and composer

6

Tone poems by

living in

Hamburg

since

1887.

Strauss.

Don Juan, Op.

Weimar, Tod und Verklärung, Op.

24, in

20,

1890

was in

first

performed

Eisenach

in

1889

at the Festival

in

of the

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein.

Mahler

to

Strauss [24 January 1892]

1

Dear Friend I

received the enclosed letter a few weeks ago from

brother in Vienna.

2 I

have come across

me that it might interest you made on young people I

much

my

again by chance, and

19-year-old it

occurs to

know what an impression your Don Juan

Vienna.

3

has

—

hope you found the scribble of the

have heard

on

in

to

it

critics there as

praise of your Tristan

amusing

as

I

did.

—

and congratulate you sincerely

it.

With

cordial regards

Gustav Mahler

The

date

it is

approximately correct.

is

written, unlike the letter, in pencil, possibly not

by Mahler although

Otto Mahler (1873-95), at tnat ^ me studying music in Vienna. Don Juan was performed at the Philharmonic concert on 10 January 1892 under

Hans

Richter.

Vienna seems letter

from

On to

over!'

partial: yesterday,

his 19-year-old brother in

enthusiastically, in

won

(RST

'The success in Mahler (Hamburg) sent me a

31 January 1892 Strauss wrote to his father:

have been

Vienna who writes about the work very

depth and with great understanding.

The young have been

Eltern, p. 148, see key to abbreviations

on

p. 159.)

Correspondence

Mahler

to

888-1 gi i

1

Strauss

Fröbelstrasse 14 III

Hamburg [20 October 1893]

My

1

2

dear Friend

27th of this month I am conducting a concert in Hamburg number of my own compositions will be performed. 3 (I am the

On Friday the in

which

a

who

only living conductor therefore taking the

would be

It

interested in

is

a great pleasure to

me

4

Weimar. Hamburg

is

I

compositions, and itself.)

you would do

if

— From the newspapers

being present.

my

opportunity that presents

first

see that

not too far away. Please

let

—

me

am

the honour of

you are well again and

me know whether you

in

are

able and willing to come.

With what

Would

it

interest

I

look forward to your 'opera', you can imagine.

be quite impossible to hear or see something from

Looking forward

to hearing

5

—

it?

from you soon,

Very sincerely yours Gustav Mahler 1

As

far as

stayed at

first private address in Hamburg — he had From Fröbelstrasse 14 he moved to Parkallee Bismarckstrasse 86. The dates of the moves are not known.

we know, first at

this

was Mahler's

the Hotel Streit.

12,

and

2

An

approximate date confirmed by Strauss's reply, see below.

3

Mahler performed

finally to

Symphony 4

5

six

songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, and the First

in the revised version

of 1893 with the

ill

in 1892,

and

in

Strauss's

work Guntram, on the

first

stage

'Titan'.

in

Mediterranean and

from 1887

title

November went to recuperate Egypt. He returned in the summer of 1893.

Strauss had been seriously

text

in the

and score of which he worked

to 1893.

Strauss to Mahler

Weimar 22 October 1893

My

dear Friend

It is I

1

unfortunately quite impossible for

me to accept your kind

should have been delighted to come, but on 27th and 28th

conduct Lohengrin rehearsals and cannot get away. 23

invitation. I

have to

gu for thinking of me— but that you are the only

Correspondence I

thank you most warmly

living

conductor interested

in

your compositions

me

asked you two years ago to send

Germany

I

is

simply not true: when

I

something from your symphonies you

don't you remember?

me down;

turned

1 888-1

can no longer abide, climate and

conditions are too

artistic

miserable! In Egypt the sun shone constantly, and of theatre 'not even a trace'!

My the

Guntram

moment

With

to

is

all is at

come out

Munich

in

at the

beginning of February;

at

the copyist's!

best wishes for a fine success

on Friday,

Yours very sincerely Richard Strauss 1

Autograph

Mahler

in the

Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich.

Strauss

to

Fröbelstrasse 14 III

Hamburg 24 December 1893

Dear Friend

When

is

premiere

is

you that

a

change)

and

is

much from

the

to take place in Karlsruhe.

1

news now

are there diffi-

papers that the

In any case

I

should

musician understanding and standing by you

sitting here in

a pleasure to

In a

Or

in the

your 'opera' to be put on in Munich?

culties?— I surmise as

word— if

remind

us say for a

Hamburg who would at all times count it an honour

smooth your path a first

like to

(let

as far as his feeble

powers allow.

performance should not come off anywhere

else

(thanks to the tender care of our lords intendants and directors— and

perhaps even conductors), and

you

as too unsuited,

I

am

if

the

Hamburg

Stadttheater does not strike

always ready to help remove such obstacles.

That the study and casting of the work would be done with the utmost devotion,

I

personally guarantee.

Sincerely yours

G. Mahler

The Munich Opera had Guntram was accepted

given no firm

for first

commitment and

performance

miere too failed to materialize.

24

in

in

December 1893

Karlsruhe, although this pre-

1 888-1

Correspondence

Mahler

gu

Strauss

to

[January 1894]

1

Dear Friend

Warmest thanks grateful to

some I

you

extracts

if,

still

Can

your

more.— How

on your coming

text,

will

2

which has heightened

it all

—

\

my

should be very

Hamburg, you could

visit to

I

much

let

me

hear

time with you, and put myself entirely at your

help you in any other way? Please,

and where are you going If I am not held up, I should like to meet you I look forward to seeing you again soon,

When

sound}\

from the work.

count on spending

disposal.

me

sending

for

interest and suspense

will you arrive,

make use of me!

to stay? at the station.

Yours Gustav Mahler 1

On

22 January 1894 Strauss conducted the seventh

Concert 2

The

in place

libretto of

Mahler

to

of Biilow,

who was

Hamburg

Subscription

ill.

Guntram.

Strauss

26 January 1894

Dear Friend

Thank you

for

you on Monday,

1

It is splendid that

it

extremely sorry that is

when he heard he had you it

would

I

cannot be with

being performed here.

'detract'

as his

— Schuch

immediate

from him. 2

you are coming hackl 3 Let me know when you

for

arrive.

'Strauss case' has caused I

much

turbulence in the usually placid

could not help laughing at the different faces

has brought to the fore.

somewhat short

room

you here with me.

waters of our local public. that

am

prefer not to stay in a hotel} In that case a comfortable

would be prepared

The

life

Most probably

Would you

I

as the Bartered Bride

got the fright of his successor.

—

your news.

shrift to a

various people will take note.

— Yesterday

at a social gathering

famous musical dandy

—a

I

gave

lesson of which

Correspondence

For

a

change

I

1

888-1 gi 1

have read the reviews. Pfohl's gave

me much

pleasure.

4

rings in the ear.

Sacred

G major!

am

I

5

already busy smoothing the way. Faithfully yours

Gustav Mahler 1

29 January 1894,

when

Strauss conducted the seventh Philharmonic concert in

Berlin. 2

Ernst von Schuch Orchestra

in

(1

846-1914), conductor of the Court Opera and Court

Dresden, conducted the sixth Philharmonic concert. In the follow-

ing season (1894-5) a 'l tne Berlin Philharmonic concerts were entrusted to Strauss. 3

Strauss was to conduct in

Hamburg on

26 February 1894, but declined after a

disagreement over the programme (see note, 4 5

Ferdinand Pfohl (1862-1949),

Opening of the

first

critic

p. 32).

of the Hamburger Nachrichten.

Prelude to Guntram,

in

G

major. Mahler does not quote

it

accuratelv.

Mahler

to

Strauss

27 January 1894

Dear Friend

my

You have probably

received

As

unfortunately have to conduct the Bartered Bride on

I

wrote to you,

I

Monday and cannot be

letter

with you. Please do not forget to send

scores (at least the three tone poems).

here?

You must have had

crying: 'Guelph' I

by now.

a

l

Have you

me

your

received the reviews from

good laugh over them! 2

— Now

everyone

is

and 'Ghibelline'! 3

look forward immensely to our next meeting here in February.

With

sincere regards

Gustav Mahler Don Juan, Tod und Verklärung and Macbeth. The symphonic fantasia Aus Italien that Strauss had Hamburg caused a storm of controversy. The allusion is to the struggle between the Welf and Germany [trans.]. 26

presented on 22 January in

Staufer houses in medieval

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gi 1

Strauss

Hamburg 2

February 1894

Dear Friend Your news concerning Herr von Bronsart makes me very happy and I I wrote to you twice in thank you most sincerely for your friendship.

—

1

—

— to judge by your postcards you have not received the letters.— you — whether you would not prefer to stay

Berlin I

also addressed a question to

here,

where

room would be prepared

a

wishes. Please

me

let

you

for

in

accordance with your

have your answer in good time.— On 13 February

have Siegfried— no luck again, I'm afraid! But

I

I

must go to Karlsruhe, come

what may.

Only please send me, koven,

2

so that

I

we

In any case

if it is at all possible, a

can prepare him a shall see

for

each other here!

your Guntram again. Please bring the alert as 'conductor', though spirit

little

I

vocal score for Birren-

in

Bayreuth.

have a great desire to enjoy

with you. This time, too,

it

am

I

you

willing to bet that

I

of your works even without discussion with you. All the same,

know

greater security to

motifs pursue

me

only notice this

in

now

my that

the author's wishes.

dreams?

be on

I shall

could recreate the it

gives

— And do you know that your

received a very enduring impression.

I

my first excitement over the work has died down.

I

I

look forward immensely to the time of the performance here, and to seeing

you again

in

Hamburg. Do

let

me know when

return your greetings most cordially.

you

arrive.

— The

Behns

3

In sincere friendship

Yours Gustav Mahler

Your

offer to

conduct

my

'Titan'

4

I

accept most gratefully, should

I

be

prevented.

Hans Bronsart von Schellenberg (1830-1913), Manager of the Court Theatre

in

Weimar, and from 1888, President of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein (founded in 1859 by Franz Liszt). Strauss had asked Bronsart to perform Mahler's First

Symphony at the thirtieth

place in June 1894 at

The

Festival of the Musikverein

tenor Willy Birrenkoven (1865-1955),

Stadttheater since

which took

Weimar.

who had been

autumn 1893 and was engaged

at

the

Hamburg

to sing Parsifal at the

1894

Correspondence

1

888-1 gu

Bayreuth Festival. Mahler studied the part with him to help Strauss

who was

acting as repetiteur at Bayreuth. 3

Dr Hermann Behn

859-1 927), a

(1

Hamburg

lawyer and composer, a friend of

Mahler's. 4

The

title

Mahler

to

of Mahler's First

Symphony, added

in 1893.

Strauss [3

February 1894] 1

Dear Friend I

am

asked

quite

when

towards me.

dumbfounded by your news. 2 — Only

I

wished

—

I

am

to sign

my

He

contract.

a

few days ago Pollini

remains extremely polite

therefore quite unable to form a judgement on this

up

matter.— Pollini

is

achieve by them.

— In any case

to all sorts of tricks.

interests, just as in this

the best course, since

case

I

Heaven knows what he means

shall think only

I

to

ask you, dear Friend, to consider only your

we would otherwise

of mine. This

lose all

power

is

undoubtedly

to direct events in

dealing with such people.

As soon

as

I

hear anything, however

slight, I shall

you be involved and your interests affected, I

expect you have received the letter

I

I

write to you. Should

should telegraph

sent yesterday.

if necessary.

Behn

told

yesterday that you had agreed to stay at his house; this of course cancels invitation, since

You

it is

will feel very

Looking forward

me my

best for you to accept Behn's.

much

at

to seeing

home

there.

you soon, Faithfully yours

Gustav Mahler It

on

seems clear that

this letter

must have been

written, as

3 February, the 'letter sent yesterday' being,

was the following one,

presumably, that of 2 February.

Strauss had told Mahler he was negotiating for an appointment at the Stadttheater (see p. 114

f.).

28

Hamburg

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gi 1

Strauss

Hamburg 3

February 1894 Evening

Dear Friend Your news has plunged me into a state of considerable agitation, and the best thing would be to clear the matter up at once by confronting Pollini directly.— However, I should not wish to do so without your consent.

As

the whole business can finally be only one of the chess-moves Pollini

so fond of, intended to dislodge vis-ä-vis himself,

it

me from my

can only benefit you to see matters clearly, and so

propose speaking to Pollini quite openly about I

beg you

to let

is

superior present position

by return what you think of my proposal.

me know

goes without saying that

I

should drop

if

it

I

it.

you raised the

— It

slightest

objection.

Yours very sincerely Gustav Mahler

Mahler

to

Strauss

6 February 1894

Dearest Friend I

to

no longer know where

me

during

with waiting.

a

Come

straight at last!'

honest,

I

I

am! The day before yesterday Pollini came up

performance and said

I

to

my

office

that

we can

get our contract

gave him a nonplussed look and said nothing.

had already prepared myself for

am somewhat

Tm fed up

in a jocularly blunt way:

tomorrow so

fatalistic

1

my

To

be

departure. (In such matters

and believe everything that happens

to

I

be for the

best.)—

The next morning (that is, yesterday) as I came who is in charge of the office, came up to me with a by Pollini and accepting all my demands. Today I intend to sign my side of the contract. I

into the theatre, Wolff,

contract already signed

can therefore only think that Pollini wants us both, which

that he pulses.

is

is

like

him

in

often overcome, incomprehensibly, by the most idealistic im-

— You can imagine how delighted 29

I

should be!

I

know of no one with

Correspondence

whom

I feel

would be

such

stilled. I

gen to you, and I

affinities,

all

and

in face

1 888-1

of whom

gi 1 all

petty promptings in

me

should with the greatest pleasure relinquish the Nibelun-

can be settled most amicably between us.—

else

suggest, to set things in motion, that you simply accept (naturally

without letting them

know what

I

have written to you).

— Otherwise he will

2

really finish

by appointing the 'famous' Grossmann. events you should make sure of Berlin from '97 on;

But at all would be

that

My

marvellous

a

contract

now runs

field for

you.

for five years.

for

I

think

3

But where are Don Juan, Tod und

Verklärung and Macbeth} Please send

Bronsart!

How

them to me very soon! I have already sent do things stand there regarding it?

my symphony

to

In sincere friendship

Yours

Gustav Mahler 1

Mahler was not

really fatalistic.

On

the contrary, he had an almost

morbid

fear of

being without a post. 2

It is

at 3

not clear

who Mahler means. Joseph Grossmann was conductor Grossmann was conductor at Posen.

at

Budapest

the time, while Paul

become

Strauss was hoping to

Felix von Weingartner's successor as conductor of

the Berlin Opera.

Mahler

to

Strauss

Hamburg 26 February 1894

Dear Friend Billow's body should reach here in the middle of next month, arrangements for a memorial service are under way; I hope you will have time to be present.

—

I

am

ordering the wreath immediately.

Concerning Guntram, I saw that

Guntram's position

today that

keep

it

will not

in

I

1

—

have known for four weeks

Karlsruhe was precarious;

2

and

be performed there for the time being.

this confidential.

When we

the conception of your work,

advance of the thorny path artistic institutions'.

this

coming. —

it

It will

next meet

name my

I

—

can I

tell

you

ask you to

Given warn you in will have to tread across our beloved 'German meet with the greatest difficulties from the its

I

shall

uncompromising demands,

30

source. I

1 888-1

Correspondence

theatre directors and the artistic personnel.

words: 'unperformable', 'voice-ruining',

On me you

can count absolutely;

matter where

I

Siegfried for us

and Parsifal

master Guntram

champion the work no

performance prepared with utmost

a

as follows:

for Bayreuth,

Birrenkoven has to prepare

and we can hardly expect him

to

beyond

time. His talent and seriousness are

same

at the

is

can already hear the catch-

I

etc.

shall personally

I

am, and guarantee you

devotion.— Here the situation

gu

doubt; but his intelligence leaves something to be desired (between ourselves).—^/»-*/

is

and does so with

no time

a

for a

the interest of the public.

all

performance

at a theatre that closes in

May,

Wagner cycle that absorbs all the strength of the artists and

— Also,

should need time to get not only

I

the performance accepted by Pollini, but the necessary space and serious-

ness for rehearsals. here.

— However,

— These

for extraneous reasons,

met. I

— But

reservations about an April premiere

my influence to have your intentions

shall exert all

I

cannot promise

I

my

are

should you think differently, or need one in any case should be successful; nor do

I

believe

I

could achieve a performance matching the significance of the work.

My suggestion is this: procure the earliest possible decision in Karlsruhe, and then decide

work here

score straight

any

I

shall

away and

I

me know

in the interests

at once

ties in

of the matter

I

will grant

it

whenever you would

what you I

think.

must present

— Pollini

Concerning the

it

as if it

almost out of friendship to is

is

me.— Of the

to so trivial a matter.

me to offer me by simply

lying here quite superfluously. Allow

copyist.— Prove your friendship for

wasting another word on the subject.

answer by return.

I

I

The

at

who wish difficul-

dreadfully suspicious.

— If

and formalities out of proportion

— At

not here

honour of you,

permit me a word as a friend. payment of 1,000 marks, it would give rise

course, agreed from the outset.

is

not you

this

parts, please a

like to.

speak to him immediately.

shall

Karlsruhe Pollini must know nothing, as he

propose to Pollini

when you

be discussed in every detail

performance here, but that / wish to request

and that you

produce the

me the vocal

the final touches to Birrenkoven your-

either for Billow's funeral or

rate, please let

for a first

to

do the preliminary study before the sum-

shall

present but returns in the next few days;

But

do everything

October or early November. You should send

mer.— In Bayreuth you would put self. — The whole thing could then come here

—

once for Hamburg.

at

in late

—

it

I

to

were

I

to

to difficulties

have such

you

saying

—

a

sum

to

pay the

'yes',

without

royalties for the

work

are,

of

write this in great haste, to let you have an

have not even

a

decent sheet of paper and therefore use

the other half of your letter. This evening 31

we have

this

tiresome 'Memorial

Correspondence Subscription Concert',

believable

were

in

Let

which

is

The

protestations, but 4 female hysteria that

am

I

am down

only conducting the

as

final

putting forth the most un-

is

me think again and Well— enough ofthat!

blooms here makes

your standpoint.

gu

quite odious to me.

my

conductor, despite piece: 'Eroica'!

3

1 888-1

again how very right you

me soon have your word of command, and accept my sincere regards. Yours Gustav Mahler

People

like

us should never

make

Hans von Bülow had died on

concessions!

12 February 1894 in Cairo.

The singer of the title role did not feel equal to this difficult part. The ninth Hamburg Subscription Concert of 26 February 1894, that was been conducted by Strauss.

When

to

have

Strauss heard the news of Billow's death, he

programme and proposed Bülow's 'Nirwana', and works by Hamburg Bülow community that was orientated towards Johannes Brahms and, furthermore, could not forgive Liszt's daughter Cosima for leaving her husband Bülow and marrying Wagner, this proposal was rejected. Strauss in his turn refused to conduct a work by Brahms.

changed

his original

Wagner and

The

Liszt. In deference to the

concert was conducted by IVlahler and Julius Spengel.

Mahler wrote women.

scathingly of the cult of the dead

In letters to his sister Justine, too,

Bülow kept up by

Mahler

to

society

Strauss

24

Hamburg March 1894

me as I was describing to you — in mind— the course taken by my efforts

on behalf of

Dear Friend Your letter reached depressed frame of

Guntram.— As I

I

had not yet approached Pollini with

imagined things would be

to Pollini

and

Germany (and

easier.

— Naive as

man who

is

not only for hotheads, but

is

say,

'There

such by old and young)

is

a

I

am,

I

a

a

somewhat

request of this kind,

expected that,

if I

go

one of the h -pes of musical regarded

v.

ithout question as

— he has composed an opera the text and music of

which I know, and which I regard as the most significant dramatic achievement (and perhaps the only significant one) since Wagner's Parsifal. Do you want to put this work on? You will not incur costs of any kind.'— if I 32

Correspondence

1 888-1 gi i

say this, then Pollini will say, 'Of course! Let

amazement

Now that

I

side,

I

me

have

it

at once!'

To my

Pollini has so far rejected the idea. far from conceding work performed— as

am, of course, very

shall finally get the

defeat,

and

do not doubt

I

a last resort

I

my

can, on

always raise the 'question of confidence'.

But to achieve this by force would be mistaken, because I need the time and goodwill of all those concerned. If Pollini were to take it on against his he will simply 'throw' will, as he will do soon, for example, with Hiarne, 1

the thing on to the stage to be rid of it; and with your

Guntram

this

is

out of

the question.

must therefore 'hollow the stone drop by drop'. For this I need time.— would be very important to prepare the part with Birrenkoven in the meantime. For all kinds of reasons that I will explain to you on your coming I

It

Hamburg.

visit to

You can

also achieve

while the iron

up ready

your

So, at

for all

Pollini in a

from me)

with Pollini personally.— We will use your

much

visit to strike

is

hot.

And

I

will

make

sure the forge

is

heated

arrival.

events:

shall have

I

my way — for I do not give in. Once I catch at a moment when he needs a favour

good mood (particularly

all will

go

well. (I

know

this

from experience.) For

this reason I

did not really want to write to you yet, for you would not believe

embittering this finally, I

is

to

me. But on the other hand you must know about

you too are used

am

to 'waiting'

— even

extraordinarily pleased about

if

not so used as

Munich

rather have seen you appointed at Berlin.

for you,

2

I

it;

how and

am.

although

would

I

— But that probably will happen

too.

But be sure to come to Billow's funeral service; 3 your opera). Can I not have at least a vocal score of

it is

it? I

very important for

must have

this to

and to have him sing something from it for Pollini. Experience has proved this a good method in such cases, since his vanity is interest Birrenkoven,

flattered.

— When

is

Guntram due

in

Weimar? 4

I

hope

to he there for

it\

Yours most sincerely Gustav Mahler

An opera by Ingeborg von Bronsart (1840-1913), wife of the Weimar director. The only Hamburg performance took place on 17 March 1897 under R. Krzyzanowsky.

On

20

March

Strauss had signed a contract with the

33

Munich Opera.

Correspondence 3

The

funeral took place on 29

1 888-1 gi i

m

March 1894

Hamburg. Strauss did not attend

the ceremony. 4

The

first

Mahler

performance took place on 10

May

1894.

Strauss

to

1

May

1894

Dear Friend have answered [should read: waited]

I

invitation

the

1

because

Wagner

presence

cycle and

is

much

I

[deleted:

as

its

May].

I

till

—

I

must therefore forgo attending the first to, but hope to be there on 1

should have wished

2

have again broached the matter with

result.

— However,

I

today to answer your kind

know our repertoire for May. As I foresaw, rehearsals come at exactly this time, so that my

first to

indispensable.

performance,

June

had

I

Pollini,

always with the same

have another plan. Next winter

3 Wolff concerts here,

as

you

know.

will

— In one

I

am

of them

conducting the I

am

doing the

great scene in Act II, and before that the Prelude, with [deleted: Guntram] if you allow me. However, time will bring the solution. I think of you now in full spate, and am often with you in thought. I regret very much that the vocal score

Birrenkoven,

—

—

you sent out

is

so sketchy that often

had not heard

if I

With Birrenkoven

I

it

I

should scarcely be able to make anything

from you.

am now zealously

studying Parsifal and taking

a real

pleasure in that capital fellow.

With May).

cordial regards,

and best wishes

for

your 'supreme moment' (10

4

Yours sincerely Gustav Mahler I

hope

To

to see

the

first

you on

1

July.

performance of Guntram on 10

For the performance of Guntram

May

at the Festival

in

Weimar.

of the Allgemeiner Deutscher

Musikverein.

Hermann Wolff

(1 845-1 902) was the owner of the H. Wolff Concert Bureau, which organized the Hamburg Subscription Concerts, previously directed by

Biilow.

The premiere

of Guntram.

34

Correspondence

Mahler

1

888-1 gu

Strauss

to

Fröbelstrasse 14 15

Dear Friend So Guntram has seen the congratulate not you but

On

cannot

us. I

you how much

have been regretting more and more that

even lacks

have only

I

I

desire to hear

this short score,

I

it. I

which

the orchestral interludes, and which, given such a special kind

all

of composition, makes any true understanding impossible.

have been prepared beforehand by yourself

to

to

outcome

the unexpectedly happy tell

1894

and has thereby been given

light of day,

the world in the fullest sense.

May

I

am

only happy

— and have drawn on those

memories during these days. 2 1 Bronsart writes that you will be so kind as to prepare my symphony. I In addition I shall bring two copies of shall send you the parts tomorrow.

—

each of the string parts, which are at present being written out here; for the

Weimar

rehearsals in

six ist violins, five

2nd

and four double basses should be enough. cript

now

in

violins, four violas, four cellos

— One other thing:

the

manus-

your hands no longer coincides in detail with the material

am

I

sending. This has been considerably retouched to match the second copy

which

I

now

have, as

I

have taken advantage of the experience of the

—

performance here. [27 October 1893] Altogether, everything is more slender and transparent.— Will the original, unrevised score be sufficient for

your preparations? Or should

done

this

I

send you

immediately in any case, were

entirely out of

my hands and

I

my copy at once?

I

should have

not so afraid to think of the work

journeying about at the mercy of the post.

you would nevertheless prefer

it,

let

me know by return and

I

shall

send

— If it

at

once. I

do have one request: please rehearse the winds and

was forced I

have

my

to

do so here

as well.

—

I

arrive in

strings separately;

Weimar on

the 2gth\

When

I

do

rehearsals?

Would you be

so kind as to reserve

place at the performances for

my

me

brother,

a

room

there somewhere, and a

who would

like to

hear them.

(It

same young man whose letter I sent you earlier). Is it really true, as Herr von Bronsart wrote, that the string section has only ten ist and eight 2nd violins? That would be very hard, for I really don't know how it would sound then! Can nothing be done to make up the numbers? I would take over part of the cost with pleasure. is

the

35

1 888-1

Correspondence

would

I

also

mention that the material

is

gu

entirely free

of errors, and

in case

of doubt should be given precedence over the original score.— instrumentation of the Introduction has been entirely changed for

The

the strings, and the scheme for this

in the folder of

is

music

I

am

sending

you.

Please regards,

me

let till

When

hear about youself.

we meet

in

is

Guntram

Best

to be printed?

Weimar, Yours sincerely Gustav Mahler

1

2

See note

p. 27.

Mahler's First Symphony,

Mahler

in

D

major

('Titan').

Strauss

to

May

17

1894

Dear Friend So be it: I am sending you the score as well. Because of a collation that has become necessary I can only send off the material tomorrow! I am 1

sending the score in a separate parcel.

Your news concerning Guntram is really extremely surprising to me. So we have a repetition of the old story that is ever new. 'Naboth's vineyard is also here.' It changes nothing; your work will go on here next winter, if I have to resort to the basest means (courting Pollini, etc.). This matters to me, among other reasons, because you will nowhere at this time find a more suitable casting for the title role than Birrenkoven, who is developing in a quite unsuspected manner in the Pa rsifal rehearsals.

He

you much enjoyment at Bayreuth. now I have not had a chance to go through Guntram

will give

Until

poor wretch find

enough hours

any rate

I

for Parsifal myself;

hope before leaving here

doubt you

will

go into

it

his solo part to take with

keep

it

with me.

How doubt

I

it

will

shall

with him

working too hard, and with the utmost exertion

is

—

I

it is

nibble at

— Shall it

daily,

I

also give

and

am

be built up in the orchestra

have to keep

seem rather depressed.

my

at

— At

through for him, and no

Bayreuth.

him

—

I'll

give

him

the short score or can

slowly piecing

I

together.

it all

— I'm in suspense to know! No

eyes and ears open.

From your

letter

— Dear Friend, that really isn't necessary! 36

— the

can hardly

too important at present.

to play the piece

thoroughly with him

him.

I

you

Correspondence

'When dogs bark we fine figure

see that

on horseback!

I

we

1 888-1

gu

are riding', says Goethe!

And you

cut a

look forward immensely to meeting you again.

hope you will be able to spare

me

I

few hours!

a

Most

sincerely yours

Gustav Mahler I

have told Birrenkoven a

1

lot

about Guntram and he

is

straining at the leash!

Clearly the second copy mentioned in the previous letter that agreed with the

new

orchestral parts.

Mahler

to

Strauss

Steinbach

am

Attersee

1

19 July 1894

Dear Friend I

am

only

now managing you have

find that the less to

mention

my

this as

to

answer your kind

to do, the less time

letter

you have.

— you probably also I

am

honest enough

only excuse.

How can you even ask whether I take your candour amiss? Believe me, I would not do so even if you clothed your criticism in a far less flattering garment.— In the matter

itself I

cannot be of one mind with you; that you wish to

find the conclusion and, as

it

were, a

point you refer to merely shows clearly,

me

summary of

that

I

the whole piece at the

have not expressed myself at

which certainly would be bad enough. If it does not bore you,

come back

to this at

Bayreuth and explain

my

today: at the place in question the conclusion

is

thoughts.

2

I

all

shall

— Just one thing

merely apparent

(in the full

sense of a 'false conclusion'), and a change and breaking-down that reaches to the essence

is

needed before

a true 'victory'

can be

won

after

such

a

struggle.

My intention was to show a struggle in which victory is furthest from the protagonist just

when he

believes

— For there

it

closest.

— This

is

the nature of every

by no means so simple

to become or to be hero.— Even if in later years (that is, when I had become detached from the matter) I became convinced that I had not succeeded in putting my truest spiritual struggle.

it is

a

intention into sound,

You

will

know

it

I

should not change anything.

at once, if

And do you know why?

you ask yourself what you would do yourself in 37

Correspondence such that

make something new, and

a case:

we

1 888-1 gi i

Am

the whole better!

I

not right— on

my

negligence: in

agree?!

And now,

after

all, I

you

will give

a valid

excuse for

movement of my Second Symphony. When you hear it you will understand that I had now to do other things than improving the skin I have shed: a new one that fits better has grown. Indeed, my new work is to the one you know as a man to an infant. these weeks

There

have finished the

are, after all, seven

our age. — to be

I

hope

I

more

to

last

years between them

be in Bayreuth in the

last

intensively with you than at the

— that means something at

days of this month, and hope

Weimar revels! Most sincerely yours Gustav Mahler

1

2

Mahler's

summer

Mahler

replying to criticisms of his First

now

is

residence 1893-6.

apparently lost (see

Mahler

to

Symphony

in a letter

from Strauss

p. 118).

Strauss [4

January 1895]

1

Dear Friend

The P.

3

score and vocal score of Iphigenia are

full

has promised

me

to accept

your version.

conditions set by the publisher!

publisher

is

not very fair in

4

this. I

I

—

I

now

in

my

possession.

2

have not yet discussed the

fear there will be difficulties, as the

know

P. too well in

such matters!

When

comes (it is due out in April) I shall need your mediation. It's damnable that we are always having to be involved in such shabby affairs. The parts are ready (for my symphony) 5 and in the next week I shall go through them with my orchestra! the time

Sincerely

Gustav Mahler 1

2

The Hamburg postmark of this postcard which Mahler sent to Strauss in Munich where he had started his second engagement in the autumn of 1894. C. W. Gluck's Iphigenia in Tauris, arranged by Strauss in 1890 and published in 1895.

3

4 5

Mahler never

Bernhard

Adolph Fürstner,

The

first

in fact

performed Strauss's arrangement of this opera.

Pollini.

three

Berlin.

movements of Mahler's Second Symphony. 38

Correspondence

Mahler

1

888-1 gi 1

Strauss

to

Parkallee 12

27 January 1895

Dear Friend

The

my

than

First

Where I

movements of my symphony

parts for the three

already played.

— It

is

and very

faultless,

clear,

and

are ready,

and strangely, much

easier

Symphony.—

shall I send

would be glad

When

it}

to relieve

'rough work' for you

.

.

is

theirs/ rehearsal?

you of

1

this rehearsal, if

you wish, and do the

.

In the next Subscription concert here the two Preludes to Guntram are

being presented,

Birrenkoven

is

2

and

at

a

matinee at the Stadttheater not long after

singing your Grail narrative.

slowly set things in motion.

I

3

— In this way,

I

hope,

have not yet had a reply to

(concerning Iphigenia). Please write by return,

With

if

my

we

shall

postcard

only a card.

best regards to you and your wife

4

Yours sincerely Gustav Mahler

Strauss conducted the 1894-5 season of Philharmonic Concerts in Berlin, and

included the

first

programme of

three

movements of Mahler's Second Symphony in the March 1895, which Mahler himself

the ninth concert on 4

conducted.

Mahler conducted the 1894-5 Hamburg Subscription Concert season, and included the Prelude to Act I of Guntram in the programme on 4 February 1895.

The second Prelude was The 'Friedenserzählung' Mahler's

On

10

letter

not in fact performed (see Mahler's next aria

letter).

from Guntram. The matinee did not take place

(see

of 8 June 1895).

September 1894 Strauss had married

his

former pupil, the singer Pauline

de Anna.

Mahler

to

Strauss [5

February 1895]

1

Dear Friend I

should

like to

be in Berlin for the

your hands entirely.— Please

let

first

me know 39

rehearsal

— or possibly take

[deleted: definitely]

it

whether

off

it is

Correspondence

1 888-1

gi 1

absolutely certain to take place on 18 February.

instruments for

and ask you

it,

gladly bear the cost myself, as

I

—

I

need

a lot

of extra

to be absolutely sure to provide these.

know

that this

is

I

shall

not agreeable to Wolff.

2

That is, one E-flat clarinet one 2nd timpanist with three timpani one 2nd harp and

C

at least eight double basses,

string.

if possible,

one or two should have a

need, apart from the two timpanists, three

six horns,

four trumpets, four trombones, one bass tuba,

That

further people.

of which, I

For the percussion

one double bassoon, English horn, one bass clarinet are needed, you will

from the

score.

—

One other thing: could I have an extra my expense, and when}

know

rehearsal with the whole orchestra at

Please answer the above very soon!

When I come

to Berlin

I

should

the commercial side of Iphigema.

In

March

the opera

Yesterday gence

I

is

to

like to

For

go to Fürstner

this

I

am

come out (early April

at the latest).

— or incomprehension — only the one to Act

I,

although

was very pleased with the performance, and

I

audience,

who were much affected. I am now doing

At the matinee

scene with Guntram. But

have already heard I

with you, to settle

getting Pollini's authority.

played your Prelude from Guntram (through Wolffs negli-

for both).

Shall

3

it

it

It

still

I

had asked

more with the

sounded wonderful!

the Prelude to Act II before the great

would have done no harm

for the audience to

at the concert.

send any reviews?

(I

never read them, to avoid

irritation, as I

have

some very mean-minded opponents.) Please answer quickly!

Ever yours

Gustav Mahler

The German

stage

is

behaving disgracefully towards your Guntram

should not have believed 1

Though undated,

it possible*.

this letter

was

— and

I

4

clearly written the

day

after the concert with the

Prelude from Guntram, which took place on 4 February 1895. 2

Hermann

Wolff, concert artists' agent, was organizer of the Berlin Philharmonic

Concerts as well as the 3

4

The

Hamburg

Subscription Concerts, see

p. 42.

publisher Adolph Fürstner, see p. 38.

Mahler

is

referring to the great difficulty Strauss had in getting any

Opera house

to

put on Guntram.

40

German

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gu

Strauss

February 1895]

[6

Dear Friend I

are.

have read the reviews after

—

am

I

all,

and

am

sending them to you just as they

glad, actually, that the rabble are

behaving on the whole so

— Did you notice that almost of them express the desire for a performance of the whole work} — This does not seem to have been lost on decently.

Pollini, for

all

he asked about

Now comes my second my mine will go off. — The

only ass

is,

of completeness.

moved, I

if a little

say,

it

today.

blow

as ever,

Herr

— the great scene from Act Sittard.

— But most pleasing of

2

and

II,

I

hope

I'm sending him too for the sake

was the audience, who were very

all

taken aback.

and always

will:

Best regards

Yours sincerely

Mahler I

have

just noticed that I

have not the Fremdenblatt to hand. Krause 4

reviews your Prelude very favourably, and

demands

the performance [of the

whole work].

See the following

letter.

Josef Sittard (1846-1903), critic of the Hamburgischer Correspondent and leader of the Hamburg musical conservatives. From Leonore's aria in Act I of Beethoven's

Fidelio.

The

text

is:

Mahler does not quote exactly. Emil Krause (1840-1916), critic of the Hamburger Fremdenblatt. love shall attain

it

.

.

.'.

4'

'.

.

.

far as

it is,

Correspondence 1888-igii

Mahler

Strauss

to

Parkallee 12 III 7

Here, dear Friend,

important thing

is

the last review

is

that they

I

February 1895

—The

promised yesterday.

most

declare themselves in favour of a perfor-

all

mance of the whole work. Pollini

is

very dependent on such things.— Our 'stock

we

the second thrust, and

have received what Finally, one

different day,

Best of

big request. It

On

all, if

without involving Wolff, I

am

I

Now you

if

I

me

to

be present

at

me

a

cannot get away. Please give

my expense\ know how things

possible, a special rehearsal at

week before the concert.

are arranged in Berlin, or to

friend;

very important to

is

18 February

and above

in the last

all,

me know

have written yesterday and today.—

I

more

the first rehearsal.

very high!'

is

are at the desired goal. Please let

whom

I

don't

I

should apply.

should prefer

bringing the parts with

—

me

it.

— If

— Please

do

it

could be done

this for

me

as a

to the rehearsal. In haste,

Yours most sincerely Gust. Mahler Please write at once!

Mahler

to

Strauss

Steinbach

am 8

Dear Friend Your letter reached me days.

The

reason

why

I

at

have had nothing to write.

meantime

fallen out

few weeks ago. 1 So

been answered.

my summer palace,

where

have not written to you

The

is

I

have been for

it

matinee did not take place;

has not been accepted

a

few

simply and solely that

completely with Pollini, and tendered far

Attersee

June 1895

I

have

I

in the

my resignation a

— my request has not even

— What the reason for this may be

I

have not yet been able

to divine.

Either Pollini will not

let

me

go under any circumstances, and therefore

breaks off any discussion of the matter; or he successor and will only reply

why

all

my

efforts to secure

when he

is

secretly looking for a

has or has not found one.

your work

its

— That

deserved publicity have so

is

far

Correspondence

1

888-1 gu

at

Hamburg or soon

— Be that as

it

may, whether

I

find another sphere of activity,

you know that

I

been confined to the sphere of pious hopes.

remain

my power to attain this end. My gratitude to you, if nothing else, would oblige me to do so. You are really the only one of all my colleagues who has taken notice of my productions so far, (and will

do everything

will, I

that lies within

hope, continue to do so).—

How

new 'symph. poem'

splendid that a

the time?

You

dramatically!

3

as

title,

What

is

all,

we

4

am

I

knew

that

How

you wanted

I

do you

was

find

a little

to treat the subject

passing through

Munich

(or Bavaria);

You

in the region!

I

shall

will let

me

can meet you?

return your kind regards. So Weingartner

read? Well

all. I

—

you are anywhere

if

know, won't you, where sisters

I

the connection?

At the end of August not forgo visiting you

My

2

be sure, the most productive of us

are, to

surprised at the

has arrived!

5

is

staying after

— now Berlin can sleep in peace again! Most

sincerely yours

Gustav Mahler Best regards to your wife. Please don't overlook

Mahler stayed Strauss's

Op.

at the

my

present address.

Hamburg

Stadttheater until April 1897.

26, Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche,

completed on 6

May

1895.

Strauss had originally planned an opera entitled Till Eulenspiegel bei den Schildbürgern and had started working on the text. Justine (1868-1938) and

Emma

Mahler (1875— 1933),

at that

time living with

Mahler. Felix von Weingartner (1 863-1 942), conductor and composer, Court in Berlin since

Hamburg

1891, and from the

autumn of 1895

Subscription Concerts.

43

also

Conductor

conductor of the

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gi i

Strauss

Hotel

zum Askanischen Hof

Königgrätzer Strasse 21

W.

Berlin

[December 1895]

1

Dear Friend Although you are sure to know that on 13 Dec. a performance of my work 2 is taking place here, I cannot help announcing it to you especially, and expressing the heartfelt wish that I may see you here on that occasion. You know what a pleasure it would be for me, and also that there is no If you can, please one in the world I would rather have in my audience. come, dear Friend! May I say again: the three movements you know are only the exposition of the work, and I think you might really like to hear the

—

last one.

Yours very sincerely Gustav Mahler

My

kindest regards to your wife.

Hermann Behn wrote

to Strauss

on 7 December 1895:

'It

would be very good

if

.' you could be here on 13 December. I understand Mahler has invited you Mahler's Second Symphony. The first three movements had first been per.

.

formed on 4 March 1895 (see pp. 38-40, 42; whole symphony was played.

at the

concert on 13

December

the

Strauss to Mahler

Herr Kapellmeister Gustav Mahler Hotel Askanischer

Hof

Königgrätzerstrasse 21 Berlin [10

December

W. 1

1895]

Dear Friend Unfortunately, richten.

2

I

cannot come, or do anything for you

M. behaved

so

offensively

nothing further to do with him or his newspaper. 3 44

at the

over Guntram that

The

I

best thing

N. Nachcan have

would be

Correspondence for

vou or

Dr Behn,

4

H. Porges who

is

to

whom

1

888-1 gi 1

my

please give

best regards, to contact

responsible for the music reviews in the

N.N. With

best

wishes for a glorious success, In haste!

Yours Richard Strauss

The postmark

of this postcard, a copy of which

is

held by the Internationale

Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft.

The Münchner

Neueste Nachrichten newspaper.

Oskar Merz, music had rejected only

critic

of the Nachrichten who, along with other reviewers,

Guntram— already

Munich performance on

Heinrich Porges

(1

16

sabotaged by part of the ensemble— after

November

its

1895.

837-1 900), writer on music and conductor of the Porgesscher

Gesangverein which he founded.

Strauss to Mahler

Munich 22 February 1897

1

Dear Friend

Many much

I

last

should

I

was so glad

the Second

movement, new like to

to

have

now and then

to

me,

is

[Symphony]

is

a little

a small sign

that

and vocal

(score

a large structure indeed!

hear the whole work, and

Behn's piano arrangement thinking

me

thanks for sending

The

score).

still

more

to

How

perform

it!

masterpiece too.

of life from you after so long;

you had quite forgotten the

With

first

I

had been

'Mahlerian'!

best regards

Ever yours Richard Strauss

Postcard copied by Henry-Louis de

La Grange.

45

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gu

Strauss

2

Vienna August 1897

Dear dear Friend

come to you with a big Have you an annotated

I 1.

from which

I

request:

vocal score or anything similar of Rheingold,

can see clearly

how

Vogl

l

plays Loge?

(I feel

sure you must

have such notes in Munich.) 2.

As

far as

I

know, you have

Tristan [Act III].

should

How

a

should

wooden trumpet for the iustige Weise' like to

2

have one for Vienna.

in

To whom

apply to have such an instrument made?

I

Please don't take

work.

I

it

are you?

amiss that

Have you

I

don't write more.

I

am up

to

my

eyes in

written anything new?

Cordial regards

Your

old friend

Gustav Mahler

1

Heinrich Vogl (1845-1903), singer

at the

Munich Court Opera.

Strauss dedi-

cated his songs, Op. 10, to him. 2

Mahler had taken up his post as conductor of the Vienna Court Opera 1897 and was appointed Artistic Director in October 1897.

Strauss

to

in

May

Mahler Knesebeckstrasse 30

Charlottenburg 22 April 1900

Dear Friend Have you

a

copy of the Austrian National Anthem with good orches-

tration in your archives?

Then

I

would ask you

Of course! to

have a copy of the score made

expense of the management here) and send

need

it

for 5

1

it

to

May. Our National Anthem (from

me

as

at

once

(at

the

soon as possible: we

a little printed

book by H.

Oertel) sounds wretched!

Many

thanks in advance!

Could

I

take the opportunity to ask a question that you should answer by

46

Correspondence

No

888-1 gri

1

as

I

have had plenty of practice

receiving refusals from theatre directors.

I

am

Yes or

a short

and quite sans gene,

one- or two-act burlesque

Kometentanz,

ballet:

naturally something departing

in the 2

an

at

course of writing a astral

pantomime-

wholly from the accustomed hopping-

about— by Paul Scheerbart. 3 Would you accept the ballet for the Vienna Opera, have the first performance and use some nice scenery? On the strength of my honest face? If there

on the

first

It will

is

a

chance of doing

performance here

it

anywhere

else, I

should prefer not to put

in Berlin.

be ready to be performed about autumn

1

901.— Please,

a brief Yes

or No: in the latter case without the usual phrases and excuses that

know!

already

I

—

4 Your songs, sung by Frau Herzog, gave me and the audience much pleasure; but the establishment critics did not find them serious enough. Anything that does not contain a certain dose of boredom 'lacks style' at a

concert.

A propos: like to

has your Third

Symphony

do 'What the flowers

already appeared in print?

from

tell'

it

introduction! Best regards for now. Please

next winter in Paris! let

me

I

should

5

As an

have the Anthem and

a

brief answer!

Ever yours Richard Strauss

The their

directors of the

head are

Vienna Tantiemenanstalt 6 with Herr Weinberger 7

a fine crew!

Better discuss that by

Don't

let

at

the publishers there get you down!

word of mouth! [Addendum

to pp. 2

and

3 of the

letter.]

Naturally,

I

only performed your songs so that you would be

sure to accept

dum

my

ballet!

That's the way

I

all

am! Well known for

it!

the

more

[Adden-

to p. 4 of the letter.]

The autograph

of this letter

is

in

the Gustav

Mahler/ Alfred Rose Room,

University of Western Ontario. Strauss had been Court Conductor at the Royal

Opera

in Berlin since the

autumn of

1898, and lived in Charlottenburg.

Strauss did not complete the composition.

The German

writer (1863-1915).

Emilie Herzog (1859-1923) sang three orchestral songs by Mahler, conducted by Strauss, on 9 April 1900 in Berlin.

47

Correspondence 5

The

suppressed, of the second

title, later

original

Symphony. Strauss did 6

The

1 888-1 gii

perform

not, in fact,

it

movement of Mahler's Third

in Paris.

Komponisten und Musikverleger, a society of Mahler had been a

Gesellschaft der Autoren,

authors, composers and music publishers in Vienna, of which

member

since

one of the founders of the Genossenschaft

Strauss,

1897.

deutscher Tonsetzer, rejected the Vienna society because

it

included publishers

(see pp. 132-3). 7

Joseph Weinberger (1855-1928), head of the publishing house ofthat name, which brought out several works by Mahler.

Mahler

to

Strauss [late

April 1900]

great haste!

in

Dear Friend Your ballet

is

accepted

my

in advance*.

— If

seem

I

to attach a condition,

it is

must have a look at the scenario mainly on account of the cost of the scenery. Could you let me see it, and also allow our set designers, wardrobe master, etc. to make a very rough estimate? In a few days you will have my answer, which you can then only an elaboration of

unconditional agreement:

I

take as a binding acceptance.

What

Good

nice marginalia you add!? to risk the

Please believe

me

that

I

stupefaction.

is

What

to

it.

— That

have to educate the Viennese

I

only too natural after the decades of long, methodical

That / am not

and

vain,

am

used to doing without the

outward pleasures of authorship, you must have noticed. except a quiet

fate

entirely

that

my

I

little

can once hear what I

I

if I

movement from

But

I'll

perform lasts

it,

am lucky, at least

a

have done.

I

know

ask nothing of

will

not take

symphony.

that that

I

can be

— My warmest thanks for performing

It

it

amiss

would be

very gladly send you the Third for

I

one good performance, so

have read the scribblers, and come to

Always the same old song. You single

—

spot and a few weeks every year in which

my own master and,

trifles.

experiences must

—

music the appreciation due slowly to start with

heavens!

1 manus lavat allusion between us even in jest! am happy if I have an opportunity of showing your

you have had

would give

my own

if I

too

misunderstood.

Symphony! (Not rise to

conclusions.

ask you not to play a

extreme

so that you

difficulties

—

it

two hours.)

Regarding the National Anthem

I

shall

do everything necessary straight

Correspondence away. So, above

all,

the Vienna Court

1 888-1 gi

send the ballet at once\

Opera

with the production

to

I

regard

it

as a matter of honour for

have the premiere. That you

will

be pleased

can guarantee^.

I

Sincerely yours

Mahler

1

The

expresssion manus

manum

lavat

one hand washes the other), the

(lit.

equivalent of our Til scratch your back and you scratch mine', refers to Strauss's sarcastic

comment

at the

end of the previous

Mahler's songs to get Mahler to perform his

Mahler

to

he only performed

letter that

ballet.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera

[summer

autumn

or early

1900]

1

Dear Friend I

have included your Heldenleben in the programme of one of this year's

Phil, concerts

conduct

become

it

2

am now

and

yourself.

'acquainted'.

convenient to you

—

think

I

3

I

asking whether you are willing and able to it

is

high time for you and our audience to

Should you be

would adhere

to

willing, please let it

me

have

time

a

if possible.

With

best regards and in haste

Yours

Gustav Mahler

On

14 October 1900 Strauss wrote to his parents: 'IVlahler has invited

conduct Heldenleben with the Philharmonic ately,

to

I

had

to refuse

Herr Gutmann

in

him performance and conducting,

for 23 January.'

{RST

me

to

Vienna on the 17th. Unfortunas

I

Eltern, p. 236.)

was under obligation

The

date given here

indicates that at least one of Mahler's letters on this matter has been lost.

From autumn

1898 to

March

1901 Mahler conducted the Vienna Philharmonic

Concerts. Ein Heldenleben symphonic poem, Op. 40 by Strauss,

March 1899

in Frankfurt. It

was not,

in fact,

performed

Philharmonic Concert Season. Mahler only performed

it

first

in the

in

1

New

performed

3

900-1 Vienna

York

in 191

1.

In April 1895 Strauss had already conducted the Berlin Philharmonic in an invitation concert in Vienna.

On

23 January 1901 Strauss appeared in Vienna at

49

Correspondence i888-igii

Munich Kaim Orchestra

the head of the

to play his

own works, including Gutmann Agency.

Ein

Heldenleben. This concert was organized by the Albert

Strauss to Mahler

Knesebeckstrasse 30 Charlottenburg 28 January 1901

1

Dear Friend

Have

received the Third!

2

Many

thanks!

must unfortunately save

I

studying what seems, again, to be a very interesting creation for quieter times than the present, as well).

That

I,

as

him

I

who

have to conduct daily (for Muck,

is ill,

an old connoisseur of scores, look forward tremendously to

your symphony, I

when

3

I

need not assure you! Once again, very many thanks!

wrote today to Gustav Brecher: well!

you good

He

a very talented

is

service.

4

he

will

approach you shortly. Receive

and cultivated man who,

Very best regards

to

you and your

I

am

sister

do

sure, will

(from

my

wife

also),

Yours very sincerely R. Strauss

1

2

The autograph performed up

3

4

of this letter

is

in the

Ernest Rose Collection.

Mahler's Third Symphony, composed to

in

1895-6, only single movements being

January 1901.

Muck (1859-1940), with Strauss a conductor at the Royal Opera, Berlin. Conductor and composer (1879-1940), engaged by the Vienna Opera 1901-2. Carl

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Theatre

[March/ April 1901]

1

Dear Friend I

and

beg you only

to

send the

technicians, all of

text.

whom

I

Our wardrobe engaged only

master, a

and the

set designer

year ago and

who

are

1 888-1

Correspondence outstanding modern

gu

give you great pleasure!

artists, will

—

am

journalists appraise an event at our institution. If it

when

I

can.— But with your opera

exemplary model should be created; and that vaingloriousness) we,

I

am

must decline

in the interests

have

become involved

to

very sorry

all,

my

selves, in all things it

capability to give

with you.)

on the

what matters

— at once.

made much more

But please

difficult for

should not be exorbitant in his usual way.

So between us the matter

is

it

an

stage, with care

Above

I

will

I

all I

do

you the pleasure. (Between our-

we achieve many performances — therein

moment

it

can say this to you without

in a 'race' with another theatre.

Fürstner should send the contracts

as well.

For

without haste. For that reason

believe the latter to be

I

the negotiations, that are

— he

accept

I

different.

by your wish concerning the date. In that case

everything within

office,

it is

of your work\ Unless you yourself, after reflecting on what

said, stand

to share in

(I

work,

like a

I

sure, are best able to put

and devotion and, most important of

that

am

—

and perform

me

I

In general, I you cannot have the premiere of your work in Vienna. not at all keen on 'first performances'. I do not care in the least how the

that

settled.

lies I

— at most, allow

— for the sake of

me by

the accounts

— What

matters

is

every material advantage

shall

put on your work the

circumstances guarantee a truly appropriate performance. If you

nevertheless desire a date,

I

you can give us the premiere, guarantee the

first

do

shall I

all

possible to

fulfil

your wish.

— But if

should of course put back everything else and

performance

for

mid-November. In

haste.

Yours sincerely

Mahler I

am

still

a little

two-and-a-half

1

The autograph Amsterdam, that is

it is

legs. I

its

history

addressed to Strauss. first

had haemorrhage

in

which

I lost

of blood!

of this undated letter

but, as

one of the

my

unsteady on

litres

is

is

The

it

of Marius Flothuis,

cannot be proved beyond doubt

contents and diction seem to indicate that

letters relating to

Feuersnot by Strauss.

in the possession

unknown,

it

the Vienna performance of the opera

The haemorrhage mentioned happened on 24 February

IQOI.

51

Correspondence 1888-igi i

Mahler

to

Strauss

[June 1901]

Dear Friend Feuersnot

1

is

concluded. This

performance

I

at the censor's. is

passes

the agreements will be

it

here.— On the date of the

can only decide after the season has started (end of August),

Would Bertram 2

in the main role be must have a vocal score by the end of August have a clear idea of the work and its performance. The day after tomorrow I go on holiday. My address for the summer:

when

I

can get an overall view.

agreeable to you? In any case to

Once he

the official process required

Maiernigg

am Wörthersee

I

via Klagenfurt.

3

With

best regards

Yours ever Gustav Mahler

1

Strauss's one-act in

comic opera Op.

Dresden on 21 November 1901.

50, It

composed

was

in

a setting

1

900-1 and

first

of the cautionary

performed

tale

of Ernst

von Wolzogen. 2 3

Theodor Bertram (1 869-1907), baritone. From 1901-7 Mahler spent his vacations at

the villa built by

him on

the lakeside.

Strauss to Mahler

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein

1

[June 1901] Confidential

Dear Friend At next year's Festival Krefeld

should

I

[of the Allgemeiner

Deutscher Musikverein]

in

make your Third Symphony the main work! 2 conduct it yourself! Has it already been performed

like to

Naturally, you shall

anywhere?

Next winter

me know it

I

am

conducting

six concerts

of new works here!

3

Please

let

urgently whether your 'Titan' has appeared in print and whether

has already been performed in Berlin. I

should do your Third here too: but

I

the orchestra together for reasons of cost.

am I

afraid

I

shall not

be able to put

have eighty-five players (sixteen

1 888-1 gi i

Correspondence firsts,

fourteen seconds, etc.) but only triple

demand on

this

the

new

woodwinds and four horns: the

300M and

reinforcements would cost about

enterprise.

I

But then

am

not sure that

can place

I

might play your

I

First!

Cordial regards

Yours R. Strauss

Strauss had just been elected President of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein

(German Musical

The autograph

Society).

of this undated

letter

is

in the

Maria Rose Collection.

Symphony

Mahler's Third

received

its first

performance on 9 June 1902

in

Krefeld.

In Berlin.

Mahler

to

Strauss

Maiernigg

am Wörthersee [Carinthia]

[June/July 1901]

Dear Friend 1.

My

First

was performed

largely excluded. 2.

concert

— with the public

My Third has not yet been performed at all — only two middle movements

from a

my own

in Berlin at

1

it,

including 'What the flowers

tell

me', which, torn from the whole at

Weingartner concert, 2 caused an immense misunderstanding of

my

intentions that truly horrified me.

Concerning Feuersnot, the censor seems, difficulties, since the

be making

horribile dictu, to

work has not yet been passed, so

that

am

I

not in a

position to send the contracts to Fürstner. I

fear

you may have

to accept changes.

At any

rate the

iirum larum'

will

need changing, 3 not only the words themselves but probably more widely! Alas, there I

is still

no placating these powers.

shall of course

With very

pursue the matter and save what

best wishes for the

summer,

to

I

can.

your wife as well,

Yours

Mahler

53

Correspondence

A

concert of Mahler's

1 888-1

own compositions on

16

gu

March 1896

in Berlin.

Mahler is not quite accurate. In fact movements from the Third Symphony were performed at four concerts in 1896-7: on 9 November 1896 in Berlin Arthur Nikisch conducted the second movement; on 7 December 1896 in Hamburg Weingartner conducted the second movement, and, also under Weingartner, the second, third and sixth

movements were performed

in Berlin

on 9 March 1897.

Mahler himself conducted the second movement in Budapest on 31 March 1897. The great choral scene towards the end of Feuersnot contains the passage: 'Your god-forsaken prudery has stricken us with woe. There's no help in psalmsinging, nor in the

men

of cloth; the maid shall be the loser, lirum larum

lei.'

Strauss to Mahler

Schweizerhof Hotel Suisse Interlaken 3

July 1901

1

Dear Friend I

shall

conduct

six concerts

the second, on 18

Symphony.

2

November,

Schillings

3

told

me

of

And

if it is,

in

Munich

No.

in Berlin next winter

perform your Third

shall

that needs fewer performers than Is that right?

new works

I

that

and

in

or— Fourth

you are writing

a

Fourth

4

III.

would you

let

me

have the Fourth for 18

November? I'll tell you why! The concerts are on the stage in the new Royal Opera House (Kroll) and I do not yet know whether I can position the boys' choir

5

at the

proper height, get hold of the

be able to procure the orchestra, and

I

six bells, etc.

I

should certainly

have three weeks of rehearsals

at

my

disposal.

The Third

is

where they have

So Nov.

please send this year,

already a definite prospect for the Festival in Krefeld, a

very large orchestra and a fine

me

a line to say

whether

assuming, of course, that

I

hall.

might have your Fourth it

is

really

for 18

more convenient

to

perform than your Third. I

am

here until 8 July and post will be forwarded after that. Please send a

line here!

Very best regards Yours *

54

Rich. Strauss

Correspondence 1

2

3

1 888-1

gu

Autograph in the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich. With the Berlin Tonkünstlerorchester. Max von Schillings (1 868-1933), composer and friend of Strauss's,

active in the

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein. 4

Mahler's Fourth Symphony, composed 1899-1901.

5

For the

Mahler

fifth

to

movement of the Third Symphony.

Strauss

Maiernigg bei Klagenfurt

am

Wörthersee 6 July

1

90

Dear Friend

The Fourth

at the printer's!

is

then, and there

is

But

shall hardly

I

may perhaps meet

existing conditions in a

have the parts ready by

new work — the first that rather more practical way and

another consideration. This

is

a

could, given an unprejudiced and sympathetic reception under favourable

circumstances, bring

me

the only reward

—

am

I

desire

from

my

creation: to be

work before the Berlin audience, which does not know me and has been alienated from me heard and understood.

in

advance by

I

a short-sighted press. I

performance; and as there

Odeon 2

are vying for

beg you,

my

reluctant to bring such a

it

—

I

is

even

have promised Munich the

a 'scramble' for

it

there— Kaim

have enough choices to agonise over as

dear Strauss, not to

let

my Fourth

1

it is

first

and and

enter your thoughts for the

time being.

As

far as the

matches

my

Third

is

concerned,

The

intentions exactly.

I

must

insist that the

six bells are

performance

by no means the most

important thing— they can well be dispensed with; perhaps there are four

had— they would

to be

3

be enough. But the acoustics of the Kroll Hall are

true? If so, dear friend, do nothing of mine there! must be first-rate. The rehearsals must be very copious and my work lasts two hours— there is room for nothing else in the programme. As in Krefeld, so in Berlin! Please don't take it amiss if, to begin with, I meet your kind intentions

supposed to be bad\

The

Is

it

orchestra

—

with nothing but

power you pleasure.

will

And

I

difficulties.

—

I

know

surmount these and have

I

for certain that if

am

at

it is

within your

your disposal with utmost

this further reason to plead for the

Third, that

I

know

Correspondence at

present of no one except you

The

Third!

who

1

888-1 gu

could take on this monster. So, the

Third!

Incidentally, if you have a good chorus at your disposal, there is also Das 4 which, of all my works, has so far made the most impression.

klagende Lied

40 minutes. Perhaps one or other of the vocal pieces could be chosen The chorus has a relatively small but very important and difficult

It lasts

with

it.

part to play. If need be score,

and where

Now

to?

as regards

I

could provide

soloists.

—

— Shall

your Feuer snot\

have heard in

a

roundabout way that the censor

work. Whether he

is

just

I

making

found out. Unfortunately there I

shall

is

difficulties, or

rate,

With

I

will

is

banning

not releasing the it,

I

have not yet

nothing to be done until September; then

go to see the censor myself;

whether the same thing

At any

send you the

I

at present

happen

in

he

is

on vacation.

I

wonder

Dresden. That would be dreadful!

shall not give in.

best wishes, and

may your

efforts

be rewarded on high!

Yours most sincerely

Mahler

A Munich orchestra founded by the Maecenas Franz Kaim. The concerts of the Musikalische Akademie took place in the Munich Odeon. About this time Mahler wrote to Bruno Walter from Maiernigg, how does '.

the Kroll Hall sound? Strauss wants to stage!

An

Can

early

it

be done?'

(GML,

do

in

Third

.

.

there! Orchestra

on the

p. 253.)

work by Mahler, completed 1880,

February 1901

my

first

performed

in revised

form on 17

Vienna.

Strauss to Mahler

Grand Hotel und Kurhaus Murren 11

Julyliooi]

1

Dear Friend

What

a

pig-headed fellow you

charming about you!

It

absolute sway, your will

concert to

are!

But

it

does no harm!

It's just

goes without saying that in Krefeld, where is

my command

itself!

56

and your Third

shall

what I

is

hold

have a

Correspondence

For Berlin, however, where

I

1

888-1 gi 1

work under

impossible to ignore the financial side,

it is

I

difficult

really

conditions and where

would ask you

to be

more

As the programme for 18 November I envisage: 1 Tasso by Liszt— 15-20 minutes Love scene finale from Feuersnot 7 minutes Mahler's Third two hours

lenient.

—

—

Would you

—

not agree even to this?

If,

as

you

say, there

is

as yet

no

understanding for your work in Berlin, the most important thing must be to get the public into the concert. will,

but

therefore ask you

I

programme for Berlin. That I did not ask for

I

all

of course, do nothing against your

shall,

the

more

earnestly to agree to the above

the Fourth from vanity, to have the glory of a

performance, you will surely believe.

first

nevertheless flatter myself that

I

I

work than Herr Kaim or even the Munich Academy. And I should only want the Fourth if, for the time being, I am not quite able to perform the Third in accordance with your intentions, for they are what matter to me before all else. The Kroll acoustics are good. I do not yet know the chorus which is at my disposal, so that to begin with I should rather give it the small task in the Third than an entire choral work like Das have more right to such

klagende Lied. Please send properly,

When

I

shall

a

me

be sure to do

when

the score in any case;

does the Fourth come out? If

I

find

No. Ill too

Vienna I

is

giving

can place

it

me enormous

difficult, I shall

Munich. The censor

take the Fourth in the second series of concerts, after in

I

so.

fun!

dare not hope for a prohibition, since being banned by the censor would little opera could have, the more so because would surely only be postponed, not cancelled. Or

be the best advertisement the the Vienna performance

am

I

wrong?

So, please,

And Upper

when does No. IV appear? me the score of Das klagende Lied

please send

at

Marquartstein

in

Bavaria.

If the

Vienna censor only objects

libretto printed

and

in place

footnote: for passage deleted

That would

sell in

masses!

to a

few

lines, we'll

have another

of the offending verses put asterisks with the

by censor

Lucky

see vocal score.

publisher!

Sincere regards

Your

old friend

Richard Strauss

1 888-1 gi 1

Correspondence

Markus,

him

3

the Prague conductor, asks

good musician and

only as a

as a conductor, so that

How

do you

Wasn't

like

commend him

to you:

I

know

my recommendation as

far as that.

4

Mikorey?

Transcript by Henry-Louis de

Symphonic poem by Franz As yet unidentified. See

to

decent chap, but unfortunately not

can only extend

I

Brecher?

right about

I

me

a very

5

La Grange.

Liszt.

p. 60.

Franz Mikorey (1873-1947), a German conductor and composer from Munich. Strauss appears to have advised Mahler against engaging Mikorey.

Mahler

to

Strauss

[mid-July 1901]

Dear Friend Tasso 20 Feuersnot 7 Intervals 10 1

Symphony two hours first movement

After the lasts

more than

On

10 minutes [interval] (absolutely necessary)

three hours.

demands

top of that, the extraordinary

the two

new works

the audience's attention and comprehension! Believe me, that

me and my

service to

work.

I

place on

would do no

my Third for my innnumerable (and, if you like, again my Second, which only lasts one-

therefore suggest you drop

Berlin this time, and perhaps do one of still

unpublished) vocal pieces, or

and-a-half hours. This, however, should be in the Hall of the Philharmonie, as

an organ

is

essential.

— Otherwise you might do my Fourth.

Perhaps

in

the second concert, as you proposed.

We

need not decide anything

circumstances

at the

yet,

'Titan') could be done, although

an audience I

shall

You

and

in the

autumn we

time demand. If you think

— in Berlin,

I

it

my

shall act as the

First (the so-called

has already been performed

— without

should have some confidence in the idea.

have Das klagende Lied sent to you.

are right about Feuersnot;

it

will

s8

be an enormous advertisement. But

Correspondence

1 888-1 gi

good heavens!— such works do not need advertising, which in my view, distracts attention from the work of art to superficial matters; and that is very regrettable.

And

rangements, and

a lot

So

let

us hope

finally,

have the delay, uncertainty with

we may succeed

in deflecting the austere

may Eros and Dionysus

path of virtue; for which

What have you

I

against Bertram?

He

ar-

we have Demuth, 2 with

without the spark of genius! and, for the second, Kurz,

a

is

much

a

fine,

who

F — even

boisterous actor.—

better voice, to be sure, but

— For the female role 4

censor from the

give their blessing.

has capital high notes (up to

G), just as good as the low range, and

Otherwise,

my

of annoyance and trouble.

I

have Schoder

3

in

—

mind

has a wonderful talent as a singer but

insufficient acting ability.

With

sincere regards

Yours

Mahler

The Fourth comes There

is

a

out in October.

soprano solo in the

last

movement. Normal orchestra except

for

four flutes and an E-flat clarinet.

There

are

no trombones or tubas.

The Third Symphony its

lasts

on average 90 minutes. Perhaps Mahler exaggerated it should be the only work in the programme.

length to persuade Strauss that

Leopold Demuth (1861-1910), baritone

Marie Gutheil-Schoder

(1

at the

874-1935), soprano

Vienna Court Opera. at the

Vienna Court Opera since

at the

Vienna Court Opera since

1900.

Selma Kurz (1874-1933), coloratura soprano 1899.

59

Correspondence

1 888-1

gu

Strauss to Mahler

Marquartstein 17

August 1901

Herr Hofoperndirector Gustav Mahler Maiernigg am Wörthersee nr Klagenfurt Austria

Dear Friend I

have not yet received Das klagende Lied\

I

have

now fixed your Fourth

would probably be best Is

Brecher

The

still

to put

for 15

it

l

December! 2

at the

How long does it last?

It

beginning of the programme?

with you in Vienna? Are you satisfied with him?

vocal score and choral parts for Feuersnot will reach you by 15

September

at the latest.

How

goes

with the Lord High Censor?

it

Best regards

Yours Rich. Strauss

1

Postcard in the Maria Rose Collection.

2

The

December

concert took place on 16

Mahler

to

1901.

Strauss

[Maiernigg] [20?

August 1901]

Dear Friend I

am

going to Vienna on the 26th, and will find out something about

the fate of our Feuersnot.

Indendant,

1

— So

who manages

to

far

I

only

know

that our highly moral

be on equally good terms with the Graces,

muses and with our holy patron saints, wishes to my representations and appeals to 'common have been in vain. Vederemo!

the nine

performance. All to

inhibit the

sense'

seem

—

Brecher

is

a capital

experience and practical

one or two seasons

at a

and

likable fellow, but for us he,

skill. I shall

try to get

him

is

too short of

leave of absence to spend

municipal theatre somewhere. Regarding 60

my Fourth

Correspondence i888-iqii

number of doubts that come to my mind: the work is conceived manner for wind and strings, and needs especially players. — From what I read, you have a new orchestra, the quality

there are a

in a rather concertante

sensitive

of which leaves kind, that

is

much

to be desired! Will they be equal to a

by no means alfresco but

full

work of

this

of fine shading.

—

finishes/)/)— and hardly has a real^" about 45 minutes, starts/)/) it should probably be placed in the middle of the concert.

It lasts

anywhere, so that I

have Das klagende Lied sent to you as soon as

shall

I

reach Vienna.

Sincerest regards in the

meantime Yours Mahler

August Freiherr Plappart von Leenheer, General Intendant of the Hoftheater, 1898-1906.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera

November/early December 1901]

[late

1

Dear Friend

Though

I

know you

to be

to say that the material for

hard

at

work,

my symphony

I

must disturb you

for a

moment

can only be sent off on Wednesday

4th (by express), and so will only be in Berlin on the 5th [December].

Whether

be a serious interruption for you

this will

do not know how your rehearsals are arranged. If

to

perform

at the

I

cannot judge, since attend the

last

enough?

When

should

which has

finally

been passed here, and which

rehearsals, will that be

On your Feuersnot,

I

beginning of January,

2 I

I

shall

I

three

arrive? I

want

have to confer with you

at

length.

Only

this for today, in haste,

Yours

Mahler

Autograph

in the

The performance

Gemeentemuseum, The Hague. did not, in fact, take place until 29 January. 6/

Correspondence

Mahler

i888-igu

Strauss

to

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [between 4 and 8 December 1901] 1

Dear Friend I

on Tuesday morning, and

arrive in Berlin

Could we have

hotel.

where!

&

Co).

2

instrument in the parcel sent by Weingartner;

think you are unlikely to have such an instrument in

staying at the PallastI

don't

mind when

or

— By an oversight two sets of parts have been sent to you. Please use

the one sent to you from Vienna (Eberle bells

am

rendezvous the same day?

a

You 3 I

will find the 'little

arranged for this as

I

— used only for ballets

your orchestra.

How from

does Destinn view the solo part?

her.

Would

it

I

should

like to

rehearse a

not be a good idea for

presence, for which

little

me

should need

I

4 I

to take a

When? Where?

one rehearsal myself

your

in

whole morning? Unfortunately the

conductor's notes are often inadequate, as

about everything on Wednesday!

have not yet had any answer

with her in Berlin!

I

found

in

Munich! We'll

talk

5

Sincerely

Mahler

Mahler arrived

The Vienna

in Berlin

on Tuesday 10 December.

printer of Mahler's Fourth

Symphony, published by Ludwig

Doblinger, Vienna.

The

sleigh bells used in various places in the

start cities

Fourth Symphony, notably

movement. Weingartner had gone on with the Fourth Symphony.

of the

first

a tour

of South

at the

German

Emmy Destinn (1 878-1930), soprano, appears to have been intended for the solo which, however, was

On Wednesday

11

finally

sung by Thila Plaichinger

December

Justine: 'Rehearsed today! Everything

performance myself, as Briefe edited

I

(1

868-1939).

1901 Mahler wrote from Berlin to his sister is

going capitally and

I

am

conducting the

agreed with Strauss today'. {Gustav Mahler, Unbekannte

by Herta Blaukopf, Paul Zsolnay Verlag, Vienna and Hamburg,

1983, p. 116.)

62

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1 888-1

gu

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [early

January 1902]

Dear Friend

Programme you need only

when you

are

etc. are

my word

can take

At any

rate

being sent off with this

letter. All is

arranged so that

down and conduct. Perhaps we shall speak further about it here; we both agree that only the performance matters. You sit

that

I

have no conductor's vanity.

you must conduct one performance or another here. Whether

the premiere or a later one depends

on how our personnel follow your

baton. I

have prepared everything with devotion and ignored none of your

hints.

— As

far as

is ready. The first (solely tomorrow— a so-called Sitz-

details are concerned, all

musical) general rehearsal [of Feuersnot]

is

probe concerned only with musical adjustments. Looking forward with great pleasure to seeing you soon,

Yours very sincerely

Mahler

Strauss to Mahler Berlin [5

January 1902]

1

Dear Friend

How

goes Feuersnot}

Could the premiere be on the 29th? I could then arrive early on the 27th for the last two rehearsals. You know that I have concerts on the 30th and 31st in Vienna, 2 and that I would be immensely grateful to you if you could make everything very much easier

me by having the first performance on the 29th. For the preliminary study I should mention that up to now it has always proved necessary in the ensemble (vocal score Nos. 172-7) to double Walpurg in the high range with some powerful chorus sopranos and for

similarly with the singers of

should be backed by

a

Margret and Elsbeth. Likewise, Walpurg number of chorus sopranos from Nos. 209-1 1!! 63

Fig.

i

Mahler, caricature and silhouette by Hans Schliessmann.

Correspondence

What do you Berlin critics?

I

say of the St Vitus's dance which your Fourth incited in the

must say

it

has far exceeded

Heartfelt congratulations, from will

1 888-1 gi

put you in the very best

my

my

worst expectations.

wife too, on your engagement:

3

spirits for the Feuersnot rehearsals, so that

this

I

can

congratulate myself as well.

Best regards to your fiancee

Your ever devoted Richard Strauss

Strauss actually wrote, incorrectly, 5 January 1901. The autograph is in the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna, Hof-Operntheater, No. 48/1902.

On Op.

30 January 1902 Ernst von Possart recited the melodrama 'Enoch Arden', 38,

Strauss.

by Strauss; on 31 January Pauline Strauss-de Ahna sang songs Both were accompanied by the composer at the piano.

Mahler had become engaged

Mahler

to

to

Alma Maria Schindler

in

December

by-

1901.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [early or

mid-January 1902]

Dear Friend Everything has been arranged in accordance with your wishes. Premiere on the 2gth, dress rehearsal on the 28th. But would it not be better to let us conduct?

1

For

I

am

come

at least a

week

you take this difficult work over with one might be disconcerted. Could you not, as agreed,

afraid that if

rehearsal, our players

earlier?

In haste,

Yours

sincerely,

Mahler

Mahler conducted the premiere and the subsequent performances.

Correspondence

1

888-1 gu

Strauss to Mahler

Charlottenburg

4 February 1902

1

8 p.m.!

My

dear Friend

do not know a finer hour than this, when you are conducting the second performance of Feuersnot, to send you once more my most heartfelt thanks for the incomparably beautiful rendition you gave of my work last week, I

and

will, I

hope, often give again.

revel in the recollection of the magical

I still

sound of the orchestra, the

magnificent decor created by the genius of Brioschi and Löffler

2 [sic],

glorious poetry of sound with which the soloists and chorus delighted

the

my

ear.

As

it

was not possible

for

evening of the 29th, could occasion, to

apart from

who have

all

all

I

me to thank all

those involved personally on the

ask you to be so kind as to convey on a suitable

taken such extraordinary pains with

my

work,

the soloists, chorus and orchestra, Herr Brioschi and

Herr 3

Löffler already mentioned, especially the stage-manager, Herr Stoll, and 4 the conductor of the chorus, Herr Luze, not to forget the all-important

producer

of

'Feuersnot'

the

manager)— my warmest

5

—

thanks,

mean,

(I

of

resounding

in

course,

the

the

all

lighting

registers

of

admiration. If Feuersnot

is still

alive then,

I

shall

passing through Vienna on 21 March,

come

if

to hear the

work again when

you would be kind enough

to hold

the performance that day.

With

cordial regards

and

in sincerest gratitude,

Your ever devoted Richard Strauss

Autograph

in the

Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna, Hof-Operntheater, No.

48/1902.

Anton Brioschi

(1

855-1920) designed the

set for Feuersnot,

(1863-1919) the costumes. Lefler was manager of scenery

Heinrich Lefler

at the

Court Opera

from 1900-3. Designers' names were not given on the Vienna programmes this time, so Strauss

August

Stoll

may

at

not have seen Lefler written down.

(1853?— 1918), stage-manager

at

the Court

Qpera 1885-1918. In

most of the works he conducted Mahler involved himself ment.

66

in the

stage-manage-

Correspondence 4 5

1 888-1

gu

Karl Luze conductor of the chorus. Feuersnot

(lit.

'fire

famine') takes

extinguished and the stage

Mahler

is

its

name from

plunged

a spell

by which

all

flames are

in darkness.

Strauss

to

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera 18 February [1902]

Dear Friend I

am

so disgusted by the attitude of the Viennese press,

by the public's total acquiescence to them, that should love to throw

it

all

down

their feet!

at

1

and most of all

cannot get over

I

— The

it.

How

I

proceeds of the

performances are as follows: I

3,100

fl

II

1,600

fl

III

1,300

fl

IV — Carnival Monday one of cancelled at the last moment!)

the best days

of the year

— goo!

(was

Alas, alas, I must take the work off for the present. But I shall not give in!— On 4 April we have a new ballet— I shall put on Feuersnot with it, they will all have to be there again and we shall see! Perhaps we shall have a less

—

prejudiced gathering. If this does not

(though It

come

Demuth must not

off, in

the

autumn

be involved in

drives one to despair to be at the

it),

shall dig out a one-acter

I

and so

mercy of

I

this

shall try

and

try again.

Areopagus of narrow-

—

minded meanness without any right of appeal. At the premiere I still had some hopes.— This, alas, dear friend, is all I can tell you for now of the fate of your child (and my own child of sorrow) I hope I shall have happier news in April. In haste, Yours very sincerely Mahler

—

'The

critics

right to

left,

have unanimously rejected the work, conservatives and radicals.'

it

was salvo

after salvo

(Max Graf in Die Musik,

p. 1023.)

6/

1

March

from 1902,

1 888-1

Correspondence

gu

Mahler to Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera 21 February [1902]

Dear Friend How wrong you

are! /.

Not

three performances

very eloquent attendance figures.

2.

To continue

— there were four,

to

1

with

perform an opera when

away does not depend on my goodwill, which I The management would immediately veto it. Our audience being what it is I know it very exactly there is certainly nothing to be done at present. At the fifth performance the theatre would be empty! I know this from experience*. No matter what I put on with it! However, as you have expressed your wish so decidedly, I shall put the work on once more with Cavalleria or Hansel. (Bajazzo [Pagliacci] isn't possible, as Demuth cannot sing two parts.) But you will see— this really I am also afraid that I shall not get permission would damage the work! 2 from the management (or still higher up). I am myself perhaps in no less the whole audience stays

hope you

will not doubt.

—

—

—

—

consternation than you, but to fight against impossible odds

is,

after all

impossible!

Most

faithfully yours

Mahler 1

There were

actually only three:

Mahler

is

probably including the cancelled one

of 10 February. 2

The Supreme Court

Steward's Office, which had jurisdiction over the Vienna

Opera.

Mahler

Strauss

to

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [28 February 1902]

Dear Friend

Today

a small

charming and on with be fixed

it

one-act opera

original)

is

1

of which

on 19 March, and ask you your convenience. Please

at

I

expect a 'success'

going on stage. If it does well, to

conduct

let

68

it

me know

I

(it is

really

shall put Feuersnot

yourself.

A

rehearsal will

in the course of this

week

Correspondence whether

I

can count on you, as

I

am

1 888-1

gu

absent for the second half of

and must make

my

arrangements for that day now.

comes

off,

we

If this to

me

shall

have

a pair that

would be particularly agreeable

Pegasus would not be yoked to

in that

March 2

a

mere

carthorse.

In great haste,

Yours very sincerely Mahler

Der dot mon, had

its

a carnival play

Mahler went on

Mahler

by Hans Sachs, with music by Joseph Forster, which

Viennese premiere on 28 February 1902.

to

Petersburg with his young wife.

a concert tour to St

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [early

Dear Friend The new work won't do gallop away.

—

I

either! It

shall therefore

had quite

a

March

1902]

good reception, but won't

put on Feuersnot on 14

March with

popular ballet that has not been performed for a long time.

a

very

l

not possible, unfortunately, on the 21st! But I shall put Feuersnot new work 2 in April, to which I should like to invite you. You will hear more at the end of March. Hoping to see you again soon, Yours Mahler

This

is

on with

a

Rund um Wien by Josef Bayer. The ballet Die Perle von Iberien by

Josef Hellmesberger jun., which had

premiere on 7 April and was performed with Feuersnot for the April 1902. gratifying

On

20 April Strauss wrote to his parents 'Today

news from Mahler

that the fifth

(RST Fltern,

p. 257.)

Mahler's

letter to

6g

now hopes

its

time on 19

received the very

performance of Feuersnot with

popular new ballet turned out very well and that he on.'

I

first

to

a

keep the work

Strauss has not been preserved.

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gi 1

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [early

May

1902]

Dear Friend have not answered your

I

answer from Müller-Reuter

kind letter as

last,

1

to a letter in

which agrees with yours apart from

rehearsals,

I

which a

have been waiting for an I

set

few

programme of

out a

details.

recapitulate:

I

In Cologne: 1)

3

2) 4

June rehearsals morning and afternoon with the full orchestra ditto (one rehearsal in the morning, one in the afternoon) then

June

in Krefeld 3) Friday morning, from

9, so I

can work with fresh performers for three

hours. 4)

Sunday,

5)

Monday,

When

final rehearsal

you

talk

forget that this

Third first

lasts

morning (four hours) and

all

lasts

two hours and

don't

I

On

about your experience

work

mind

this I

in Berlin

is difficult

and unusual.

waiting!

my

But

performance

with the Fourth, you

work

I

is

easy,

whereas

— Furthermore, this

unbearable to

it is

to the difficulties

is

and

to

my the

it!

I

me to send my work add

a

confused and

and obstacles arising from

astringent intentions, which are hard to understand as this

insist.

immediate future depends on

into the world without sufficient preparation, deficient

must

three-quarters of an hour and

performance and everything in

assure you,

finally

of two hours.

it is.

my

Believe me, for

me me and smoothing my path, as you undoubtyou must secure me these rehearsals, and I cannot

must have a faultless performance. Otherwise you will do

grave harm, instead of helping edly intend. Therefore:

do without any of them. Otherwise, however sorry collaborate.

Concerning the question of

costs, I

I

should be,

admit that

I

this

could not

time your

I am always ready to make must be asked of me, and I know you will not demand more than is absolutely necessary. But I say this again for guidance, should you encounter difficulties in your Sunday session. About the quality of the orchestra I am, I must admit, no less concerned after your last letter! To

kind help

is

very welcome. Nevertheless,

sacrifices if they

increase the thirty-strong Krefeld orchestra to a hundred?

And how? A motley

collection that

is

Where from?

not up to standard could not cope with

Correspondence

my

work; that I know! Just have a look trombone must be outstanding, with a

Would

not your

first

1 888-1 gi i

At any

at the score!

whom

trombonist in Berlin,

rate, the first

and mighty breath!

colossal tone I

have heard highly

praised, be best for this?

Now

it is all

in

any decision on

your hands, dear Friend, and as soon as you have made

my

fate

on Sunday, please put

my mind

at rest!

was immensely glad about Feuersnot. I shall not give up now. The next 2 In the performance (the ninth) is on Friday the 23rd of the month! I

—

autumn you must conduct

it

here.

With

sincere regards

Yours

Mahler

The

alto solo

3 is

going off to Lessmann

4

tomorrow.

I

also sent

it

to

Müller-

Reuter a few weeks ago to be forwarded to the singer!

Theodor Müller-Reuter (1858-19 19), conductor of the Concert Society

in

Krefeld from 1893-19 18.

May, on the 7th. movement of Mahler's Third Symphony, which was

Feuersnot was performed only once in

From

the fourth

performed on 9 June 1902 at the Festival in Krefeld. Otto Lessmann (1844-1918), music critic and composer, an

official

in

first

the

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein.

Strauss to Mahler

Marquartstein

Upper Bavaria 21 July [1902]

1

2

Herr Gustav Mahler from Vienna Maiernigg (Wörther See) Carinthia

Dear Friend As you need a horn player,— my father, 3 recommends one: Max Müller, first horn at

whom the

I

am

just visiting,

Spa Orchestra

at

Bad

Reichenhall. I

have written to Herr Müller, saying he should apply direct to you.

Perhaps you could have the young

man come

to

Vienna and blow

for you!

Correspondence 1888-igii

How are you

How

otherwise? Contented and industrious?

very difficult for the chorus?

klagende Lied last? Is

it

this winter in Berlin!

How

is

long does Das

should

I

like to

do

it

your dear wife? Best regards to you both

Your

old friend

R. Strauss

1

The de Ahna

family had a country residence here, in

Upper Bavaria where

Strauss spent his vacations. 2

Autograph (postcard)

in the

Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna, Hof-Opern-

No. 515/1902. Franz Joseph Strauss (1822-1905), previously theater,

3

first

French horn

in the

Munich

Court Orchestra.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [late

l January /early February 1903]

Dear Friend

My

contract with

cannot find

my way

my in

it)

present publisher that

I

is

such

a

do not know whether

the Genossenschaft deutscher Tonsetzer.

2

For

obligation to join the Society of Authors here.

31

I

muddle I

am

(I, at least,

entitled to join

have put myself under

(At the time, in order to be

would not have minded joining a Society for the Preservation of I send you my contract? And could you or your experts glean the necessary from it? If it is all right, I should be most glad to be a member of your society and, of course, to sit on the committee. Would it not be best for us to discuss it all when you are here, and for you to keep open my right to membership until then? Apart from that, my wife asks you both to lunch with us (followed by a nap in a quiet room) and to be with published

I

Purgatory.) Shall

—

—

—

us after the concert. Quite alone and undisturbed. Sincerely yours

Mahler

The

following postcard from Strauss

is

the invitation extended here.

72

no doubt

to be seen as a direct

answer

to

Correspondence

The Guild

of

German Composers,

major part, was incorporated

The

11

at Strauss's instigation, in

founding of which Strauss played

a

in 1903.

Gesellschaft der Autoren,

Mahler was admitted on

in the

1 888-1 gi i

Komponisten und Musikverleger

November 1897 and

resigned on 31

in

Vienna.

December 1903

order to join the Genossenschaft deutscher Tonsetzer

(see pp. 132-3).

Strauss to Mahler 5

[.

.

.]

for

I

February 1903

1

1. 10 on 4 March. If half-past two suits you should come with great pleasure. Perhaps, how-

only arrive in Vienna at

your midday meal,

ever, as

I

I

have an informal rehearsal in the afternoon,

the evening, after the concert!

2 [.

.

.]

it

would be better

Is Feuersnot still alive?

[

.

.

.

in

]

1

Quoted in the Autographen-Auktionskatalog No. 606 (1975), by J. A. Stargardt, Marburg. According to the catalogue, this is a postcard addressed to Alma

2

On

Mahler. 4 March 1903 Strauss conducted a concert by the Berlin Tonkünstler-

orchester.

Strauss to Mahler Berlin

27

November 1904

1

Dear Friend Just back from

of the Society

2

my

for

travels,

I

am

writing to thank you and the committee

your kind telegram, and to thank you especially for the

wonderful performance you gave of the work. 3 task

is

in kindling transient

The more

Viennese enthusiasm, the

what you have done. Best regards

to

thankless such a

less shall I forget

you and your dear wife,

Yours sincerely

Dr Richard

Transcript by

Alma Mahler. 73

Strauss

Correspondence

The

1

888-1 gi 1

Vereinigung schaffender Tonkunstler in Wien, founded in 1904 with Mahler

Honorary President. Symphonia domestical Op. 53 by Strauss, first performed on 21 March 1904 under Strauss in New York. Its first performance in Vienna was at the first orchestral concert of the Vereinigung schaffender Tonkünstler on 23 November as

its

1904 under Mahler.

Strauss to Mahler 15

February 1905

l

Dear Friend I

have

just learned

through Frau

Hermann Wolff2

that

on Sunday we

have the pleasure of welcoming you here personally

shall

3

for the first

performance of your Fifth. That's capital!

As you

are (alas!) not conducting yourself,

4 I

am

sure you will give

me

the pleasure, on

Monday

20th at 1.30 p.m.

come with your wife and have a cosy meal w ith forward. With best regards from us both, to

us, to

w hich we both look

Your ever devoted Richard Strauss Please send a few consenting words to Joachimsthalerstrasse 17, Berlin

W15.

1

2

Postcard transcribed by

Alma Mahler. who managed

Louise (Aloysia) Wolff (1 855-1935),

Bureau

after her

the

Hermann Wolff Concert

husband's death.

3

Mahler did

4

Arthur Nikisch (1855-1922) conducted Mahler's Fifth Symphony harmonic Concert on 20 February 1905.

not, in fact, go to Berlin

on

74

this occasion. at the Phil-

Correspondence 1888-igii Strauss to Mahler Berlin 5

March 1905

1

Dear Friend

Many

thanks for your delightful

send your exact programme

names of

possible, with

And

3

to

singers,

letter

if

and

all

your kind help: please

our Secretary and Herr Rösch

and enclose the

the voice-types of the soloists not

be very glad

2

we could use some

or

known

all

to

texts for the

4

soon as

as

programme.

me; we should, of course,

of them for the other programme.

5 For the Requiem by Josef Reiter and the Te Deum by Bruckner we need the 6 usual oratorio quartet; for the one-hour choral work by Otto Naumann a

dramatic singer with an outstanding voice (mezzo-soprano), and for the rest of the

programme 7

nand Löwe, who

the instrumentalists

Court Orchestra. Feuersnot

The

is

Ferdi-

come to an understanding with you directly about all whom, thanks to your kindness, he may draw from the

8

shall gladly

letter to

Your a

I

good baritone. The Festival conductor

a very will

conduct myself, on the 27th.

your Intendant

will likewise

go off very soon.

Symphony again gave me great pleasure in the full rehearsal, only slightly dimmed by the little Adagietto. But as this was what

Fifth

pleasure

pleased the audience most, you are getting what you deserve.

The

two movements,

first

especially, are quite magnificent; the

has a quality of genius but seemed rather too long;

how

inadequate performance was responsible,

Scherzo

somewhat At the final

far the

I was unable to judge. work had a great and unclouded success. The concert audience, by contrast, showed themselves somewhat more indolent intellectually, which is nothing new to you or me. Nikisch set to work with much

rehearsal your

zeal and, as far as

German music

suits

him

at all, in

my

opinion acquitted

himself very well.

So please your songs

let

etc.

me know

soon about the kind and

ability

of the soloists for

Best regards to you and your wife,

Your ever devoted Richard Strauss

My 1

2

wife sends her greetings.

Transcript by

As

yet,

Alma Mahler.

undiscovered.

75

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi 1

For the Festival in Graz, 31 May to 4 June 1905. Friedrich Rösch (1 862-1925), musician and lawyer, active

in the

Allgemeiner

Deutscher Musikverein and the Genossenschaft deutscher Tonsetzer. Josef Reiter

(1

Der Tod und

862-1939), an Austrian composer.

die

Mutter

for soloists,

Naumann

(1871-1932), a

Ferdinand

Löwe

i.e.

the Court

Mahler

to

1

2-part choir and large orchestra by Otto

German composer.

(1865-1925), conductor.

Opera Orchestra.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [late

April 1905]

l

Dear Friend

am rehearsing Feuersnot Diemuth— Frl. Förstel 3 I

with a new

cast.

2

4

Herr Weidemann I hope the Both have splendid voices and are original, spirited players. performance will give you pleasure. As I have now to make my arrangements (everything must be ready before I leave for Strasbourg), 5 please tell me definitively whether I should fix it for 5 [deleted: May] June or 27 May, as was decided originally, and when you can hold the final rehearsal.— As I

Kunrad

—

have heard nothing for weeks,

my

I

songs are Weidemann, Moser

do not know where I am. The singers 1 (baritones) and Sembach, tenor.

for

6

Sincerely, in great haste

Mahler 1

On

28 April Strauss wrote to

baritones 2

Weidemann and

The Vienna Court Opera

Max

IVloser,

von Schillings, 'As

soloists

and the tenor Sembach

offered the participants in the

Mahler has the

. .

.

Graz

Festival three

performances on their return, including Feuersnot. 3

4 5

6 7

Gertrude Förstel (1880-1950). Friedrich

Weidemann

(1871-1919).

Venue of the Alsatian Musical Festival 20-2 May, 1905, where Strauss and Mahler conducted their own works (see pp. 134 f.). Anton Moser ( 1 872-1909). Johannes Sembach (1881-1944).

76

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi 1

Strauss to Mahler Berlin 5

W.

May

15

1905

Dear Friend I

have to give you two pieces of bad news 2

at once; as

have to conduct the

I

Festwiese at the 5 June (as if Wagner had composed it only for such occasions!), I must leave Graz on 4 June. For this reason I cannot conduct, firstly, Feuersnot in Vienna on the 5th, and ask if you could do it for me, and secondly, the Heldenleben on the 4th in Graz, which has therefore been moved to 2 June and must be replaced on

Crown

Wedding on

Prince's

the 4th by Liszt's Ideale as the opening

This brings told

me

me

number of the

often that

Up to now

songs, which last one-and-a-quarter hours. piece of

somewhat exaggerated

composers all

last

concert (yours).

main point of this letter: the gentlemen at Graz have you would like a concert of your own in Graz for your

to the

festival zeal

vis-a-vis the Director of the

the less notice of

it

as

me, and even once asked

have taken

I

Vienna Court Opera.

I

have taken

you yourself have never expressed such

me

this as a

on the part of the Graz Opera

not to perform your Fifth

a

Symphony

wish to at

Graz

so that you could support the Festival without being suspected of ulterior

motives by your superiors. This would be

you

to allocate

whole concert

a

quarter hours. As

I

because

I

I

am

artists

a

I

were now

one-and-a-

number of deservedly

of giving preferential treatment to compositions

anxious to avoid an appearance of partiality, the more so

is

the

main thing

me

not on this occasion seem to

you now have Ideale

case if

have, as President, obligations towards the entire membership;

and because— which

1.

more the

was accused two years ago by

unperformed fellow by Mahler,

still

for a series of songs lasting

to a

programme

— the special position you desire does

artistically necessary.

What

objections do

like this:

by Liszt (20 minutes), only

to

warm up

the audience as an

introduction, then 2.

One-and-a-quarter hours Mahler songs

3.

Imperial

March [Wagner]

as conclusion.

A finer programme, or one more favourable to you, I cannot imagine! Your songs are the principal attraction of the programme, and the two old gentlemen provide the framework! I

hope you are

in

agreement.

times, but on this occasion

I

You know

reallv could not

I

am

glad to oblige you at

meet vour wish

for a

all

matinee

Correspondence

1 888-1 gi i

of your own, for on 4 June there is the second Chamber Music morning, on the General Assembly. An 3 June the morning is completely filled by extension of the Festival by a day

We

is

absolutely impossible.

can discuss details when we meet in Strasbourg.

arrangement that we

shall

Is

still

it

the

have twenty-four soloists from the Vienna Court

Orchestra as support for the whole Graz Festival, especially for Heldenleben

on 2 June? I have personally sent invitations

Weidemann and

Preuss.

to

your singers Gutheil, 3 Kittel, 4

5

Please send your song texts by return to Graz for censorship and to us for printing in the

programme,

that has to be

produced very urgently. Best regards

Yours sincerely

Dr Richard 1

2

Transcript by

Alma Mahler.

Act III of Die Meistersinger.

3

See

4

Hermine

5

Strauss

p. 59.

Kittel (1 876-1948), alto.

Arthur Preuss

Mahler

to

(1

878-1 944), tenor.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [between 6 and 9

My

programme would

last

May

1905]

about half an hour.

Dear Friend I do not desire a 'special position'! That would be a great misunderstanding on your part. Only a small hall for my songs that would be performed in the manner of chamber music. And just because I should not wish to take away an evening, I suggest a matinee. And in the interests of the whole it

—

does not seem dignified to put on

So an

please think

it

a

few songs

as the conclusion of a Festival.

over again! 'Preferential treatment' for Mahler? Should

artistic association really

have democratic principles? Or should the

gentlemen regard your espousal of my cause as camaraderie? Both assumptions are

repugnant to me! Moreover, you yourself know best that 7*

I

am

not

1 888-1 gi

Correspondence forcing myself

upon you, and

reasons (despite

all

on these songs only

To

perform them

and

in taste

in a large hall

to

2

to

me

I

bow

to

I

have put there.

l

decidedly lacking

is

your decision, but ask you to give serious

meaning

that

— And here

is

I

is, if

difficult

your work

to

I

The main

[Mahler meant June]

on 4

May

can hold the

You

confuse the notes

to

parts have

new perform-

have the work ready in good time. But whether can stay in Graz on

final rehearsal so early that I

May

must

I

make any use of what you have to make the necessary

not

one does not want

critics call 'bold strokes'!).

do everything

can hold the

request for confidentiality

may

cannot possibly be in Graz on the 4th!

here on the 5th instead of you,

what the

I

the second difficulty. If I conduct Feuersnot

know how

I

off a Festival

about programme changes?

provisions at once.

I

round

my arguments.— Your

surely not understand as

(in

not vain.— Here, for artistic

would expose us to those reproaches! For the rest (as I in cause embarrassment and, believe me, would like very much

consideration to

ers! I shall

am

and they were only appropriate

in the small hall,

withdraw completely)

have told

really

I

really

no way wish to

that

the pressure of 'commercial' considerations),

I

do not know

final rehearsal

at present.

here with

— If

I

2, 3 and 4 have the matinee

Weidemann (who

sings the

Lieder there) the following morning and with only a minor further change

programme

to the

6th!

So please

let

(Elisabeth

7'

on the 5th)

me know now what you

I

could conduct Feuersnot on the

think and can

do.— For my

part

I

agree to everything. I

am

counting on you to conduct the

new production of Feuersnot here

personally as this would be very helpful in propagating the it

work and getting

accepted by the theatre-going public.

With

sincere regards and looking forward to seeing you again,

Yours

Mahler

NB

I

should say that

I

should have preferred to be entirely free in Graz in

order to devote myself more fully to

mention, in order not to appear

my

self-seeking.

Vienna tasks and

—But

on something of mine being performed

to insist

songs, as they are less trouble to prepare, being a

But

as they are being

So— only That So

it

I

performed,

it

also, as

as Schillings felt

in

Graz,

I

suggested the

more modest

must be done

you

he had

gift.

in appropriate style.

in the small hall!

should cut a better figure

cannot be ostentation on

at a large festival

mv

concert

is

self-evident.

part to prefer a matinee in the small

hall.— 79

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi 1

Your wishes concerning twenty-four Philharmonic from me. However, the committee (I

—

difficulties

players will meet no believe for financial

reasons) seems to want to engage a smaller number.

1

On

2

In the Industry Hall in Graz.

3

Franz Liszt's oratorio Die Legende von der

29 January 1905 the Verewigung schaffender Tonkünstler in Wien had organized a Mahler evening in the small Music Society Hall, at which the Kindertotenlieder

and four other Rückert songs were given

never, in fact, conducted.

on the 7th, not the

Mahler

to

their first performance.

heiligen Elisabeth,

which Mahler

The performance was conducted by Franz Schalk

5th, of June.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [about 10

May

1905]

Dear Friend As Löwe will have written to you by now, a way out has been found. As the first concert takes place on 1 June in the Stephanie Hall (the room suited to my pieces), things have been rearranged to provide a place for me. I hope all is

now

in order.

sake, as he can

— To me this

have

a

good

is

particularly agreeable for Weidemann's

rest after

1

May

[Mahler means June], and

have time for two proper orchestral rehearsals of Feuersnot.

Weidemann

is

I

a

splendid fellow and exactly the right artist to do justice to your work, and so, I

hope, to keep

Once

I

it

in

our repertoire.

have your agreement

I

shall

send the texts to Lessmann. Best regards, in haste

Yours very sincerely

Mahler I

have just received your telegram!

with two other numbers

Sembach

are the singers.

fill

the

My songs last one-and-a-half hours and first

concert.

Weidemann, Moser and

1

On

1 June 1905 thirteen songs by Mahler were performed in Graz: six songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, the Kindertotenlieder and two other Rückert

songs.

The

singers were Friedrich

Weidemann, Anton Moser,

Fritz Schrödter

(1855-1924), tenor, and Erik Schmedes (1868—1931), tenor. Johannes did not take part.

Ho

Sembach

Correspondence Strauss

1

888- igi i

Mahler

to

Marquartstein

Upper Bavaria 1

8

August 1005

1

Dear Friend Have you really the intention announced in the enclosed notice from Der 2 Tag} If so, I should at least like to let you know that by 1 September the Fürstner publishing firm

will

3

have finished preparing the vocal scores

and

proofs,

from which the study of the main parts can be begun. Schuch

starting

on

1

September and expects

to bring the

4 "

is

work out about the end of

November. The orchestral material ought, by human 1 November.

calculation, to be

ready by If

you therefore agree

a

contract by return with Furstner (who will not

otherwise supply you with parts) you can,

if you think fit, start studying the main parts at the beginning of September; it is likely to take two to three weeks. For Herodes, Herodias and Jochanaan the probable choices are

and Weidemann. Narraboth

Schmedes, Mildenburg'

what of Salome? For Dresden style

and power of

would be voice. I

suitable?

She

is

Do

voice). I

I

have decided after

you not think that

have heard from

certainly pretty.

Has she

many

9

Your Feuersnot

said to have

is

6

Now,

on Frau Wittich

Vienna

for

quarters that she

is

(for

Kurz"

Frl.

your best

acting talent :

have had enthusiastic reports of your songs

(Rösch).

all

— Slezak.

in

Graz from many friends

been wonderful

Many

too.

thanks

retrospectively.

Schmedes sang

a

very respectable Tristan in Cologne. But

disappointed with Mildenburg's Isolde (apart from Act

I

was very

where she had

I,

great moments). Voice, intonation and diction left almost everything to be

desired in Acts II and III. Kittel was vocally excellent, and

Meyer 10

very

sound.

How I

are

you otherwise?

stay here until

1

Is the

October and

Seventh finished already?

am hoping

to

11

have good news from you

soon.

With

sincerest regards to

does she owe the kind

gift

you and your wife, from mine

of soap

too.

(To

whom

— many thanks!) Yours ever

Dr Richard Please take care in ordering the scenery that 81

it is

as

low

as possible

Strauss

and the

Correspondence

888-1 gu

1

acoustics favourable. Massive sets are not needed, Jochanaan's cistern that juts

above ground should be so arranged that the singer can sing and see the a hole concealed with gauze and invisible to the

conductor through audience.

Alma Mahler.

1

Transcript by

2

Announcing the intention

3

For Salome, Strauss's opera Op. 54, based on the play by Oscar Wilde. Conductor of the Dresden Opera (see p. 26).

4 5

to

perform Salome

at the

Vienna Opera.

Anna von Mildenburg (1872- 1947), dramatic soprano,

at the

Vienna Opera

since 1898. 6

Leo Slezak

7

Marie Wittich

8

9

10 1 l

See

(1

873-1946), tenor. (1

868-1931), dramatic soprano.

p. 59.

Strauss had

left

the Festival in

Graz

owing

early

to the death of his father.

Mayr (1877-1935), bass, at the Vienna Opera since 1902. Mahler composed his Seventh Symphony in the summers of 1904 and 1905. Probably Richard

Mahler

Strauss

to

Maiernigg 19

August 1905

Dear Friend

The

notice has obviously been conjured from nowhere.

premiere cannot possibly be decided

yet.

not bring out your opera on 4 October,

(December

until January.

— All that

1

it

a

for Figaro in

jubilee.[)]

same

(the

date of the that if

I

do

new production of Don Giovanni must December)

for the

Mozart

2

As soon as I reach Vienna I shall write more coming from the censor.

Would you

please, in

any

case,

need be,

start

to Fürstner.

—

Ill

omens

are once

send the text as soon as possible (or the

definitive version of Wilde's play) so that if

is

excluded as too unfavourable for such an

is

come out

November

The

certain

can probably not be performed

important new work, and because in

is

I

can submit

it

to the censor

3

brawling with him in good time. Also, the management

and, will

not approve a Kreuzer until the work has passed the censor. I

should

like to start

studying the work at once, as

singers study

Salome so

ment.— Kurz

is

as to

impossible.

I

intend to have three

have a choice and also

A wonderful voice, 82

a possible replace-

but impossible as an actress

1 888-1

Correspondence

gu

—

But I have high hopes of a slender young singer of colossal power and unfaltering high register, with whom I am starting to study the

even for Lucia.

part at once. (Frl. Bland).

A

The

rest

of the cast

fits

my

plans very well.

Schmedes, Mildenburg and Weidemann (perhaps Demuth).

must think more about— but under no circumstances Slezak, who takes no trouble, sings in a slovenly, unrhythmical way, and gets off by the third performance. He must keep to Troubadour and Narraboth

Arnold.

My

I

5

Seventh

manage

to get

is

finished.

— How

did you get on this

anything done apart from Salome}

— but the jewel in the crown (Weidemann) 6 missing. — However, Diemuth was wonderful.

capital,

summer? Did you

— Your

Feursnot was

was unfortunately

7

Best wishes to you and your wife from us both. I

am

just leaving for

Vienna— alas! Your most devoted

friend

Gustav Mahler

Name-day of the Emperor Franz Joseph, 2

Mozart's 150th birthday

3

On

traditional date for premieres.

in 1906.

20 September 1905 Mahler was informed that the censorship office of the

Court Theatres had

'for religious

and moral reasons declared

itself

opposed

to

Opera

in

the acceptance of the libretto of the opera Salome". 4

Elsa Bland (1880-1935), soprano, guest performance at the Vienna 1905, appointed in 1906.

5

Presumably the tenor

roles of

Manrico

in Verdi's 77

Trovatore and Arnold in

Rossini's Guillaume Tell. 6 7

He was ill. The role was sung by Gertrude

Mahler

to

Förstel.

Strauss

IMPERIAL AND ROYAL COURT OPERA 1 VIENNA 22 September 1905 [letter drafted

but not sent]

Sir

According

to a

communication received by the Office of the Director of

the Imperial and Royal Court Opera, the Censorship here has declared itself

opposed

'for religious

libretto of the opera

and moral reasons'

to the acceptance of the

Salome, and 'the General Intendant of the Imperial *3

Correspondence and Royal Court Theatre

is

1

888-1 gi 1

thus not in a position to permit the performance

of this dramatic work'. I beg leave to inform you of this decision, and must regretfully abstain, under these circumstances, from producing your work. I

remain, Sir,

Yours

faithfully

Mahler 1

The

is in the Haus-, Hof- und No. 1019/1905. Mahler did not send documents. Instead, as we may suppose from a

original (official letter with Mahler's signature)

Staatsarchiv, Vienna, Hof-Operntheater, this letter off;

it is still

among

his

telegram draft of the same day, he sent Strauss the following telegram: 'Please

send 2 or 3 vocal scores of Salome as soon as possible, so that the main singers can begin studying their parts. Which firm is publishing the work? Regards, Mahler.' Mahler seems at this time to have intentionally avoided informing Strauss of the rejection by the censor. See the following letter from Strauss.

On

8

October 1905 Rainer Simons, Director of the second Viennese opera house, und Volksoper, wrote the following letter to

the Kaiser Jubiläums-Stadttheater

Richard Strauss

in Berlin:

Dear Herr Kapellmeister

As

I

Opera. let

me

have just heard, your work Salome

Would you be kind enough

to let

will not pass the

censorship of the Court

me know whether you

are

now

willing to

have the work.

Yours very sincerely

Simons Strauss wrote a few lines below this inquiry and sent

it

to

Mahler:

Strauss to Mahler Berlin 10 October 1905

1

Dear Friend Is this true? Please return this letter.

work has no censorship

difficulties to

The Dresden

overcome,

is

premiere,

at the

2

where the

end of November! Cordial regards Rich. Strauss

»4

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi 1

1

Original in the Strauss-Archiv, Garmisch-Partenkirchen

2

The Dresden premiere

Mahler

to

December

took place on 9

1905.

Strauss

Vienna

October 1905

11

Dear Friend It is

the melancholy truth. Indeed: the censor has already refused

no one knows about

As

reversed.

yet

I

it,

for

shall

I

move Heaven and Earth

have

to

have not been able to trace whose influence

is

it.

So

far

this betise

behind the

ban.

This

letter

suits

impossible at the

my

purpose very

performance as possible.— You must even pretend to be negotiating for

head even our omniscient censor believe as

what unpleasantness

soon as

I

I

it.

if

—

will

I

Salome

welll

my

Jubiläumstheater.— But

plan

is

is,

now

of course, quite to present

necessary support

me

such

a

and

in this

dare say that with this pistol to his

be willing to talk to

us.

You would

not

have had to put up with from that quarter

got back from Strasbourg,

1

when

I

spoke enthusiastically about

the project. It is

only for

February

this reason that I

— for Salome.

I

wanted

have been aiming to spare

you

this

January

at

worry so

— or

your pleasure in the premiere. Apart from that the fact that as Catholic a Court as

carry weight here. that if the

— So,

I

I hoped, and still hope, Dresden allows the performance

please— keep

Court Opera refuses,

be considered.

ask you to

let

a

even

as not to spoil

silent for a while;

performance

at the

me keep the letter for a

that will

write to Simon[s]

Jubiläumstheater will

few more days.

I

hope

may serve me as an (unlooked-for) weapon in the unequal struggle. And now, dear Strauss — I cannot help speaking of the moving impression your work made on me when I read it recently! This is your apogee so far! Indeed, I assert that nothing that even you have done up to now can be compared to it.— You know — I don't go in for empty phrases. With you even less than with others. Every note is right! What I have long known: it

you are

a natural dramatist!

I

confess that

it is

only through your music that

Wilde's work has become comprehensible to me.

I

hope

to be able to attend

Dresden.— Let me know whether you consent to my plan of campaign. You have my word that I shall leave no stone unturned and shall the premiere in

85

Correspondence never

flag in

championing

this

1 888-1 gi i

incomparable, thoroughly original master-

piece.

In great haste

Yours most sincerely Gustav Mahler 1

Strauss had played Salome to Mahler on the piano in Strasbourg (see p. 136).

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [mid-October 1905]

—

Dear Friend, In great haste! I am now somewhat more hopeful. This I hope to be able to let you have letter has done me very good service. Please excuse the desolate state of the definite news in the next few days. enclosed letter. I tore it up by mistake and had to retrieve the pieces from 1

—

the waste-paper basket.

Sincerely

Mahler 1

The

letter

from Rainer Simons

to Strauss, see the previous

exchange of

letters

between Mahler and Strauss.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [22 or 23 October 1905]

In haste!

My

dear

Friend— at

last

I

have something gratifying to report!

The

Your Salome has been passed! I have just been to the censor. Within a week he will return the libretto to me with passages marked where he would like the expression modified a little. I have his promise that nothing fundamental needs to be changed.—

difficulties

are removed!

Unfortunately,

he objects to the name Jochanaan. 86

He

requires

it

Correspondence 1888-1Q1 changed. please

I

let

suggested Bal Hanaan. However,

me know

by return.— Once

I

if

you have

wish,

a different

have his comments

shall

I

send

my suggestions), and we shall get down to studying the work at once. I am going to cast Salome four times (as have no female who completely matches my conception of the part) and you can them

to

you (perhaps with

I

then choose the one that you think most suited.

importance to

me

your demands, so that rest of the cast

is

as

I

we

cannot propose Schoder. agreed.

With

It

and singing

that the performer's voice

'

is

of the utmost

ability

should meet

What do you

cordial regards,

and

think?

a sigh

of

The

relief,

Mahler 1

Marie Gutheil Schoder, famous ideal for the part in

as

much

was

for her acting as her singing,

clearly

Mahler's eyes, but he knew that Strauss did not accept her

type of singer. Strauss later became one of her admirers and she sang Octavian in the Vienna premiere of Rosenkavalier (191

1).

Strauss to Mahler

24 October 1905

1

Dear Friend

Thank you

for the

unselfish efforts,

happy news of yesterday, and above

and not

condolence recently.

The

less for

all

your (and your wife's) kind

recognition you accord

my

for

your

letter

of

work, words that one

hears so seldom from colleagues and that one really needs so

much, gave me

almost more pleasure than the news that your omniscient censor had

withdrawn the ban.

I

agree, of course, to

changing of John's name, whose story

2

all

the changes you wish.

every schoolboy knows,

is

The

delight-

ful.

In Dresden, as prima donna Wittich condescended too late to learn her part, the first

performance has had to be postponed until December.

yesterday gave Schuch 9

December

I

which I can guarantee him the first performance. If he has not brought the work out by then, those who can steal a march on him are free to do so. So you have a clear run. I would mention that on the evening of 13 December I am leaving for Warsaw, Moscow and St. Petersburg, and shall only return at the beginning of [January?

Now

as the last date for

illegible].

you can arrange things

as

you think #7

fit.

Do

you wish

to

have your

Correspondence

1 888-1 gi

performance immediately after the Dresden one, say on 12 December? Or postpone

The

it

until

score

is

January?

already engraved; the orchestral parts will be ready by 10

November.

You already have a celesta; you need only get a heckelphone! Thank you again (and your dear wife), and please accept my warmest good wishes (from

my

wife also).

Yours very sincerely

Dr Richard 1

2

Transcript by Strauss's

pun

Strauss

Alma Mahler. (halsbrecherische

Geschichte,

literally

'neckbreaking story')

is

untranslatable.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [31

October 1905]

Dear Friend

My

somewhat

These accursed I told no one) have completely spoiled things again. The censor, who had definitely agreed to the performance he merely required textual changes of which he would notify me within a week— must have been worked on by someone in the meantime. For he has just returned the text to me with a long disquisition (I shall bring the letter with me to Berlin, where I shall be on yth and 8th) and speaks again of 'the depiction of acts that belong to the sphere of sexual pathology and are not suited to our stage'. That confounded escape into generalities all over again, against which there are no weapons! I beg you, dear Strauss keep every thing between ourselves from now on, otherwise we shall get hopelessly stuck. On Tuesday I shall see him in person and take the bull by the horns. / shall not give in, and regard your Salome as my own personal affair. What damages me most here is the damned postponement in Dresden, which is interpreted here in 'influential quarters' as a sign of censorship difficulties there. The devil knows where this wind is blowing from. — Please let me know where and when we can talk things over thoroughly in Berlin on the days mentioned (in the afterbulletin for today

is,

alas,

less cheerful.

newspaper hacks (heaven knows who they got the story from

—

1

—

88

—

Correspondence

noon— or

1

evening of the 7th we have the

the evening of the 8th;

2

otherwise

I

am

888-1 gi 1

— the concert

final rehearsal

is

on

entirely at your disposal!).

Best wishes

Yours sincerely

Mahler 1

Quotation from the censor's

2

On

November 1905 Oscar Symphony in Berlin. 8

letter to

Mahler of 31 October.

Fried conducted a performance of Mahler's Second

Strauss to Mahler Berlin 1

November 1905

1

Dear Friend Thank you for your kind letter; I spoke to Schuch yesterday: the Dresden premiere has been postponed by a week, from 28 November to 8 December, 2 for the simple reason that the orchestral parts are not yet ready and cannot be sent to Dresden before mid-November. Schuch told me in 3 confidence that the Vienna Censor Dr Jellinek had asked him whether Salome had met with censorship difficulties in Dresden. Schuch answered: not the slightest. I hope this reassured the Vienna censor. So you are coming on 7 November? I am here and ask you simply to decide when you would like to speak to me, and when you would like to dine with me. I am completely free on 7 and 8 November. My telephone number

—

is:

Charlottenburg 1145.

Looking forward

to

meeting you, and

a

thousand thanks for everything!

Yours

Dr Richard 1

2

3

Alma Mahler. The Dresden premiere in fact Transcript by

Strauss probably

took place on 9 December.

means Hofrat Dr Emil

Sc,

Jettel

von Ettenach.

Strauss

Correspondence

gu

1 888-1

Strauss to Mahler Berlin

December 1905

15

'

Dear Friend 2

Where were you on the 9th? I missed you very much. You missed a magnificent performance: Schuch's and Burrian's 3 achievement was quite extraordinary. You really ought to see the Dresden performance: you would enjoy

The

first

it.

three performances were completely sold out: the orchestra

indescribably beautiful.

How do things stand in Vienna? I am waiting impatiently for favourable news from you. Who is to perform this horribly difficult work if the theatres that really can play it fail to do so? Best regards from us to you both, Yours Dr Richard 1

Transcript by

2

The day

Strauss

Alma Mahler.

of the

first

performance of Salome

in

Dresden.

Karl Burrian (1870-1924) sang Herod in Dresden.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [winter of 1905-6]

Dear Friend Your letter comes affairs

is

at a

nothing.) Nevertheless, his

mind and

still

very opportune moment.

The

situation for your

goodl (Please, only between ourselves, otherwise

need help.

I

can answer for

— The censor has already changed

not presenting the slightest obstacle. But higher up there

is

a barrier to

yesterday.

I still

Your

be broken down. letter is

1

Curiously,

very helpful to

my

I

was chipping

at

it

is

only

purpose. Please, keep on

negotiating quite casually with Simons.

But

I

assure you, in the autumn

we

shall

quite impossible at the Jubiläumstheater) for a

—

have Salomel I

(Jt is,

performance and something always prevents me. In spring go

of course,

keep trying to go to Dresden I

am

sure

Correspondence to attend shall let

one— I

should be delighted

you know

in

1

888-1 gi 1 could be there too. In any case

if you

I

good time. Sincerely yours

Mahler

1

prohibition of Salome at the Vienna Court Opera

The

said to have been

is

instigated by an archduchess.

Strauss to Mahler

22

December 1905

l

Can you send me a Diemut 2 for 2 performances Feuersnot in Munich 28 December? Please wire immediately stating fee. Strauss Hotel 4 Seasons. 1

The

transcript of this telegram

is

in the

Strauss-Archiv, Garmisch-Partenkir-

chen. 2

One

of the principal soprano roles in Feuersnot, properly spelt Diemuth.

Mahler

Strauss

to

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera

December

[22 or 23

1905]

Dear Friend

From

available after shall,

now being sent you will see that 7 January. Can you still use her then? — She

the telegram

of course, put Michalek

at

rehearses the part immediately! I

am

in hot pursuit of

/ shall get

The

my

The

perform

When would

Salome whenever the

way, you

situation being as

1906.

2

your disposal and

may depend on it is,

I

this glorious

work

at once.

only

is

delightful.

will see to

like

manage

goings-on here are a disgrace.

is

1

—

I

that she

it

her to be in Munich?

chance presents

itself.

But you must have patience.

that.

shall hardly

you

slightest

Forstet

I

But you

it

before the autumn of

am

terribly sorry

will

enjoy

it

when

I

cannot

the time

comes.

A

thousand greetings

Yours

Mahler 9'

Correspondence Gertrude Förstel sang Diemuth

in the

1

888-1 gu

new performance of

Feuersnot in June

1905.

Margarete Michalek (1875-?) sang Diemuth

at the

January 1902. Neither Förstel nor Michalek sang

on 23 December that he had

Mahler

to

a

Vienna

in

first

Munich,

performance

in

as Strauss cabled

replacement from Dresden.

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera

[mid-March 1906] Dear Friend I

cannot prevent the Breslau enterprise

might well be the best way

to bring

would not believe how vexatious ourselves)

For— I

what consequences give you my word

—

'question of confidence'.

be with them!

I

2

it I

my

1

and would not wish

opponents to their senses.

matter has been for

this

may have

for

me

to.

or (between

me.

shall not give in

even

if it

should involve a

If the Breslau people have the courage, then

would place myself

It

— You

God

Herr Lowe's 3 disposaland Roller* would give him

entirely at

should he need our musicians or anything

else,

any support needed with scenery.

With

sincere regards

Yours

Mahler I

have

which 1

just I

heard a splendid performance in Amsterdam of your

am

especially

The United Theatres performances

2

in

fond

4

Taillefer,

of

5

of Breslau were planning a tour with Salome, including

The ban on Salome was

Dr Theodor Löwe,

not the reason for Mahler's resignation in 1907, but his decision (see pp. 138

f.).

Director of the United Theatres in Breslau.

Alfred Roller (1864-1935), painter appointed by Mahler as scenery manager at the Court

5

works.

Vienna.

undoubtedly influenced 3

among your

On

10

Opera

in 1903.

March 1906 Mahler conducted Das

klagende Lied at the Concertgebouw,

while Willem Mengelberg conducted Taillefer, Op. 52, by Strauss in the same concert series.

92

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi i

Strauss to Mahler Berlin W. 15 March 1906 1

5

Dear Friend

As you have

so kindly agreed that a Breslau performance in Vienna seems

likely to further

and

let

our cause,

him know you

which he

is

I

Löwe

it.

assent to Herr

him

way

to the

Dr Löwe

so magnanimously, for

extremely grateful. Let us hope that this

against us by blocking Salome's

ing

my

today conveyed

are willing to support

will

not

now rebound

Court Opera instead of smooth-

intends to bring the entire orchestra from Breslau, but

thankfully accepts the help of the inspired Roller with sets and costumes.

was very reluctant

I

to agree, as

I

am

loath to deprive you of the Vienna

performance; but after the enormous struggles you have had,

first

a great

success for the Breslau Salome in Vienna seems almost the only possible

way of preventing

influential court circles

from blocking Salome's adoption

by the Court Opera.

hope you are not inwardly displeased with

I

case,

I

Salome give

let

my permission today; 2

should withdraw rise to a

me

over

and

question of confidence!

We

need an

determination, your genius and your outlook in such

you

to

put anything

at stake

attain our

ends without

this!

for

Thank you

this; if that

were the

for heaven's sake artist

a position

do not

of your

too badly

on Salome's account. In the end we

shall

again for everything, and best wishes to you and your dear

wife,

Ever yours Richard Strauss

Transcript by

The in

Alma Mahler.

invitation performances

Vienna

in spring 1906,

whether the delay was

by the Breslau United Theatres did not take place

but only from 25

May

for practical reasons or

93

to 20 June 1907. It is not known was occasioned by Strauss.

Correspondence 1888-igii Strauss to Mahler

Marquartstcin

Upper Bavaria June 1906

7

1

Dear Friend Fürstner library, if

is

prepared to dedicate

you are willing

the score to

me

a

Salome score 2

to

you

for

your private

your heirs to return

to sign a declaration obliging

on your decease.

If you agree, the score will be sent to you at once.

Was

the Sixth

3

to

your

liking?

Will you soon be able to send

me good news

about Salome

in

Vienna?

Best wishes to you both

Yours ever Richard Strauss

Transcript by

Alma Mahler.

As the Vienna Court Opera had not concluded an agreement to perform the work, Mahler knew it only from the vocal score and from a performance in Graz in

May

The 1906

1906.

first

performance of Mahler's Sixth Symphony was

at the Festival

Mahler

to

in

May

Essen on 27

of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein (see pp. 141

ff.).

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [between 8 and 10 June 1906]

Dear Friend I

am

willing, of course, to sign the declaration.

score at once, for

I

have

labyrinth.

—

soon as

got back here.

I

I

had

a great desire to lose

He

should just send the

myself

in the

mysterious

with an influential person concerning Salome as

a talk 1

If

I

have not yet secured their agreement,

report a promising 'indecision'.

(I

did not expect anything

more

I

can

to begin

I also mentioned your readiness to grant me an, extension until November, which was accepted with significant alacrity. —All in all I think can count with certainty on being able to perform Salome next year. A

with.) 1

I

—

94

1 888-1 gi i

Correspondence definitive

answer

ning to recover

in the

my

autumn,

No

spirits.

if this is

doubt

all

agreeable to you.

this

must

—

I

am

begin-

be.

Yours sincerely Mahler

From

Mahler

the Festival in Essen.

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [October 1906?]

1

Dear Friend must

tell you as early as possible: permission is still must decide by 1 November is answered with a Now I should welcome it if Lowe could put on a performance here shrug. as soon as possible. That would breach their defences.

Reluctant as

withheld*.

am,

I

I

My objection that

I

—

It is too stupid]

This

in haste for

your information.

I

hope

to see

you

in Berlin

on

8

November. Yours most sincerely

Mahler

The

date of this letter cannot be determined unequivocally.

The content November

suggests late September early October 1906; but the mention of 8

makes October 1905 seem Symphony was performed in happened with This would

dates,

refer to 8

Mahler's presence

likely.

his

On

8

November 1905 Mahler's Second

presence in Berlin (see

p. 89). Possibly, as often

Mahler has made a slip of the pen and means 8 October. October 1906, when his Sixth Symphony was performed in

in Berlin

(under Oscar Fried).

95

Correspondence

1 888-1 gi i

Strauss to Mahler Berlin

4 January 1907

Dear Friend have to conduct external concerts every evening for the whole week

I

including Saturday and, urgently in need of rest, must forgo hearing your

magnificent work

2

once more

heard yesterday, again lar

made

this evening.

strength and freshness of invention, and

the audience I

is

The

movements,

first

me

the deepest impression on

was sincerely glad

I

beginning to love and understand your

the matter finally.

I

am

as Fürstner

is

well again,

sure you will not attribute

my

lack of interest or admiration, but to

my

I

to see

how

art.

wrote to Fürstner again today and hope you will soon be able to

Salome score your own. As soon

that

in their particu-

I

hope

call

the

to settle

absence today to a

over-exertion in the past weeks.

Please give your wife our regards, and accept our best wishes,

Your devoted

friend

Dr Richard 1

2

Alma Mahler. The Third Symphony, performed at

Strauss

Postcard transcribed by

a

Berlin Philharmonic Concert on 14

January 1907 under Mahler.

Mahler

to

Strauss

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera [6

February 1907]

Dear Friend I

heard the new Schoenberg quartet

and impressive that

Dresden

Festival.

I

I

1

yesterday and found

cannot but recommend

it

it

so profound

most emphatically

for the

enclose the score and hope you will have time to look at

it.— The Rose Quartet 2 offers to interpret

it

if their travelling

expenses are

paid.

Forgive

from

me

for pestering you, but

I

think you will have

much

pleasure

this.

Yours sincerely and

in haste

Mahler 96

/

Mahler waiting for Strauss

at the door

of the Landestheater,

Salzburg, igo6.

2

Gustav Mahler, igoj.

3

Richard Strauss, igoj.

U»u^«-s

:

1

./

The first page of the autograph Mahler conducted.

'"

iX-S^'-^

*

MS o/Feuersnot, rAf only opera by Strauss which *

~7ߣ3f*2+.

U

Hall.

5

The

first

page of the autograph of Mahler's Fourth Symphony, a work which

Strauss especially valued.

6

7

The Strauss family

Alma and Gustav Mahler, 1903.

about

TEATRO COLON Empress:

Concesionarios:

WALTER MOCCHI

FAUSTINO DA ROSA -WALTER MOCCHI

MARTES

A

las

Ci»

AGOSTO

DE

14

y

21.15

SEGUNDO COHCIERTOPE ABONO a

MARTES

VIERNES

y

POR,

lLa.

FILARMONICA DE VIENA bajo

la

direccion del maestro

RICARDO STRAUSS PROGRA/AA i.

ira.

Sinfonia en re

MALHER

mayor

Lento

Muy

agitato

Solemne

Muy

c

modcrato

agitato

II.

Obertura Coriolano

Conoerto en Allegro Adagio. Allegro

nii

bemol para piano y orquesta

— Un poco mosso. ma non truppo

AI piano: Senor

—

.

BEETHOVEN BEETHOVEN

.

Rondo

ALFRED BLUMEN III.

Muerte y Transfiguraciön. (Esce na Sinfönica)

NOTA.

—

Durante

U

cjecucion d«

U*

Announcement of Strauss

Symphony

obr.m. no

s

m

permmri

.

.

U

STRAUSS

«trada a

performance of Mahler

s

U

pUtaa

First

with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Buenos

Aires, 1923.

Dell«? Barllen mil Orduilcr.

3.

llr

III.

i

Arnold Schönberg;

Pelle«? und Mellsa de* iimphtnlsAt DHUnt.

Sesdnge.

Kammermusik-

u.

Liederabend

1905, halb 8 Uhr abends Im Saale Bdsendorler. 10. Februar

:

III.

Ordiesterkonzert

lt. ITlürz 1905, halb 8 Uhr abends Im Srohen fTluslkacrelnssaale.

^Programme

(

//

d 20 Bejjer/

J

Announcement of Mahler s performance of Strauss Vienna, 23 November 1904.

loa loa s

Symphonia domestica,

Correspondence

Many

simply

It

1

will

not leave

D

String Quartet in

888-1 gi 1

my

desk.

minor, Op. 7 by Arnold Schoenberg

February 1907 in Vienna. The quartet led by Mahler's brother-in-law Arnold Rose performed on

2

1

thanks for Salome.

Mahler

(

1874-195 1),

first

5

(1

863-1946).

Strauss

to

The

Director

Imp. and Royal Court Opera 1

[May

1907:-]

Dear Friend

am

I

I

going on here. I'm leaving. is,

and practitioner of rare

— This affects me greatly, as

2

is

can predict with certainty

that outstanding artist stay.

know what

sure you will

consequence that

seems

it

to

—

unfortunately, that Roller, talent, will

me

not be able to

of utmost importance to

keep him for the theatre. There are possibilities in him that no one can yet suspect.

occurs to

It

me

that perhaps Berlin (above

use of him!

You can

you

something may come of

in case

confidentiality, as

me

a

few

it

all,

you

expect remarkable things of him! 3 it.

in Berlin) I

can make

pass this idea on to

— But please treat with strictest — Could you send it

could be badly misunderstood here.

lines to let

me know how

I

should advise him? In haste,

Yours very sincerely

Mahler

The

exact date of Mahler's resignation

apparently went on throughout Roller remained scenery

had

a

manager

is

not known, though negotiations

1907.

at the

Court Opera

until 31

May

1909. Strauss

long conversation with Roller (see letter of Alfred Roller to Gustav

Mahler, valier

May

n

March

1908,

AM pp. 313-6). For the

(Dresden, 26 January 191

remained exemplary

1)

first

performance of Rosenka-

Roller created scenery and costumes that

for decades.

97

Correspondence

Mahler

to

1

888-1 gn

Strauss

[Vienna]

[May/June 1909]

Dear Friend By a somewhat roundabout route

New

via

York

1

and Paris

have

I

received your card.

As

far as I

plans for the Tyrol.

know,

my

First lasts about 50 minutes.

summer. In

few days

a

Burying myself there

you, otherwise

I

me

am

going by

for a while. It

is

have not yet any

I

Toblach

rail to

too bad that

it is

ejected

I

by the

in the

so far from

should certainly descend on you. Unfortunately,

not yet heard your Elektra\

would have

I

2

I

have

cannot go to the theatre here (Weingartner police) so

York.— Your Salome was given wonderful interpretation of the

I

must wait

a very vulgar

title

role

until

performance,

by Mary Garden

Dalmores as Herodes is capital as well! Best wishes to you and your wife from us both.

impression.

4

New

I

hear

3

but owing to a

made

it

a

in

powerful

5

Yours ever

Mahler

Since his resignation as Director of the Vienna Opera, Mahler had been

conducting in

New

York, but spent most of the year

Strauss performed xMahler's First in

Berlin on 3

December

in

Europe.

Symphony at a concert by

the Royal Orchestra

1909.

At the Manhattan Opera House in New York. Mary Garden (1 877-1 967), soprano. Charles Dalmores (1871-1939), tenor.

Strauss to Mahler

Garmisch 21

August 1909

1

Dear Friend

On Monday

morning we leave

Dolomites and hope to come

Tuesday.

to

for a nine-day

automobile tour of the

Toblach and see you on Monday evening or

2

The barometer is

falling,

but the weather on the other side of the Brenner

Correspondence

1

888-1 gi 1

always different to ours. Would you be so very kind as to send me a telegram tomorrow, Sunday evening: (Strauss Garmisch), to say whether is

the weather

Hoping

fine

is

to see

where you are and

is

likely to last.

you soon! Best wishes from us both to you both

Yours

Dr Richard

Alma Mahler.

Transcript by

The

of the Strauss family to Mahler in Toblach did take place.

visit

Mahler

to

Strauss [late

My

Strauss

September 1909]

dear Friend

One

request: please send

manuscript paper firm. again be in the rococo.

between potentates. October

in

1

3

—

I

me

a

postcard with the address of the Paris

— My summer was very good,

What

am

a pity

2

and you

our 'interview' was so short,

conducting

my

Seventh

Amsterdam. Please send your reply

at the

there:

4

will

once

almost as

beginning of

Concertgebouw.

Best wishes from your old friend

Gustav Mahler

At that time Strauss was writing

his scores

on paper supplied by the Papeterie de

Leysse pres Chambery-Forest (watermark), H. Lardesnault Ed. Bellamy Sr/ Paris (stamp).

In the

summer

of 1909 Mahler composed his Ninth Symphony.

Allusion to Rosenkavalier on which Strauss was working.

The meeting

at

Toblach mentioned

in Strauss's

99

previous

letter.

Correspondence Strauss

to

1

888-1 gu

Mahler

Landhaus Richard Strauss Garmisch 11

May

191

1

Dear Friend I

read with great pleasure that you are feeling better and are recovering

from your long

2

illness.

it may be some diversion in the melanknow that next winter, probably in early

Perhaps

choly hours of convalescence to

December, I shall perform with the Royal Orchestra in Berlin: your Third Symphony. If you would like to conduct yourself (you will be pleased with the orchestra), it will be a pleasure to hear your lovely work under your own direction again,

much

as

should naturally rehearse

I it

should in

of course, to conduct

like,

any case, so that you

will

it

myself.

I

have no trouble,

only enjoyment.

With the

heartfelt wish that

and with very best wishes from

you may have completely recovered soon,

my

wife too,

who

follows the

news of your

condition with deepest sympathy,

Most

sincerely

and respectfully yours Richard Strauss

Best regards to your wife, your mother-in-law and your

1

The autograph

of this letter

is

in the

sister.

Alma Mahler- Werfel Bequest, University

of Pennsylvania. 2

3

Mahler

fell critically

Vienna

via Paris.

He

ill

in

February 191

died on 18

May

1

191

in

New

Strauss conducted Mahler's work at the concert on

100

York and was transported

to

1. 1 1

December

191

1

in Berlin.

RIVALRY AND FRIENDSHIP

Rivalry and Friendship y£)G\

An

Essay on the Mahler-Strauss Relationship by Herta Blaukopf

About seventy years after Mahler's death, and some thirty after Strauss's, we now present the correspondence in which their friendship was recorded. A conspicuous delay. The more so if we remember that Strauss and Mahler knew each other for twenty-four years, spent long hours and sometimes days in discussion and were also linked by many practical concerns. While the documents reflecting the relationship between Strauss and Mahler remained unpublished, knowledge of what they had in common was gradually

As

lost.

Alma Mahler published

early as 1924 1

volume of

a

This volume, containing

letters

by her

by Mahler to friends and colleagues, does not print a single one of the many letters which Mahler addressed to Strauss. Even more surprising, there is deceased husband.

no indication that such

letters exist.

Now

it

a total of

is

but

it

no

is

refused to have

but one that

is

dence

2

it

Alma

letters intention-

owner of the letters, a mere supposition, 1939, when Alma Mahler

less plausible that Strauss, as the

them published

in 1924. This, too,

reinforced by Strauss's refusal in

sought permission to print

Mahler. So

letters

conceivable that

Mahler, always ill-disposed towards Strauss, omitted the ally,

420

came about

a

number of

that these

letters

is

addressed by Strauss to

two important collections of correspon-

contain neither letters from Mahler to Strauss nor letters from

Strauss to Mahler.

After the Second

World War

in the Strauss literature

isolated letters

by Mahler

logues, and in published selections such as Die Welt Briefen.

2,

to Strauss

appear

— in biographies, exhibitions and exhibition um Richard

cata-

Strauss

in

But none of these went beyond individual publications that could 103

Rivalry and Friendship not reflect either the extent of the correspondence or the relationship

A

between the two composers.

comprehensive publication was not

attempted, as the whereabouts of the letters written by Strauss to Mahler

was unknown. Whereas Mahler's

letters to Strauss are

kept almost without

exception in the archive of his heirs in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Strauss's letters to

Mahler were never

collected and preserved.

despite years of searching, only

been located. Thus,

as

opposed

some of the

Even

to the sixty-three letters

lished here, there are only twenty-eight

for this edition,

letters originally written

by Strauss, and of these

have been preserved only in transcripts by Alma Mahler. disappeared, probably with a legacy, during the air raids

Mahler appears always

number of

on Vienna

to

have

by Mahler pub-

The

a

dozen

originals

other documents from Mahler's

in 1945.

have been rather careless with

letters sent to

many away. Only this can explain why so fewletters addressed to him have come to light in public and private collections, in auction houses, and among dealers. After her husband's death Alma him, and to have thrown

documents from the years 1880 to 4 This is known to Whether there were us. similar the only collection of this kind portfolios from later years is not known. However, Mahler's sisters Justine and Emma kept a number of letters addressed to him whose writers seemed

Mahler discovered

a portfolio containing

1886, including letters from his parents and brothers and sisters.

interesting to them, and in this way, with letters by Pietro Mascagni and Anton Bruckner, some by Strauss have survived. But these are only isolated and their fragments. The great majority of all letters addressed to Mahler number can be estimated from his replies must be regarded as lost. Alma Mahler, it is true, published a number of letters to Mahler from the period

—

—

1904-10, in her memoirs,

5

but these few pieces look

rather than a considered selection archive.

The

like

chance discoveries

from an abundant correspondence

twelve letters from Strauss that

Alma

originally

wanted

to

incorporate in her book on Mahler and that probably survive only in her transcripts, likewise

have

this

random character about them. To sum up,

it

can be said that even from the years of Mahler's marriage no letters to him

have turned up, not even his

own remain

letters

from

his wife,

and without these some of

incomprehensible.

Those contemporaries who knew Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss personally often mentioned them in the same breath, yet they were also 104

Rivalry and Friendship

means

generally seen as radically opposed: antithetical in their musical

temperaments and personalities. Ludwig Schiedermair, who knew both composers in Munich before the turn of the and goals

as in their

century,

characterized

diverging

their

natures

follows:

as

Strauss, the productive artist deliberately pursuing his goal

on firm ground however high he aspired

his feet

sumed by goals.

.' .

— Gustav

his artistic intensity, struggling restlessly

'Richard

and keeping

Mahler, con-

towards the

loftiest

6

.

Mahler himself was aware, only too aware, of the traits of character that him from Strauss, and emphasized them on many occasions. In a letter to the music critic Arthur Seidl in 1897 (see p. 122) he described his relationship to Strauss in terms of Schopenhauer's image of two miners distinguished

tunnelling from opposite directions,

Alma Mahler's memoirs Mahler later years.

'Mahler used

who

also

eventually meet.

used

this

image

to say,' she writes, 'that Strauss

our tunnels from different sides of the same mountain.

some

day.'

'

According

to

in conversation in

and

I

are digging

We shall surely meet

8

No comparable statement by

To him Mahler whose achievements as a composer and conductor he acknowledged; but his relationship to Mahler was not burdened with psychological problems. The curious metaphor of the mountain chosen by Mahler, which expresses his ambivalent attitude to Strauss, undoubtedly did not come to was

a colleague,

perhaps even

him by chance. He

felt

that

Strauss has been recorded.

a friend,

between himself and

his colleague there

mountain blocking the view each had of the other, was conditioned by

a

was

a

a climatic barrier that

fundamental difference of being. 'Mahler and Strauss

enjoyed each other's conversation, perhaps because they were never of the

same opinion,' Alma Mahler records. 9 However, the antithesis was much common ground. When they first met in 1887 they were both under the spell of Richard Wagner, who was still a controversial figure. Both were composing and knew enough of their craft to see before long that it was they— Strauss and Mahler who were to show music the way after Wagner. Both earned their livings as orchestral conductors, overlaid by

—

both suffered under the inadequacies of the theatre business. If Mahler

and Strauss took such different directions as composers despite their

common

experience of Wagner, they nevertheless

felt

that they were

partners.

By origin they were as unlike as Munich musician, the other of

night and day: one the son of a respected a

Jewish 105

distiller

from the Bohemian

Rivalry and Friendship village of Kaliste. In Strauss's

and

younger

a

sister,

on

home

whom

there were only two children, Richard

parental love and attention were focused,

while Mahler had thirteen siblings of whom eight died in childhood. Here a

childhood darkened by poverty and death, there a happy one. Strauss was a

good pupil. His cheerful temperament and ite

who even turned

with his teachers,

lively

a blind

mind made him a favourwhen he composed in

eye

lessons. Alongside the usual instrumental lessons he received instruction

from colleagues of his father

in

harmony and counterpoint, and, while still a conservatory, he made his bow a composer. When he was twenty, Hans von

at school,

without having ever visited

before the

Munich audience

as

Biilow, the leading conductor of his time, accepted for performance the

wind serenade, Op. mental tuition his parental

7,

by the young Strauss. Mahler,

in early childhood,

home

tory at Vienna.

at fifteen

He made

and go with

iQOi,

drawer

as a

all,

These

to the conserva-

Lied,

for

life, it

is

at

first

time in

the Court Opera. If

it

is

stamp the human personality, the

can be understood

who

still

which remained

manuscript and was performed for the

the harbinger of suffering

bestower of

means

composed Das klagende

true that childhood and early youth

above

too, received instru-

musician he had to leave

insufficient

when Mahler had long been Director of

artist's

a

ends meet by giving piano lessons while

school himself. At twenty he in his

but to become

known

why Mahler developed

to us,

into

and Strauss into the

joy.

deliberately

simplified labels should not, of course, give the

and failure, while That was not the case. If Strauss got his works accepted more quickly, Mahler had an immense advantage as a conductor, for we find him installed as Director of the Royal Hungarian Opera House when Strauss had to be glad of a place as second conductor at Weimar. The frequent journeys which are part of the conductor's profession brought Strauss and Mahler relatively often together, even though they never spent a long period in the same place. When they stayed for a few days in the same town, they spent a large part of their free time together. Between these personal meetings they exchanged letters. This connection was never broken off in the twenty-four years of their acquaintance, even though times of frequent meetings and numerous letters alternate with impression that Mahler's

life

was spent

in renunciation

Strauss hastened from one easy conquest to the next.

periods of sparser contacts. as

it

The

has been preserved and

is

presentation of their correspondence, as far

accessible,

now makes

it

possible for the

first

time to reconstruct the personal relationship between Strauss and Mahler 106

Rivalry and Friendship in its entirety.

from the

This attempt also makes use of throw

letters, that are able to

light

all

the other sources, apart

on these

artists' friendship.

In October 1887 Richard Strauss, at that time third conductor at the

Munich Opera, came

to Leipzig

been second conductor

where

for

about

at the Stadttheater.

a

The

year Gustav Mahler had

occasion for the journey

was the concert given by the Gewandhaus Orchestra on 13 October,

which Strauss conducted he

his

made Mahler's acquaintance

Mahler met frequently

at

F minor Symphony. How and through whom

in his

not known.

is

Max

Steinitzer,

whom

Leipzig days, probably played a part, for

many decades later Strauss wrote the following in his so-called 'Grey 'Max Steinitzer, my later biographer and a friend of my youth, had sung the praises of Mahler, who was a conductor in Leipzig and was Diary':

10

arranging posthumous sketches of Weber's Drei Pintos.'

correct, Steinitzer probably also introduced the

two

young conductors, the 27-year-old Mahler and the 23-year-old Strauss.

We

If this recollection

may suppose

is

that Strauss's

name was

already familiar to Mahler, not only

from Steinitzer's accounts but through the very frequent performanabove

ces of his works,

all

F minor Symphony. This work, which

the

according to Steinitzer contains

'a

great deal of genuine Strauss' but

within the framework of strict form',

New York

1 1

had had

its first

'still

performance, by the

Philharmonic Society, as early as December 1884; Franz

Wüllner had conducted the German

first

performance

Cologne, which

in

had been followed by renditions under Strauss in Meiningen, under

Hermann Levi

Munich, under Robert Radecke in Berlin, under Jean Dresden and under Hans von Biilow in Hamburg. Mahler must also have known that in the 1885-6 season Strauss had been Music Director under Biilow at the court of Meiningen, a position that Mahler himself had passionately desired. When he was underemployed and utterly Louis Nicode

in

in

Music Director in Kassel, he had heard Biilow conducting the Meiningen orchestra and had sent to him an extravagantly worded petition dejected as

culminating in the words: loveliest thing

I

'When

at yesterday's

had dimly hoped

for, it

was

concert

I

saw me:

clear to

fulfilled the

this is

your

homeland— this is your master — now your wandering shall end, or never! And now I am here and ask you: Take me with you — in whatever form — let 12 me be your pupil, even if I must pay my fees in blood. That had been written at the end of 1884, and Mahler had come far as a .'

.

conductor since then, even without Billow's help. But as io 7

a

.

composer he had

Rivalry and Friendship not yet

made an appearance,

performed

we

if

disregard three songs that had been

Prague concert [18 April 1886]. Indeed,

at a

especially if

we compare him with

surprisingly

little.

for his years,

the younger Strauss, he had produced

In 1887 Carl Maria von Weber's sketches for the comic

opera Die drei Pintos came to Mahler's notice in Leipzig and he undertook to produce,

from these scanty fragments and other music by Weber,

a stage

version that could be performed. Naturally there was not only a lot of

harmonizing and instrumentation to be done, there were parts

completed and even to be composed, but

had

to hide

much

behind Weber.

pleasure, but

it

It

was

a piece of restoration that

was not work

in

to

be

Mahler gave Mahler

for reasons of expediency

which

his

own

personality could be

fully expressed.

On

29 October 1887, soon after his return to Munich, Strauss sent

von Biilow

a report

on

his stay at Leipzig, in

which he spoke

at

Hans

length of

Mahler.

made

a

seemed

to

I

new, very delightful acquaintance

me a highly

intelligent

in

Herr Mahler, who

musician and conductor; one of the few

modern conductors who knows about tempo

and

modification,

in

general had excellent views, particularly on Wagner's tempi (contrary to

those of the

now

accredited

Wagner

conductors).

Mahler's arrangement of Weber's Drei Pintos seems to piece; the first act, ... I think

you

which Mahler played

will also

enjoy

to

me,

I

me

a master-

found quite delightful

13 it!

On this enthusiastic recommendation Biilow studied the

vocal score and,

undeterred by the success of the Leipzig premiere of the Drei Pintos,

condemned

it

utterly. In a letter

of 27

vigorously, accusing

him of

with the best will

was impossible

it

work: 'No matter whether

it

March 1888 he reprimanded

'acute lack of judgement' to find

anything praiseworthy in the

Weberizes or Mahlerizes

difference— the whole thing

is

Strauss

and declaring that

— by Jove

infamous, antiquated rubbish.'

it

makes no

14

In face of this rejection by the conductor who, in his eyes and probably in

Mahler's too, was the highest musical authority in Germany, Strauss beat a retreat.

He

could more easily justify a change of mind because the Drei

Pintos, in the course of their short-lived triumphal procession across the

German

stage,

were

just

then being rehearsed in Munich.

On

7 April,

therefore, Strauss wrote a letter of apology to Biilow.

With

the

most

heartfelt thanks for

your kind

108

letter, that

gave

me

colossal

Rivalry and Friendship pleasure, justified

me

to

I

should only

to confess

how

reproach concerning the Drei Pintos.

recommend

(which

like

in

a

work

conception

is

for

salutory has been your

almost entirely by

was dreadfully hasty of

It

only knew the first act Weber and which still does not

your perusal when

I

seem so bad to me, so that my lack of judgement must indeed be chronic). At the rehearsal yesterday I saw Acts II and III and completely understand vour horror, they really are extremely mediocre and tedious. In the instrumentation Mahler has perpetrated

some dreadful blunders,

using three trumpets, trombones and tuba in the simplest passages; he constantly writes upper Fs and as high as

Gs

for the oboes,

and

a ^ on the F horn; and from a conductor!

for the

I

now

horns goes

see, too, that

you are quite right about the orthographic slovenliness. But the worst fifths at the

end of the

saw them myself

C

major vocal

in the sketches.

As

Act III

trio in I

said,

... are

knew only

I

by Weber, the

I

first act,

which Mahler had played to me on the piano with great enthusiasm; some of this must have infected me, so that I most deeply regret that you,

most revered master, have been the innocent victim of rashness.

my

youthful

15

Unfortunately we have no document describing Mahler's impression of Strauss and his symphony.

Nor do we know how

the relationship

Leipzig developed in the time immediately following the

can suppose with some certainty that Mahler,

first

begun

meeting.

in

We

who left his Leipzig post Munich in the summer,

prematurely in spring 1888 and spent some time in visited Strauss

on

this occasion.

The

very

first letter

been preserved (p. 10) makes such Possibly, Strauss even attempted to persuade that has

by Mahler

a contact

to Strauss

seem probable.

Hermann Levi to perform March 1888, as far as a

Mahler's First Symphony, that had been finished in 'third conductor'

could persuade a

'first'

to

do anything. In one of the

notebooks containing Strauss's recollections we read:

'I

visited

him

fre-

quently in his apartment where there were fine Feuerbachs, Böcklins and

Thomas on

the walls, and once played [with] him the humorous funeral march from Mahler's First Symphony (about 1888), sight-reading fourhanded from the manuscript score.' 16 In October 1888 Mahler was appointed Opera Director in Budapest, an office that made such heavy demands on him that from this period of his life noticeably fewer letters by him have been preserved than from earlier or later years. The only existing letter from Mahler to Strauss from the

wg

Rivalry and Friendship Budapest period

(p.

20) confirms, at any rate, that

had not been broken

oft'

all

and that personal meetings

In the autumn of 1891 we Budapest— first conductor at likewise forced to leave his

find

Mahler

— forced

contact between

them

also took place.

by intrigues

to leave

Hamburg Stadttheater and Strauss— native city Munich — second conductor in the

Weimar. As on many previous occasions, Hans von Billow had helped to advance the young Strauss's career by recommending him to the GrandDucal Intendant at Weimar. Biilow himself, now old and in poor health, conducted the Philharmonic Concerts in Berlin and a concert cycle in Hamburg, where he lived. Biilow anecdotes were rife in the city; he and his eccentric wit were a topic of conversation in every musical circle; and as he

had switched his loyalty from his previous idols Liszt and Wagner to Brahms, a native of Hamburg, he was revered as a higher being. Mahler

now saw

the opportunity to establish the contact with Biilow that he had

approved by him

striven for in vain for years, to be

perhaps even performed. respect as a conductor.

words on

its

He

as a

composer and

quite quickly succeeded in gaining Billow's

Testimony of

this

was

ribbon, 'To the Pygmalion of the

a laurel

wreath with these

Hamburg Opera. Hans von

too, in a manner in keeping with his somewhat exalted showed how much he esteemed his young colleague. While conducting he would turn towards him, pass him the score and point out 17 particular passages to him. In the autumn of 1891 Mahler had an opportunity to play him one of his compositions on the piano, and chose the first movement of his as yet unfinished C minor Symphony. While playing he looked up and saw that Biilow had his fingers to his ears. This experience— the collapse of a hope long nurtured was described by Mahler in a number of conversations and letters, including a letter to Richard Strauss (p. 21). This letter is written in a confiding, almost comradely tone, suggesting that the friendship between the two composers had become closer in the preceding period. Mahler must have been aware that his post at Hamburg was much more important, and also better paid, than Strauss's at Weimar. If he nevertheless presents himself as universally rejected and unrecognized this shows us that, for him, as now by Biilow success as a composer was the only real success. The friend in whom he confided was, however, no longer the Richard Strauss of the F minor Symphony, but a 'musician of the future'. Turning his back on the paternal influence and on strict form in general, with programmatic orchestral works like the symphonic fantasia Aus Italien and the symphonic poems Macbeth, Don Juan and Tod und Verklärung, he had conquered the concert halls as

Biilow.'

At concerts,

nature, Biilow

—

—

—

1

10

Rivalry and Friendship rapidly

— though there was no lack of attacks by conservative critics— as he

had done

same

earlier with his

which he

letter in

wind serenade and

his

symphony. When,

in the

by Bülow Mahler asks Strauss

relates his rejection

,

Don Juan and Tod und Verklärung, may have been looking for the recipe for

impres-

for the scores of

this gives the

sion that he

success that he lacked

and which,

knew It was possibly in such a mood that 'Symphony in C Minor' on the cover sheet of

in his opinion, Strauss

Mahler crossed out the words

.

the score he wrote in 1888, and replaced

October

Schott Verlag for publication as a

by the

that

is,

adding further movements to

direction taken by Strauss, was submitting a

movement.

It

was doubtless from such

Symphony which had had 1889, he added

To Mahler's almost

all

('.

.

was of so

that

woeful

.

in the

14 to

this

we may

finishing the

symphonic poem in a single with what he took to be

a flirtation

when

revising his First

— unsuccessful — premiere

borrowed from Jean Paul

titles

E.T.A. Hoffmann

its

On

labelled

'Totenfeier'.

and, in keeping w ith the

it,

the compelling fashion of the day that in 1893,

gramme

title

movement thus 18 'symphonic poem'. From

Mahler had abandoned the idea of

infer that at that time

symphony,

it

he offered the symphony

1891

manner of

in

Budapest in and

('Titan', see p. 23)

Callot'), thus suggesting a pro-

help to the music that he later withdrew them.

little

letter

from that period,

— his reply, like — to have reacted in a very friendly and

of autumn 1891 Strauss seems is

lost

comradely manner. As emerges from his

letter

of October 1893

(p. 24)

him scores, and have them performed.

Strauss had asked his colleague two years before to send

may

possibly have held out the prospect of helping to

At any

rate Strauss

access, to have

seems

in this letter, to

adopted for the

first

maintained tow ards Mahler up to the

which we unfortunately have no

time the attitude which he then

latter's death,

and on which he prided

himself even in his memoirs: that of the discoverer and patron whose

concern

was that Mahler's costly and gigantic scores should not

it

unperformed

lie

in his drawer.

Behind Mahler's hesitation between symphony and symphonic poem, his toying w ith fanciful titles, there lay a problem that exercised Mahler himself for many years and that has worried musicology up to the present: the problem of the programmatic element in his music. Constantin

and behind

Floros has attempted to demonstrate that Mahler

is

wrongly

classified as

an

absolute musician and should rather be considered a typical programmatic

composer.

19

His argument

Mahler prior

to 1900,

these statements

is

based primarily on things said and written by

when he renounced programmes

Mahler proclaims an

'inner

programme'

for all time. In

in his

works and

Rivalry and Friendship

Second Symphony he was concerned

stresses that in the conception of his

'never with the detailed description of a process but at most with a 20 Taken strictly, Mahler's account of his procedure here feeling'. is

far removed from Strauss's, who wrote the following programme of the symphonic fantasia Aus Italien, written 'The frightening lack of judgement and understanding shown

by no means

postscript to the

by himself:

by the majority of critics causes them, and a large part of the public, to be induced by perhaps dazzling but purely superficial aspects of my work into misunderstanding or even completely overlooking its real content. This is

made up of beauty of

feelings aroused

Rome and

by contemplating the splendours and natural

Naples, not of descriptions of them.

.' .

21

.

Despite this consonance, the fundamental differences of view between Mahler and Strauss should not be overlooked. These manifest themselves, for example, in their attitudes to the symphonic poems of Franz Liszt. In the

summer

Totenfeier

of 1893,

when Mahler added

Lechner of his decision I

a

second and third movement

have given

to retain the traditional designation

much thought

what

... to

I

should

order to give an indication of the content by the

my

to

— two more were to follow — he spoke to his friend Natalie Bauer-

word

intentions in one

and nothing

else!

Terms

worn out without having

at least.

call

my symphony,

and

title

'symphony'.

to

in

comment on

But

let it always be called 'symphony' poem' and 'symphonic poem' are anything, and one should only think

like 'tone

really said

of Liszt's compositions in which, without any deeper coherence, each

movement

depicts something of

Mahler's antipathy for Liszt

its

is all

own.

the

22

more surprising because,

since his

student days in Vienna, he had been a fanatical Wagnerian, and at that time

Wagner and Liszt went hand in hand. At the age of when Strauss, still entirely under the influence of his father, condemned Wagner and was 'bored stiff' by Siegfried, Mahler was already a member of the Wagner Society in Vienna. All the same, he never became an adherent of Liszt and his 'New German School'. partisanship of

seventeen,

Mahler

said that his opinion of Liszt

Strauss's.

thought as

'When we little

highest esteem.

workmanship of

met he

of Liszt as I

shall

his

tion, as the threads

visible

last

and palpable

I

was diametrically opposed to me that he had earlier

[Strauss] told

do, but had later

never do that.

come

The meagre

compositions are as open to

to hold his

work

in

content and shoddy

view.,

on close inspec-

of an ill-woven garment that become everywhere after

it

has been worn for a short time.' 112

23

Rivalry and Friendship Strauss had been educated in the most extreme musical conservatism by his father, the

horn player Franz Strauss, revering Haydn, Mozart, Beetho-

ven and Mendelssohn, and condemning Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner.

When

the 21 -year-old Strauss was working under Bülow,

ceased being

composer Alexander who,

Ritter,

who had long know the

devotee of Wagner, in Meiningen, he got to

a

Ritter,

like Strauss,

who was

a

member of the Meiningen

orchestra.

subsequently lived in Munich, converted the son Liszt.

He

explained to him the significance of these composers in the history of

art,

of the anti-Wagnerian Franz Strauss to the creed of

Wagner and

urged him to read Wagner's writings, and in so doing imparted to him the intolerance that was as prevalent

among

the

'New Germans'

as

all

among

Richard Strauss's talent was too strong and original for

their opponents.

mere imitator of Wagner or Liszt as a result of Ritter's took over from them as a principle of his own creation he himself formulated in his essay 'From my Youth and Apprenticeship': 'New ideas must seek new forms this basic principle of Liszt's symphonic works, in which the poetic idea was indeed also the formative element, from 24 then on became the guiding thread of my own symphonic works.' The clear rapprochement between Mahler and Strauss in 189 1 suffered an interruption. At the beginning of May 1892, Strauss was taken ill with pneumonia and spent almost the whole of the following year in the

him

become

to

instruction.

a

What he

—

Mediterranean region.

The 1893-4 brought ill

and

a

season, in which Strauss

change

frail

in

German

that he could not

Out of consideration

series.

did not at

musical

first

resumed

life.

his service in

Weimar, had

Hans von Bülow had become

so

Hamburg concert organizer, Hermann Wolff,

conduct his Berlin and

for the invalid the

look for a successor but engaged a different conductor for

almost every concert. Strauss conducted two of the Berlin concerts; in the

Hamburg

subscription series Strauss and Mahler took over one evening

each. This

development gave

rise to a

very intensive correspondence of

which, unfortunately, again only Mahler's part

is

extant, as well as a

personal meeting between Strauss and Mahler in January 1894.

On

22

January 1894 Strauss wrote to his parents from Hamburg: 'Yesterday we had the final rehearsal, which went very well and in which {hornbile dictu) the audience enjoyed

who

is

and

Bride,

a

Dr Behn, who spoil me with

to Billow's; the ,' 25

hour.

.

"Mazeppa" most.

I

spend much time with Mahler,

very charming and conducted a capital performance of the Bartered

.

I

have been twice

sat

with us for an

their hospitality.

second time he showed himself and

Rivalry and Friendship

Not only Mahler's personal conduct, but also his letters from this period show how hard he was trying to oblige his colleague. He invited him to stay with him the next time he visited Hamburg; he suggested Strauss might entrust the first performance of his first stage work, Guntram, to the

Hamburg his

Stadttheater; he described his efforts to persuade the director, Pollini, to accept the

Bernhard

own pocket

Guntram,

to

solely

work; he offered Strauss 1,000 marks from

pay the copyist.

And

all

that before he

knew

the score of

on Strauss's name and on the impression Strauss had given

Hamburg. Mahler was thus

in a similar position to

Strauss's earlier vis-a-vis the Drei Pintos, that he

had somewhat prema-

him on the piano

in

turely extolled to Biilow;

way, probably as

a similar

1894

in

and Mahler corrected

Weimar.

To

a result

his attitude to

Guntram

of the performance he attended in

in

May

an unknown correspondent and about an unidentified

work he wrote, 'Apart from Guntram I have never met with anything so 26 immature and at the same time so pretentious.'

childishly

This verdict clearly did not apply, however,

to the orchestral parts of the

Mahler included the Preludes to the first and second acts of Guntram in his concert programmes, not only in Hamburg but in 1899 in Vienna, and even a decade later in New York. Even after the Weimar performance Mahler tried with total commitment to have Guntram rehearsed at Hamburg. Director Pollini rejected the work. Perhaps his resistance was based on healthy theatrical instinct, for Guntram did not succeed on any German stage, but perhaps the negotiations he had had with Strauss over a post at Hamburg played a part. This is a somewhat opaque and uncongenial episode in the Mahler-Strauss relationship, unopera, for

congenial because neither of first

contract

Strauss, tired of the

He

them acted with complete

integrity.

Hamburg Stadttheater was running Weimar provincialism, was on the lookout

with the

Mahler's out and for a

new

—

return— in an elevated position to Munich, but despite many promises the negotiations became very protracted. It was in this situation that his discussions with Pollini began, though it is not known whether Strauss approached Pollini or Pollini Strauss. As early as January 1894 he wrote of his plans to his father, even mentioning the amount of his prospective annual income: 'Whether I have a lot of work and vexation here [in Weimar] or in Hamburg makes no difference; but it does make a difference whether I have a salary of i2,oooM in Hamburg or 3,000 in post.

really

Weimar.'

wanted

to

27

Although started in

with Pollini must have Mahler of them until the

this letter indicates that his negotiations

December

1893, he did not inform 114

Rivalry and Friendship beginning of February. We know that he conducted a concert in Hamburg on 22 January and spent much time with Mahler. Despite this, he made his which has not been preserved and chose, negotiations known in a letter

—

—

hardly by accident, the day after he had sent Mahler a piece of good news

Symphony in Weimar. Mahler showed himself very taken aback by the negotiations between Pollini and Strauss (pp. 28 and 29), but was able to announce after a few days that Pollini had offered him a new contract in which all his conditions were concerning the performance at his First

accepted

(p. 29).

This suggests that

in his fear for his

may have made a number of concessions Pollini.

That

neously

is

Pollini ever intended to

to

come

to

Hamburg post Mahler

an early agreement with

engage Strauss and Mahler simulta-

very unlikely, and Mahler's speculations on such a possibility

(p.

way of concealing from Strauss that he had been worsted. Shrewd as Mahler may seem to have been in this murky affair, director Pollini was still shrewder. For it was undoubtedly, as Mahler suspected, one of Pollini's manoeuvres designed to dislodge Mahler from his 'superior present position' (p. 29). On 7 February, with the new contract just safely concluded, Mahler wrote to a Budapest colleague, the 29) were probably only a tactful

He was

composer Ödön von Mihalovich. that Mihalovich if

had submitted

for

returning an opera manuscript

performance

at

Hamburg, and wrote

as

he were on the point of leaving Hamburg.

My contract with Pollini

runs out this year. ...

It is

not as

if Pollini

has

He was ready to make every material sacrifice; but he claims he cannot meet my artistic conditions, to which, as you know, I attach far more importance than to my personal interests; and so I am resolved once more to 'shake the dust from my feet'! As far as I know discussions are already under way with Strauss in Weimar, who told me not tried to renew

he would as

I

know

like to

it.

be

my successor here.

that splendid

That was the

first

and

man, he too last

selves in direct competition.

I

is

pity the poor fellow already, for 28

not one for concessions.

time that Mahler and Strauss found them-

They

did not bear each other malice over

it.

In

Mahler even admitted that he would gladly have Hamburg post if there had only been a place free for

a letter to his sister Justine let

Strauss have his

him somewhere wanted

all

autumn of

On

else (see p.

117).

And

along, the conducting post in

Strauss finally got what he had

Munich

that he took

up

in the

1894.

12 February 1894

Hans von

man He was

Biilow, the grand old

music, died in Cairo where he had been seeking a cure.

of

German

the son-in-

Rivalry and Friendship

prophet of Richard Wagner,

husband of his daughter Cosima; he was the a prophet whose wife Wagner took. Reacting

against the experience with

Wagner he became

law of Franz Liszt, the

first

the friend and patron of

Johannes Brahms; he discovered Richard Strauss and failed to recognize Gustav Mahler. Strauss had long outgrown his influence but continued to honour his mentor's memory, as we can read in his memoirs, Erinnerungen an Hans von Bülow. \

development of

my

Alexander Ritter,

me— the

out of

.

.

touching sympathy for me, his influence in the

his

was

artistic capacity

who

— apart

most decisive

Mahler's recollections of von Bülow were of not write

them down. In honour of the

Beethoven's

from the friendship of

my good father made moment in my career.' 29

to the chagrin of

and

'Eroica',

the

memorial

a different kind;

service

Second Symphony, which has provided food 30

'You

shall rise, shall rise again

my

Wagnerian he did

great deceased he conducted

Michaeliskirche gave him the inspiration for the

lysts:

a

for

flesh

last

the Hamburg movement of his

in

thought for psychoana-

from brief repose.

.' .

.

In the following season, 1894-5, tne two voun g conductors so unequally

by von Bülow became

treated

Subscription Concerts in Berlin.

The two crown

his heirs.

Mahler took over the cycle of new

Hamburg, Strauss

the Philharmonic Concerts in

and inexper-

princes, however, clearly too reckless

ienced, held their positions for only this one season.

As

early as spring

1894 Strauss succeeded in furthering his friend

He

persuaded his superior, the Weimar Intendant Hans

Mahler's interests.

Bronsart von Schellenberg, to perform Mahler's First Symphony. For

some

years Bronsart had been President of the Allgemeiner Deutscher

much

Musikverein [German Musical Society] and his word carried

weight

programme for the annual musical Festival. In 1894 this Festival — for which the somewhat archaic term Tonkünstlerversammlung was used — was to take place in Weimar. Strauss offered to hold the preliminary rehearsals of the First Symphony, since Mahler was not able to in

deciding the

leave

Hamburg

until just before the

Shortly before leaving for

performance.

Weimar Mahler wrote

his sister Justine,

who

enjoyed his complete confidence, a letter portraying his relationship to Strauss.

...

I

have spent

untruthful

a great deal

if I said that

loped.— I

see

of today.

We

many

more and more

of time with Strauss. But

I

should be

points of contact between us had deve-

that

I

have divergent goals.

am quite alone among From my standpoint

116

the musicians I

can discern

Rivalry and Friendship everywhere only old classical or New German pedantry. Hardly has Wagner been recognized and understood than the usual army of bigots (claiming to be the sole dispensers of salvation) come and surround the

whole terrain with ramparts against true changing the old, even

and

in recreating

just

such

it

if it is

from the needs of the

out.

But a likeable fellow all the same, as far Whether it is all genuine has yet to be seen.

between ourselves, for he to fall out with

my

becoming

is

him

'of

all

the gods

my

and have nothing

myself with. But

to reproach

me

I

all

am,

you can see from Strauss

To

could

I

All this

— and

have tried everything in

ness closes for as

as

I

at present.

.

.

.

my

is

do not

should have gladly made way for him

I

—

doors to

in

he did speculate slightly on

too. Incidentally,

successor, and

only friend'

had only found another place.

worst.

which always consists

a pontiff.

make him want

life,

more significant than the new, moment. Strauss in particular is

greater and

And

it I

seems that

am

if I

this direction

my Jewish-

lucky to be where

post here

is

I

by no means the

31 .

.

.

understand Mahler's fundamental reserve towards the 'likeable

fel-

how intolerantly Strauss was behaving at the time and how far the 'New German pedantry' was obstructing his view of the musical scene. The New German School had come into being under Franz low'

we have

to realize

Liszt's leadership in close allegiance to

programme music

at the centre

Wagner, and had placed symphonic

of their creation. Their works were dissemi-

nated by the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein brought into being by Liszt,

and publicized by the Neue

Ritter's influence Strauss

sidedness did not

lie

Zeitschrift für

became caught up

in its glorification

Musik. Through Alexander

in this

movement.

Its

one-

of Liszt and programme music, but

The admissible composers inWagner and, of course, Liszt himself.

in its repudiation of all other tendencies.

cluded Beethoven, W^eber, Berlioz,

The

Italians

were proscribed, and likewise

the French, and of the Slavs at

—

—

leaving aside Hector Berlioz most Smetana was acknowledged. But the

arch-enemy, the target of all diatribes and scorn, was Johannes Brahms. In

February 1894 Mahler had seen Strauss refuse to conduct a concert because he had been asked, in memory of Bülow, to include a work by Brahms. Mahler, although

a

Wagnerian, was not

a

doctrinaire musician.

advocated Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Bedfich Smetana; he was the admirers of Mascagni; he espoused the cause of a opera, Joseph and his Brothers, by Etienne

— now

He

among

forgotten

Mehul, and did not even draw back before Giacomo Meyerbeer. The work he happened to be rehearsing

Rivalry and Friendship

was accorded his complete devotion. Mahler undoubtedly also rehearsed Brahms's Third Symphony with enthusiasm for the Hamburg concert, for he held Brahms in high esteem despite having been, since his student days, a disciple all

of Anton Bruckner. Throughout his

Mahler kept aloof from

life

factions and sided only with quality. Even his antipathy for Liszt did not

prevent him from appreciating and arranging performances of his Legende von der heiligen Elisabeth.

At the

thirtieth Festival of the

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein

in

Guntram by Richard Strauss and Hansel and Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck were presented. The main symphonic work of the Festival was Mahler's First Symphony, which at the time bore the title 'Titan'. The work had an unfavourable reception, on account of inadequate preparation, the confusing title Mahler had devised while revising the score and undoubtedly also because of the formal difficulties the work posed to

Weimar

the operas

the audience of the time. Until the end of Mahler's

of sorrow

mostly

among

his

symphonic

reviews

negative

where he was spending receiving them:

offspring.

and sent them

'Many thanks

critic is

What had

.

at

the

Attersee

mid-June Mahler acknowledged sending the reviews. I found them

for

drollest of

not entirely 32 the author of the worst reviews!' .

Mahler

to

remained the child

friend collected the

his vacation. In

most diverting. You do not know the from another quarter.

life it

A Hamburg

.

Str.

is

them, which came to

me

above suspicion! His favourite

taken place between Strauss and Mahler in Weimar, and what

caused Mahler to harbour and express this monstrous suspicion of

Strauss— for only he can have been meant— is not known. Nor can it be who is meant by the favourite critic. The epithet would

ascertained exactly best

fit

Arthur Seidl,

a friend

of Strauss's youth, or the Berlin music editor

Otto Lessmann. Possibly Strauss made sensitively.

criticism

The

Even

in his

mature years— as we

from Strauss, although he cared

objections Strauss raised to the

comment during

a critical

rehearsals or after the performance of 'Titan', to

shall see

little

Symphony

the

which Mahler reacted

— he could not endure

for the opinion of others.

are

known

to us

because he

communicated them to Mahler in writing. Although Strauss's letter is lost, we can infer from Mahler's reply that Strauss had advised him to shorten the final movement, which Mahler declined to do, giving detailed reasons (P- 37).

We should no merit

not,

however, conclude from

in the First

Symphony. The

heard the work on 3 June 1894 in

this suggestion, that Strauss

critic

Ernst Otto Nodnagel,

Weimar and misunderstood 118

it

saw

who

entirely,

Rivalry and Friendship

among the few One might even

people

wrote later that Strauss had been

music new, but not confused'.

33

who found

'the

say that apart from his

Fourth Symphony, Strauss valued the First Symphony most among Mahler's works. The failure of the First Symphony in Weimar did not deter Strauss from including a further work by Mahler in the programme of the Berlin concert favourite, the

of

all

he was conducting as Billow's successor, the three instrumental

series

movements of the Second Symphony. As Strauss was a newcomer to Berlin and Mahler was as good as unknown, this represented a risk, though Strauss was clearly encouraged by the concert organizer

In the

programme of

Hermann

Wolff.

Philharmonic Concert on 4 March three movements of the unpublished sym-

his forty-ninth

1895 Strauss included the

first

phony, and invited Mahler to conduct the performance himself. Also present at this concert was the Austrian composer Wilhelm Kienzl,

between Strauss and the conductor Carl

The theme

of the

first

Muck

who

sat

in a box.

movement, vigorously introduced by the double

basses and developed expansively, impressed me. In the further course of the

movement

that held

my

attention throughout,

and instrumental audacities were

to

all

kinds of harmonic

be heard, particularly

a

stubbornly

who was

dissonant fortissimo passage for the brass. Richard Strauss, taking a rest from conducting during this number, had invited

myself to

sit

with him in an empty box to enjoy Mahler's work together.

At the passage to

me

Muck and

for brass just

mentioned Strauss,

sitting

on

my

left,

turns

with enthusiasm in his eyes, 'Believe me, there are no limits to

musical expression!' At the same time, to distorted with unmistakable revulsion

my

right,

Muck's

face

is

and the single word, 'Horrible!'

comes from between his teeth. I, 'the worldling betwixt', was moved to reflect on the divergent effects of art on natures differently constituted and on the eminent subjectivity of all artistic enjoyment. 34

The later

response to Mahler's

C minor Symphony was negative,

and decades

Strauss recalled that Otto Lessmann, the publisher of the Allgemeine

Musikzeitung, had scolded him with the words, 'the altar that Bülow

now been fouled b\ pygmies'. 35 Lessmann, who was active in the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein,

consecrated has

and like-minded people, no doubt took care that

name

for seven years

Mahler's

did not appear on their Festival programmes. Strauss, by contrast,

was an unwavering admirer of the Second Symphony and recommended his father to hear it when Mahler conducted the work at a concert of the

UQ

Rivalry and Friendship

Hugo Wolf

Society in the

C

conducting his

you want

autumn of 1900: 'On 20 October Mahler in Munich, a very interesting work.

If

you need only write

to

minor Symphony

to hear the general rehearsal,

a

few lines

is

36

Arthur Seidl (the secretary of the Hugo Wolf Society).' In 1895 and 1896, when their correspondence became sparser again

after

Guntram and Titan period, both composers worked for the first and last time in their lives on the same artistic task, the setting to music of Friedrich Nietzsche. How different were their temperaments and the prolific

approaches, and

how

divergent their interpretations of Nietzsche, can be

heard from the two works that sprang from this interaction of philosophy

and music. Strauss,

poem

in

keeping with his tendency, produced a symphonic

one movement lasting

good half-hour, entitled Also sprach most reserved work, the one most closely related to absolute music, from that period. Mahler composed a symphony in six movements lasting one-and-a-half hours that was originally furnished with movement titles and subtitles and was to be called 'Meine fröhliche in

Zarathustra.

It is his

By

Wissenschaft'.

most

a

serious,

the time

it

went

to print,

however, Mahler was a declared

opponent of all programmes and unceremoniously discarded the carefully considered and often-changed

poem 'O man,

take heed!'

titles.

All that

to

an

alto

forms the fourth movement of the symphony.

voice,

While Strauss translated

his

thoughts and feelings on reading Nietz-

sche's Zarathustra into music, Mahler's alto solo,

has

little

to

and animals

to

Dionysus of the in the last

Third Symphony, leaving aside the

do with Nietzsche.

expression to the whole of Nature

But

remained of Nietzsche was the

from Zarathustra which, entrusted

— from

He wanted

to give musical

inanimate rock through flowers

man, and beyond that to the divine. The pagan Pan or first movement might still be thought of as Nietzschean.

movement

the divine

is

embodied

neighbour and the motto, 'Father contemplate

my

in Christian love

of one's

wounds! Let no being be

forsaken!'

The his

musicologist

Ludwig Schiedermair, who knew both composers

in

youth and described them as antipodes, pointed explicitly to what they

had

in

common,

the concern with Nietzsche.

Like Richard Strauss, Gustav Mahler was affected by Nietzsche's spirituality. It is

not that either tried to dissolve and convert Nietzsche's ideas

directly into music, but rather that they

were inspired by them to

produce basic ideas of their own work. More extensively than Strauss in

his

Zarathustra (of 1896) Mahler grappled over and again with

Rivalry and Friendship Nietzsche's thought

— driven

testify

— as

his

However much they

nature.

make-up, they yet agreed

me

also

to escape the discord in his

own

spoken and written statements

by an unrelenting urge

differed in their physical

in their

and

intellectual

adherence to Nietzsche's

their productive reaction to the challenge of

to

and

art,

programme music.

in

37 .

.

,

Mahler would not have been pleased to hear this in his later years, as he programme music but Nietzsche as well. When, on a journey in 1906, he was asked by the composer Bernard Scharlitt about his repudiated not only

'point of contact' with Strauss, the musical

arrangement of Nietzsche, he

sidestepped the real problem: 'The explanation musicians, sensed what

work.

,' .

I

might

call

is

simply that we both, as

the latent music in Nietzsche's mightv

38

.

Strauss completed his 'Symphonic

poem

after Nietzsche' in

August

1896, and Mahler the first movement of his Third Symphony, the only one of the six that was still missing, at about the same time. In the same year, at

the end of

November

Zarathustra at to wait until

a

1896, Strauss conducted the

first

performance of

concert of the Frankfurt Museumsgesellschaft. Mahler had

1902 for a complete performance of his symphony, and would

perhaps have waited longer had not Strauss come to his

aid.

Who,

in face

of

such inequality before the public, could have entirely suppressed envy or

The Czech composer Josef Bohuslav Foerster, Hamburg period, observed how

jealousy?

Mahler could

not.

who was

a close friend

of Mahler's in his

preoccupied Mahler was with the 'Strauss our friendship

I

beginning of

case': 'Right at the

noticed that Mahler saw in Strauss his only rival; he got

hold of each of his scores, that were appearing in quick succession at

J.

Munich at the time, immersed himself in them, talked about them and made a number of pertinent criticisms, which were always wellAibl's in

founded and without

By saw

a trace

of denigration.'

39

the expression 'his only rival' Foerster probably

in Strauss his only equal, the

only one

meant

who counted

that

Mahler But

for him.

it because he remembered that at that time, in the Mahler had not been free of jealousy. Just as he had once, in Leipzig, envied Arthur Nikisch his fame as a conductor, he now witnessed the young Strauss's success with the critics with a vexation to which he sometimes gave utterance: 'Take the Strauss case! They [the critics] now

perhaps he also used 'nineties,

proclaim with mighty complacency that the days of unrecognized genius are over.

For behold: hardly has he appeared than we trumpet

Hurrah: from now on geniuses

will

be paid forthwith in cash!'

his praises!

40

Rivalry and Friendship

symphonic poems by Strauss already mentioned, the highly had recently been added. Mahler studied the new scores not only to learn from them, but also, no doubt, to mark himself off from them, to preserve his own sound and his own form. He drew the

To

the

effective Till Eulenspiegel

distinction above

one stroke,

He

all

by revising

not from one day

his attitude to

to the next,

programme music. Not

started in 1896 with the suppression of the

'Titan'

title

Symphony, and ended in 1900 with a ciation of programmes and all literary auxiliaries. Mahler, it is true, had never composed programme music subtitles of the First

had never

Strauss,

The

music.

at

but as part of a protracted process.

and

the

all

radical renun-

as practised

by

tried out the sculptural gestures of the Eulenspiegel

common

autobiographical element in his works had nothing in

with Strauss's self-portrayal in the Heldenleben. That the problems of

programme music were, Strauss, however, journalist

is

for

Mahler, connected with his relationship to

revealed by his brief correspondence with the music

Arthur Seidl,

a friend of Strauss's youth.

Of this

correspondence

too only Mahler's contribution has been preserved, but the content of Seidl's letter can be inferred, since

Mahler quotes from

it

in his reply

of 17

February 1897. It is curious how you have given me in a sense a clarification of myself. You have very aptly characterized my goals in contrast to those of Strauss. You are right that my 'music attains to a programme as its final

intellectual elucidation,

whereas

in Strauss the

the outset as a task to be performed'.

—

I

programme

is

given from

believe that in this you have

touched on the great enigmas of our time, and

at the

same time

stated the

either/or confronting us.

Mahler goes on

in his letter to

Arthur Seidl to

set

out the principles of his

composition, and finally expresses his gratification that recently a few of his

works have been performed. I

shall

me

initial impulse to produce them was given to magnanimous way. But no one should think I see

never forget that the

by Strauss

in a truly

myself as his 'competitor' that

I

(as

unfortunately often happens).

cannot regard two such people as

aside the fact that

I

a 'subtraction

should doubtless appear with

—

my

greatest pleasure to have found such a

creator

I

see

as a it

as

comrade-in-arms and fellow

among my contemporaries. Schopenhauer somewhere 122

repeat

works

monstrosity had not Strauss's successes paved the way for me,

my

I

sum'. Leaving

uses the

Rivalry and Friendship image of two miners tunnelling from opposite directions, who meet on their subterranean paths.

Strauss.

seem

— How lonely

if I

triumph.

I

This seems aptly

should

sum up my

to

relationship to

and how hopeless would

feel

my

striving

could not see such 'signs and miracles' as auguring future

When

way

in a

long harboured in secret.

me

so flattering to

'opposed poles' of the new magnetic

axis,

you

refer to us both as the

you express

a

view that

have

I

41 .

.

.

In the autumn of 1897 Mahler attained the highest position open to an

opera conductor

Joseph Six

I

by

at that time:

a

months previously Strauss had announced

Mahler

Emperor Franz

decree of 8 October the

appointed him director of his Imperial and Royal Opera in Vienna.

is

replacing Jahn at Vienna'.

42

to his parents that 'G.

Strauss was

in

still

Munich,

this

being his fourth year there, but though he was Court Conductor with the

same power

as

Hermann Levi had

had, he had only a two-year contract.

As

composer and conductor of his own works Strauss had by now succeeded in carrying his fame far beyond Germany's borders. At the time when Mahler was granted his Imperial appointment, Strauss was conducting two a

concerts at the

Amsterdam Concertgebouw,

in

which, with works by

Beethoven, Wagner and Berlioz, he presented two of his

own symphonic

poems. In mid-November we find him

programme

included three of his

own

November,

where,

in Brussels,

in

Barcelona with

a

compositions, and a few days at a

that

on 21

later,

popular concert, he played only his

own

Immediately afterwards he went to Paris and London, where

works.

Strauss songs and the symphonic

poems

Till Eulenspiegel

and Tod und

Verklärung were performed.

The

situation, therefore,

viously.

Mahler

composer. that he

To

still

was the same

had an advantage

begin with the Court Opera

had no time

anything

for

conducted more than

a

else.

as

it

had been ten years pre-

as opera conductor,

In his

and Strauss

as

made such demands on Mahler first

hundred performances,

Vienna season (1897-8) he in addition to rehearsals,

negotiations and administration. 'Please don't take

it

write more,' he says in one letter to Strauss of the time.

amiss that 'I

am up

to

I

don't

my eyes

in work.' (See p. 46.)

In the autumn of 1898 Strauss in his pocket,

went

Strauss was thus in the his desires

left

Munich

as 'Royal Prussian

had he been

German at

Vienna was more fortunate

capital

and, with a ten-year contract

Conductor'

to the Berlin

and would have been

once entrusted with a concert in this respect, for in the

123

Opera.

at the goal

of

Mahler

in

series.

autumn of 1898 he took

Rivalry and Friendship over as conductor of the Philharmonic Concerts in addition to his opera

on 19 February 1899, a composers' concert took Wagner, Wilhelm Kienzl and Engelbert Humperown works. At this concert Mahler conducted the

duties. In his first season,

place in which Siegfried

dinck conducted their Preludes to the

first

and second

acts

ofGuntram. Undoubtedly, the

intention was for Strauss himself to interpret one of his works.

therefore

assume

Mahler

conduct

to

to this concert

that Strauss in his place.

The absence

shows that not only

Mahler's have been In

was not available and asked

lost

must

his old friend

of any correspondence relating

letters

by Strauss but

a

number of

over the years.

November 1899 Mahler performed Philharmonic concert. There

Italien at a

original

We

is

the

no

symphonic

fantasia

Aus

performance

trace of this

in

the extant correspondence, indicating another gap. It is

not until 1900 that we can again observe the usual communications

between Strauss and Mahler. orchestral songs by

Mahler

On

at a

9 April 1900 Strauss performed three

concert of the

Wagner

Society in Berlin.

Shortly afterwards he offered Mahler a ballet for performance at the Vienna

Opera, which Mahler accepted without seeing it, but which Strauss never composed (see p. 47 and p. 48). Strauss's letter contains a number of including a warning against the Vienna Gesellschaft der

postscripts,

Autoren, Komponisten und Musikverleger (an association of authors,

composers and music publishers), the head of which was Mahler's publisher Josef

society in

Weinberger. Strauss was involved

at the

time in setting up a

which only composers and not publishers were represented.

In January 1901 Strauss appeared at the head of the

Vienna with

a

programme of his own works including

Ein Heldenleben. During this

Mahler took

visit a

Kaim

Orchestra in

symphonic poem personal meeting between Strauss and the

place, probably the first for a considerable period.

Their

conversations inaugurated a period of close contact and abundant corres-

pondence, from which, fortunately,

been preserved. During his his

new opera

visit to

a

number of

letters

Vienna Strauss seems

Feuersnot; he probably also played from

for at the outset of the

correspondence we are

in the

it,

by Strauss have to

as

have spoken of

was

his

custom,

midst of deliberations

concerning the Vienna performance.

At the beginning of June Strauss went

to the thirty-seventh Festival of

the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein,

which took place that year

at

Heidelberg. His intention, as he wrote to his parents, was to conduct some of his

own

works, 'and to unseat Herr von Hase in the General Assembly;

perhaps the rest of the committee

will fall

124

with him: Steinbach, Lessmann,

Rivalry and Friendship It will

etc.

be a

jolly fight.

,43 .

.

.

Strauss emerged victorious from this

he was elected First President of the Musikverein, and of the old

affray:

The defeated Herr von Hase was head of a publishing house (Breitkopf & Härtel), and so belonged to a group with which Strauss was in violent conflict at that time. With the governing committee only Otto Lessmann survived.

election of Strauss as President a society,

new

era began in the

which was of great importance

for the

life

of the venerable

development and propaga-

new music. Richard Strauss, in his Weimar period still a one-sided 'New German pedantry', had undergone a process of artistic and human maturing that impelled him to keep the Musikverein's tion of

'pontiff given to

Festivals

make

open

to all musical tendencies. Naturally, Strauss did not himself

the selection from the 250 or so compositions that were submitted

each year.

The work was

shared by a

number of committee members, but

Strauss set the guidelines for selection: 'He stressed in the most unmistakable

way our common duty, do

had any right

to

us otherwise.

We

and

invite not

Even

anyone have

sine ira et studio, to let

so— however much

should be on our guard against

even

a suspicion

of one-sidedness.'

Bruno Walter

a witness as impartial as

Deutscher Musikverein

in

his say

who

our personal feelings might incline all

cliquish preferences

44 recalls the

the friendliest terms:

'.

.

.

Allgemeiner

should

I

like

to

observe in retrospect that the selection of contemporary works of the most divergent tendencies and styles gave a thoroughly favourable impression of the committee's open-mindedness.

I

can, indeed, think of the services of

the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein to musical fresh

and progressive

great respect.'

spirit

and

at least

work Symphony by Gustav Mahler

had not the

to accept a

until then

Society's

life in

Germany,

its

serious sense of responsibility, only with

45

However, we know of committee

its

one case

for

(p. 52)

been performed

Festivals,

in

which Strauss by-passed

the forthcoming Festival:

his

the Third

which, although completed in 1896,

in its entirety. In the following years, at

Mahler's Second

Symphony

(in

Kindertotenlieder and other songs (in Graz) and the Sixth

Basle),

Symphony

the (in

Essen) were performed. In the same year as he was elected President of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein, 1901, Strauss took over as conductor of a concert series in Berlin. Although he had now been established in Berlin for almost three years, up to now he had only occasionally had an opportunity to

conduct concerts.

The Philharmonic Concerts were conducted by Arthur

Nikisch, the concerts of the Royal Orchestra by Felix Weingartner, both of 12s

Rivalry and Friendship

whom

were honoured by the

finally

discovered a gap that he could

critics

and worshipped by the public. Strauss fill.

As modern music was neglected

the established concert series, he put on concerts of

new works,

in

starting

with six in the 1901-2 season. For these he was not able to use the Royal Orchestra, but the Berlin Tonkünstlerorchester, increased to ninety players. If

we consider

his position in the

Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein

we realize that no other artist of the time had on modern music as Strauss. That he used his power

together with these concerts,

much

as

wisely

influence

is

by many

attested not only

programmes

in

artists

but not least by the concert

which he helped Anton Bruckner

to achieve the recognition

he deserved and presented such diverse personalities as Hans Pfitzner, Piotr

Edward Elgar and Gustave Charnew works Mahler conducted Fourth Symphony— a few weeks after its Munich first performance. a letter to another Berlin concert organizer Strauss explains why he

Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Ignacy Paderewski, pentier. his

In

At one of Strauss's

first

much importance

attached so

You know

that

I

concerts of

to

Mahler's Fourth.

can only perform new works.

grief with Bruckner's

D minor.

be dropped. Mahler's Fourth

But is

this

have already come

to

had been rehearsed too much

to

my main

The

First

its

Third

is

not

large orchestra

and

attraction; the

performable here for the time being because of chorus.

I

and Second Mahler has already conducted here

Now your concerts are not so exclusively devoted to new works mine. Why don't you let Mahler conduct his First or Second Sym-

himself. as

phony on difficult

Fourth, personal

2

December?

It

I

owe

this to the

a

new

whole company which,

I

as

cannot give up the

you know,

is

not

my

affair.

Please do the Second is

can do the Berlin public no harm to hear these

works quite often. But unfortunately

Symphony and

the splendid Klagende Lied (that 46

work). Chorus and soloists are always at your disposal.

.

.

,

Although Strauss originally intended to conduct himself, pressed by Mahler he ceded the rostrum to the composer. Mahler's old friend Natalie Bauer-Lechner reported with satisfaction on the symphony's reception by the audience and above

Richard Strauss,

all

whom

by Strauss himself. the

work interested more from one rehearsal to away by it, particularly the third

the next, was finally quite carried

movement, saying that he could not write such an ädagio. He also told Mahler afterwards, with a large number of people present, that he had 126

Rivalry and Friendship learned an extraordinary

good look

at

amount from him.

'I

have had an especially

your Second Symphony, and assimilated

sign of his esteem Strauss aftervyards sent 47

him

much from

it.'

As

a

the scores of his entire

works.

During

this stay

concerning that

little

lines,

artistic

Mahler

in

Mahler and Strauss had

Berlin,

related in a letter to his fiancee,

taken out of the context of the whole

Alma

conversation

a

know

fundamentals, of which we unfortunately

only the

Schindler. These

letter, are

very frequently

quoted. Mahler's statement that he had 'talked very seriously with Strauss in Berlin

and

understood as

we can

tried to it

stands.

show him the cul-de-sac he was But

if Mahler's letter to

him

see the chain of ideas that led

with Strauss

at this point,

to

and the context

is

in',

read in

cannot be its

entirety,

mention the Berlin discussion

also reveals the content of this

around the programme

discussion. It revolved

Alma

in music.

we have seen (p. 122), begun to distance himself from the literary programme when he withdrew the titles of his First Symphony. The Third Symphony, too, copiously subtitled in the As

early as 1896

Mahler had,

as

manuscript, went to press without these programmatic indications. In the

autumn of 1900 Mahler's antipathy to the programme reached its highest point so far. He was in Munich to conduct a performance of his Second Symphony. After the concert he retired with friends and admirers to the Park Hotel to bring the evening to a convivial end. The conversation came round to programmes and programme notes. It

was

as if lightning

had struck

a

calm sunny landscape. Mahler's eyes

shone more than ever, his brow furrowed, he rose excitedly from the table

and proclaimed

in

an emotional voice, 'Away with programmes that

arouse false notions. Leave the audience

being performed; do not force

do not teach

it

to

it

be prejudiced! If

listeners the feelings that flowed

its

own thoughts on

to read while the a

music

composer has imparted

through him, his goal

is

work

the

being played;

is

to his

attained.

The

language of sound has come close to words, but has revealed infinitely

more than they can

A

express.

year had passed since this

rounds

in

music

circles.

,' .

48

.

Munich

declaration,

which soon went the

After Mahler had conducted his Fourth

for Strauss in Berlin he travelled to

Dresden

Symphony

to attend rehearsals of his

Second. At the wish of the King of Saxony he composed

a

guide to the

work, a programme that, while not explicating individual musical themes or

Rivalry and Friendship

words the emotional content of individual

passages, nevertheless put into

movements and the metaphysical questions they raised. Mahler discusses this programme for the Second Symphony in his letter to Alma before coming by simple association to Strauss.

The Second

whom) and is

— For

than the world.

so.

and self-contained, that

so unified

I

am

for the 'world'

know

— the mere surface of the matter— as

only gives externalities

programme do

for a superficial, helpless person (you

And

does every programme of a musical work.

finally

which

My Almschi! Justi has not told you that

goes off here today.

programme was written

this

convinced that

it

if

work

this for a

can no more be explained

God were

asked to give his

he has created, he would be equally unable to

— At most we should then have a 'revelation' that reveals as much God and

of the nature of

Indeed,

it

would lead

life

directly

my programme

as

— like

all

does to

my C

religions of revelation

minor.

— to misun-

derstanding, incomprehension, to a simplification and coarsening and finally a distortion that

nizable.— I have tried to

show him

entirely follow is

but he only shall bring

the cul-de-sac he

me.

And

touching.

my

makes the work and above

just talked very seriously

He

yet

I

is

a

creator unrecog-

But unfortunately he could not

very likeable fellow and his relationship to

can be nothing to him

pedestal.

him out

is in.

all its

with Strauss in Berlin and

— He

is

to see you.

shortly 49

— since

coming

I

can see

to Vienna.

This passage makes clear that Mahler mistakenly believed to be

all

me

of him

Perhaps

I

his colleague

caught in the 'cul-de-sac' of descriptive symphonic poems, rather

than on his via triumphalis to the opera stage. And yet it was precisely Mahler who could have foreseen this development, for he had declared as early as 1896 that music was standing 'at the great crossroads where the two divergent paths of symphonic and dramatic music this idea ever

found confirmation,

great instrumental

it

symphonies and

was

in

in the

Mahler's

.

.

.

part for ever'.

own

50

If

progression to the

simultaneous metamorphosis of

Strauss into musical dramatist.

In

December

1901, however, nothing was yet decided.

The

Berlin

conversation might have led to a deeper relationship between the two artists.

But

it

turned out differently. Their subsequent meetings took place

under different auspices, leaving on his trip to

unsuspecting friends congratulating

him

Mahler had become engaged shortly before the engagement to his the turn of the year. Strauss' was among those for

Germany and announced

at

(p. 65).

Mahler's

circle

128

of friends in Vienna was

made

Rivalry and Friendship

up of people of his age with whom he had shared his joys and sorrows for more than twenty years, a kind of self-appointed family whose spiritual head, strangely, was not Mahler but the poet Siegfried Lipiner. Within a few days Alma succeeded in estranging her fiance from these friends, w ho appeared

to her too old

especially Lipiner

and

insignificant. It

may

be that Mahler's friends,

and Natalie Bauer-Lechner, also made mistakes, that

they did not receive his young fiancee with sufficient cordiality, and

underestimated her

spirit, particularly

her fighting

spirit. It will

surprise no

one that Alma emerged victorious and his old companions vanished from

Gustav Mahler's

This happened

life.

Richard Strauss and

his wife Pauline

Feuersnot and to give two concerts.

in

mid-January 1902.

came

Vienna

to

The day

A

few days later

to see the

premiere of

before the performance Strauss

wrote to his parents: 'Yesterday, Monday,

final rehearsal of Feuersnot under Mahler which unfortunately, because of his dreadful nervousness, did not go so well as the Saturday rehearsal had led us to expect, when, above all, the glorious Vienna orchestra delighted me utterly. It is decidedly the best

orchestra in Europe, with the most beautiful sound.'

51

Strauss had been married since 1894 to the opera and concert singer

and who had sung the main

Pauline de Ahna,

who had once been

female part in the

Weimar performance ofGuntram.

was known not only

woman part,

was

as a masterly interpreter of her

of unpredictable temperament and

relationship

no

his pupil

total lack

between Strauss and Mahler up

but the

moment Mahler was

a matter of course that the

Alma gave

Pauline Strauss-de

to

of constraint. In the

now she had played

virtually

engaged, and soon afterwards married,

two wives became involved

a detailed description

Ahna

husband's songs, but as a

of her

first

in

it

it.

meeting with Richard and

Pauline Strauss in her book on Mahler. She also wrote in this connection

Mahler had not conducted the first performance 'because he had an 52 She was wrong! For Mahler, as the records of the Court Opera show, had not only rehearsed Feuersnot but had conducted that

aversion to the work'.

handed the work over after the third performance honeymoon. If such an error is possible, we must treat

the premiere, and only

when he

left

on

his

the account of the other events of this premiere evening with caution,

although

Alma

generally bases herself on her diary.

At the end of January there was the premiere of Feuersnot by Richard Strauss. Pauline Strauss watched the performance with us in our box. She raged the whole time: no one could like this botched piece of work,

we were

dishonestly pretending to like 129

it

but knew as well as she that

Rivalry and Friendship there was not an original note in

everything was stolen, from Wagner,

it,

from many others, even from Schillings ('Maxi' as she called him) whom 53 she far preferred to her husband. In short, she was raving. .

In 1946, in the library of his friend and biographer Willi

Zürich, Richard Strauss discovered Alma's book, read the margin.

He

it

.

,

Schuh

and annotated

it

in in

lacked the documents in Switzerland to correct Alma's

Vienna

error regarding the conductor of the

first

performance. But to the

passage just quoted describing Frau Strauss in the opera box, he added the following marginal note that reflects his bafflement: 'Totally unbelievable!

At any

fabricated, or at least

rate entirely

misunderstanding

this

whole story

particularly liked Feuersnot.

The

'

is

based.

it

is

mystery on which

a

The more

so as

my

wife always

5A

scene in the opera box

is

followed in Alma's account by a violent

quarrel between the Strausses, ending with Frau Pauline returning to her hotel

and refusing

We

went on ahead

to

our table without speaking a word. Strauss soon

came, visibly exhausted,

'My

words,

wife

premiere dinner.

to take part in the

is

sat

down

beside

me and

said, in these exact

often dreadfully rude, but, you know,

it is

something

I

showed himself to me in his true colours that evening. During the meal he had no other thought than 'money'. He constantly pestered Mahler to calculate the royalties to be anticipated from a large or a moderate success, sat the whole evening with a pencil in his hand, put it behind his ear from time to time in a semi-jocular way, in short he need.' Strauss

behaved

like a

commercial

Perhaps Mahler,

still

55

preoccupied with the premiere that had awakened

his 'productive powers' too,

calculations of royalties.

traveller.

would have paid no attention

He had known

to Strauss's

Strauss for fifteen years, was aware

of his intellectual interests and also of his business sense. But

back the

memory

Alma

called

of the premiere evening in a letter she sent after him to the

Semmering where he had taken

a

few days' refuge. Alma's

of the letters sent to Mahler, has been

lost.

letter, like

most

We can only guess at its contents

from Mahler's reaction.

At breakfast joy.

.

.

.

I

received your dear letter, which gives

Not only

me

inexpressible

the parting, the whole evening was unsatisfying to

me. The atmosphere Strauss spreads around him

is

so sobering

— one

becomes thoroughly estranged from oneself. If these'are the fruits that hang from a tree, how can one love the tree? Your observation on him hit 130

Rivalry and Friendship

And

the mark. it

not

so:

am

I

proud that you

on the truth so spontaneously

hit

.

Is

rather eat the bread of poverty together and walk in the light,

than lose oneself will see the

like that to triviality.

The

time

come when people

will

my

wheat winnowed from the chaff— and

time

come-

will

when his is over. Your remark the evening before last, 'You take no part in the conversation', you will now be able to answer yourself — What could I reply to these coffee house phrases at such an exalted moment, after such a performance, which awakens my own productive powers too, and that .

.

.

ought to free us from everyday things, not lead us into the midst of squalor, like a conversation about royalties and capital (the constant

dreams of This

St. 's fantasy,

letter is

attitude six

56

almost indivisible from his enthusiasms).

not easy to interpret.

What

weeks before when he had wanted

a difference

from Mahler's

to help the 'dear fellow' out

of his 'cul-de-sac'! Perhaps Mahler needed to show himself in his true light before his future bride,

who had

taken exception to Strauss's preoccupation

with business. Perhaps he liked to superiority because he

feel

himself cast in a role of moral

matters of money-making. Perhaps

felt inferior in

the jealousy subliminally present in the

Hamburg

days had caught him out.

Mahler was by no means the unworldly dreamer and ascetic that his disciples later made of him. Although generous with it, he knew the value of money.

He also knew how

to look after his business interests,

and was

no

in

danger of having to eat 'the bread of poverty'. Nevertheless, the commercial aspects of his profession were uncongenial to

him from the

real thing

premiere evening Mahler's pen only

art.

His annoyance

him because they

biblical diction,

at

moments of

which

surprising

is

at this stage

of his

great inner agitation.

distracted

behaviour on the

at Strauss's

therefore understandable; what

is

solemn tone and the

—

We

life

is

the

flowed to

can therefore

assume that Mahler was not only annoyed, but moved at deeper levels. Such solemnity could only announce a personal injury or a painful disappointment. Mahler uses the image of 'the wheat and the chaff' again in connection with Strauss several years a

later, in a letter

performance of Salome conducted by Strauss

his wife:

'Deeply

at

work

in

it,

under

a

of January 1907. After

in Berlin,

mass of rubble,

subterranean fire— not a mere firework!

is

Mahler wrote

to

a live volcano, a

It is probably the same with That is what makes it so hard to separate the wheat from the chaff in him. But I have enormous respect for the phenomenon as a whole, and have now reaffirmed it. I am immensely glad!' 57

Strauss's whole personality!

131

Rivalry and Friendship Mahler's contradictory judgement on his colleague can only be explained in himself. In 1907 he was glad that Strauss would not be counted as chaff before history, but that wheat and chaff, rubble and

by contradictions

volcanic powers, lay one over the other in

him

love and respect him, which was for

The in

first

meeting

after the

Vienna premiere of Feuersnot must have been

Krefeld. Strauss had put Mahler's Third the

first

movement of which was

be heard as a whole for the first

that he, Mahler, could

genuine need.

of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein in

at the Festival

June 1902

him and clearly a

first

time.

Symphony on

the

programme,

unperformed, and which was now

still

Alma Mahler reports as

to

follows on this

performance.

After the

first

movement

there was an outburst of jubilation. Richard

podium and applauded so ostentamovement. And after every audience seemed more enthralled Strauss became

Strauss went right to the front of the

tiously that he really sealed the success of the

movement the more and more

.

passive,

and

finally invisible.

.

Later the same evening Strauss showed himself in

had dined

in a small restaurant. In

.

.

.

.

all

his coldness.

We

going past, Strauss patronizingly gave

each of us his hand and walked on without noticing Mahler's terrible excitement, without saying a single word to him. Mahler

and remained success

for a while silent

now seemed

felt this

deeply

and downcast. The whole outward

worthless to him.

58

In 1903 the relationship between Strauss and Mahler was enriched by a

new

aspect. Since the turn of the century Strauss

and

a friend

from

his

youth, Friedrich Rösch, had been fighting for a reform of the copyright law that

would secure more

same time

a

rights

and larger incomes

for

composers. At the

performing rights society was brought into being, the Genos-

Three years

senschaft deutscher Tonsetzer, that was incorporated in 1903. earlier Strauss

Vienna

(AKM)

had expressly warned Mahler

Gesellschaft

der

in a letter (p. 47) against the

Komponisten

Autoren,

member

of which Mahler had been a

Genossenschaft were opposed from the

und Musikverleger

since 1897. Strauss and his

start to the

AKM

because

it

included music publishers who, in Strauss's opinion, set the tone. At the

beginning of 1903 Strauss seems to have begun, in preserved, to

showed

woo Mahler away from

distinct interest, but

wanted

to

a letter that

the Vienna

make

has not been

Mahler

(p.

72)

his final decision only after a

personal meeting with Strauss. This conversation 132

AKM. is

likely to

have taken

Rivalry and Friendship place in

March

Tonkünstlerorchester

What

when

1903,

in

Strauss conducted a concert of the Berlin

Vienna.

passed between them

we unfortunately do

Mahler, usually an assiduous observer of

word

not a

all

on these discussions and

to say

research will bring

new

material to light.

Alma

not know.

things relating to Strauss, has their

outcome. Perhaps future

We know

today only that Strauss

succeeded in securing Mahler's defection from the Vienna association, since he resigned at the

on

this

end of 1903. In October 1903 Mahler corresponded 59 and consulted his lawyer. Nothing is

matter with Friedrich Rösch

known about

his admission to the

That he joined

is

proved by

Genossenschaft deutscher Tonsetzer.

a letter written to

publisher Josef Stritzko. This very revealing

Mahler by the Vienna

letter,

reproduced below,

must, however, be approached with some caution since Stritzko, Mahler's

Vienna publisher, was naturally involved

in the conflict of interests with the

Genossenschaft.

Vienna 5

May

1904

Herr Director Gustav Mahler, I

have

made

enquiries

careful

concerning

deutscher Tonsetzer but with great regret result of signatures given

by yourself,

it

I

the

Genossenschaft

must inform you

is

impossible for

successfully in both your interests and our own.

that, as a

me

to act

You approached

us

previously with a request to release you with respect to the Vienna Autorengesellschaft, and

We

we met your

request in order to oblige you.

were, however, of the opinion that you, Herr Director, or your

representative,

would come

to

such an agreement with the Genossen-

would promote the dissemination of your work rather than hindering it. But you have not only submitted yourself to the statutes of this society; you have also agreed to recognize the performance fees

schaft as

demanded by

the Genossenschaft, and indeed, the rights to

registered compositions

that have appeared

all

your

under our imprint are

retained by that society even if you should cease to be a

member. In

this

the Genossenschaft does not protect your and our interests, but uses you to force concert organizers to reach

agreements with them. In

this

way

major performances of your symphonic works have already been pre-

we must both suffer considerably. Further performances are now envisaged, but I fear that these too will not come about for the same reason. At all events I beg you, Herr Director, to come to an vented, from which

'33

Rivalry and Friendship understanding with the Genossenschaft through your representative

Emil Freund;

250-400M, looked

at

for

if

continues

it

to

impose performance

work

the propagation of your

our contract, hoping to find

is

virtually ruled out.

a point that

might

Dr

fees I

of

have

entitle us to

intervene as publishers, but unfortunately the only point that would have

given us this right has been annulled by the permission granted you to resign from the Vienna Gesellschaft in order to join the Genossenschaft.

Try

have your works freed by the intervention of your

to

Richard Strauss,

friends,

etc.,

reduced to not more than 50-1 00M. this as

it

demanded

seems for

representative

to

me

You

more

are the

E.

likely to achieve

impossible that such large contributions are

works by Richard Strauss or others.

Dr

German

or at least to have the performance fees

On

this point

your

Freund could no doubt ask for clarification. Yours very respectfully Stritzko

What happened take, has not yet

Strauss

is

60

subsequently, what steps Mahler took or omitted to

been discovered. The correspondence between Mahler and

of no help here, nor are Mahler's hitherto published letters to his

lawyer, Emil Freund. All that Gesellschaft.

The

is

certain

is

that he did not rejoin the

high fees demanded by the

German

Vienna

league do not appear

to

have damaged the dissemination of Mahler's w orks, for

in

1903 and 1904 that Mahler, the previously unperformed composer,

the breakthrough he longed for. His

autumn of

symphonies

to IV,

I

1904, the Fifth as well, were performed in

was precisely

it

and

made

after the

many German

cities

with himself or others conducting; and in the Netherlands, where Strauss

had scored successes

as early as 1897,

Mahler's work found

a

musical

home

from 1903 on. In October 1903 he wrote to his wife from Amsterdam: 'After the final chord a quite imposing burst of applause. Everyone tells me there has been nothing like

it

in living

memory.

Strauss,

who

is

much

in

vogue here, has been beaten handsomely.' 61

When tion

Strauss read this in 1946 he put a question

mark

In 1905 Strauss and Mahler were linked in

than in

all

more mutual undertakings

previous or subsequent years. At the end of May the

Musical Festival took place

German music

to

however, reflected fectly, as

mark and an exclama-

in the margin.

French

in

first

Alsatian

Strasbourg, with the aim of opposing

in peaceful rivalry.

this elevated objective

The

concert programmes,

of cultural politics rather imper-

French music was represented only by Cesar Franck and Gustave '34

Rivalry and Friendship Charpentier, who had to contend with Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Wagner, Strauss and Mahler. Strauss conducted a Mozart concert and his Symphoma domestic a, Mahler performed his Fifth Symphony and a whole Beethoven evening with the Ninth as it culmination. According to Alma

Mahler's report, Mahler had numerous rehearsals and 'glorious' perfor-

who

mances. Strauss, on the other hand,

allegedly attended only the final

rehearsal: 'was filled with alarm at the prospect of his performance.

foamed

at the

mouth, became violent

performance, not one entry was

in his rage.

right.'

The

Domestic a:

a

He

dreadful

62

The impression made on the audience seems to have been different. The French writer Romain Rolland, who esteemed Mahler highly and saw in Strauss the

'first

musical personality of Europe', while criticizing the way in

which Mozart, under Strauss, had 'taken on called Mahler's interpretation of

domestica

made

a strong

a

Beethoven an

stormy, violent aspect', 'outrage'.

63

The Symphoma

musical impression on Rolland: 'One

is

dazzled by

the beauty of this light, soft, compliant, subtle orchestra, particularly after

the compact orchestral mass of Mahler, that heavy bread that has not 64 .' risen.

.

.

The programme accept, calling

it

of the Symphonia domestica, however, Rolland did not

one of the most audacious challenges that Strauss had

'hurled at taste and common-sense'.

65

Strauss confessed in a letter to Rolland written a few weeks after the Alsatian Musical Festival that

Mahler had

said

something similar

to him:

'You may be right about the programme of the Domestica. You are entirely in

agreement with G. Mahler, who utterly condemns the programme.' 66

A few days after the Musical Festival in Strasbourg, the annual gathering of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein took place.

The

host town on

was Austrian. In June 1903 Strauss had written to and colleague Max von Schillings: I think Graz excellent this occasion

his friend

and I Graz is very good soil for us in contrast to the very backward Vienna. ... So let it be Graz. But at any rate Mahler must give us one or two Festival operas on the way there and back.' 67 Mahler's contribution to the Graz Musical Festival consisted of a series of songs Kindertotenlieder and other settings of Rückert, songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn— and he corresponded intensively with Strauss on the place and timing of their performance (pp. 77-80). Strauss passed through Vienna at the end of May and travelled with Mahler to Graz, probably on 30 May 1905. Mahler reports on this journey to his wife: 'I was quite alone in a coupe with Strauss from Vienna to Graz and we talked very agreeably '.

.

believe that

—

135

.

.

.

.

Rivalry and Friendship Unfortunately he was ealled away the next day by the

as in the old days.

sudden death of

my

and did not hear

his (84-year-old) father

songs.'

68

Following on the Graz Festival Mahler offered the participants three

performances

at the

Vienna Opera: Feuersnot by Strauss, Die Rose vom

Liebesgarten by Pfitzner and Die Legende von der heiligen Elisabeth by Liszt.

Max

von Schillings,

most

after Strauss the

man

influential

in the Allge-

meiner Deutscher Musikverein, who had reservations regarding Mahler,

was enthusiastic about these Festival performances and sent

a report to that

effect to Strauss.

While

still

in

Strasbourg Strauss had played Mahler and his wife the not

facts.

We know of this only from the many examples show, was often very Surprisingly Strauss, about whom Alma Mahler

a trivial,

scandalous anecdote a few pages earlier, fares

yet quite complete

Salome on the piano.

recollections of

Alma

free with dates

and

had served up

xMahler who, as

extremely well on this occasion. His effect must have been is felt

irresistible; this

even from Alma's somewhat spiteful report.

Strauss was cheerful and communicative at that time. His Salome was

He

finished.

asked Mahler whether he would

hear him play the

like to

opera from the manuscript. This had a minor antecedent.

had told Mahler that he wanted opposed the idea

to

He had

violently.

When

Strauss

put Wilde's Salome to music, Mahler a

thousand arguments against

it,

ethical to begin with but not least the probable impossibility of perform-

ing the

work

though not

in Catholic countries. Strauss disagreed

for long.

I

told

Mahler afterwards

should want to talk Strauss out of setting advising a

man

not to marry the

So now Strauss had triumph

in his offer.

made our way

had located

to the place,

and was

irritated,

was surprised he

was

like

he loved.

and there was

a

note of

piano shop and the three of us

where there were dozens of pianos. The room

had big gleaming windows on past or stopping to look in

a

I

a particular libretto. It

woman

finished the composition,

He

that

—

all

sides,

with people constantly walking

pressing their noses against the

window

as

they tried to catch the sound. Strauss played and sang incomparably well. Mahler was enthralled.

We

came

to the dance. It

was missing.

T

haven't done that

yet!' said

Strauss and after this big hiatus played on to the end. Mahler asked, 'Isn't

it

risky simply to leave out the

longer in the T'll

mood

dance and do

it

later

when one

is

no

of the work?' But Strauss laughed in his carefree way,

manage.' But he did not, for the dance /J6

is

the only

weak thing

in the

Fig. 2

Strauss, silhouette by

Hans Schlossmann.

Rivalry and Friendship score

—a

won

over.

mere compilation of the commonplace. Mahler was

One can

risk

preposterous plausible.

anything

one has the genius

if

like

the

69

In contrast to the 'eighties and the 'nineties,

works

entirely

make

to

when opera houses had new

The Bartered Bride, Cavalleria Rusticana,

La Boheme at their disposal, in the new century a itself felt. Mahler had rehearsed many new works or

Falstaff, Pique

Dame made

certain stagnation at the

Court Opera but

hardly a single one that had run for any length of time. That he recognized the dramatic

Strasbourg,

power and the

when

must be doubted, but on siasm, to his superiors as

historic musical rank of

Salome

at

once

in

Strauss gave a foretaste of the score, singing at the piano,

Vienna he spoke of

his return to

among

others,

and wanted

soon as possible. While he anticipated

to

it

with enthu-

perform the new work

difficulties

with the censor, he

thought they would be surmountable. This censorship did not extend to the life

theatres maintained by the

Emperor were not

to

perform anything that

disseminated subversive or lascivious ideas, and above

be

let

The

fall

that

The

but was limited to the Court Theatre.

whole of Austrian theatrical

all

no words should

might offend the religious sentiments of the audience.

censor had also

made

difficulties

before the Vienna performance of

Feuersnot (pp. 56, 58-9 and 60), but these were removed by the first performance at the Court Theatre in Dresden. At that time the General

Intendant had written to Mahler: 'The success of the premiere den], and particularly

its critical

[in

Dres-

reception, will fundamentally influence the

decision on the performance of this opera at the Court Theatre here.

Mahler was counting on being able

perform Salome too

to

after

.' .

7(

.

some

Dresden was free of scandal. He was wrong. In Feuersnot the point at issue had been an indecent joke: the censor had not wished to appear prudish and had turned conflict with the censor,

provided the

a blind eye; with Salome, the text of

Oscar Wilde, the

criteria

were

first

performance

at

which was by the

different.

The

socially ostracized

censor objected not only to a

subject which 'belonged to the sphere of sexual pathology', but

the corporeal appearance of Christ.

71

The

John the Baptist and

battle with the censor can

still

more

to

his allusions to Jesus

be exactly reconstructed from the

correspondence between Mahler and Strauss (pp. 82-95). There is no argument, no tactic that Mahler did not make use of. He extolled the opera, that he

knew only from

that the

the vocal score, as a

Vienna Volksoper would

steal a

modern masterpiece; he warned march on the Court Opera; he

thought of textual changes to appease the censor; he helped to bring about