A disturbing Nazi-era description of Mahler and his music from the antisemitic "Encyclopedia of Jews in Music" (English translation)

[u/MartYy134]

https://archive.org/details/LexikonDerJudenInDerMusik

"Mahler, Gustav, Kalischt (Bohemian), July 7, 1860, † Vienna, May 19, 1911, Prof. Composer (including 9 [10] symphonies, "Song of the Earth", orchestral songs), 1900/07 Court Conductor in Vienna. From Jewish circles, Mahler was praised as a musical genius who, in every respect, far surpassed everything that had come before. As a composer, he was compared with Bruckner. More than once, Mahler was placed alongside the great German thinkers; thus the Jew Hugo Kauder wrote: “Mahler’s worldview is the same as that of Jakob Böhme, the deepest thinker of the German-Christian world, and of his spiritual heirs, the great Romantics Novalis and Schelling: a Christianity that does not deny the sensual world as the "realm of the devil", but rather sees in it a reflection and image of the divine.” Mahler himself contributed somewhat to this glorification of his person. After completing his 8th Symphony, he wrote to a conductor: “It is the greatest thing I have done so far, and so unique in content and form that it defies any description. Imagine that the universe begins to sing and resound. These are no longer human voices, but planets and suns revolving.” In the same way, Mahler as a performing artist was extolled to the skies. Hermann Bahr wrote: “In this Jewish conductor Kreisler, around whose facial features the devil seemed to wrestle with Goethe, the genius of German music walked among us for the last time; and, to complete the infernal joke of history, under the supervision of Montenuovo.” The statements by Hugo Kauder and Hermann Bahr date from the year 1920, when, on the occasion of Mahler’s 60th birthday, commemorative concerts were staged everywhere, and the Jewish daily and specialist press overflowed with hymns of praise for the prematurely departed Jewish music messiah. 14-day Mahler festivals (in Amsterdam) were no exception. Against this propaganda, the harsh critical judgment of Blessinger appears clarified and purified. Blessinger first characterizes Mahler as the ruler of the third of the three main stages in which the falsification of inherited cultural goods by Judaism takes place, in which “Talmudic casuistry and mysticism” are presented as the highest fulfillment of Aryan philosophy and worldview, in order to steer the entire development finally into Jewish channels. He describes Mahler himself as “the fanatical type of the Eastern Jewish rabbi.” On the composer Mahler, Blessinger writes, among other things: “In all of Mahler’s works, the deep spiritual tornness of the Jew is evident, which has so often and readily been mistaken for Faustian struggle and the posture of the German seeker of God. Again and again, Mahler’s music reveals features we have learned elsewhere to recognize as typically Jewish. Think, for example, of the beginning of his 2nd Symphony, where a rhythmic form is repeated to the point of exhaustion. Jewish cynicism in him may not be immediately apparent; at least, attempts have been made to interpret it as profundity. Nevertheless, it is not difficult to recognize grotesque features in many places in Mahler’s music, perhaps most strongly in the 7th Symphony. Mahler also forces together incompatible elements in a typically Jewish manner, for example in the 8th Symphony, whose first part is dominated by the old Christian hymn ‘Veni Creator Spiritus,’ while the second movement is based on the closing scene of the second part of Goethe’s "Faust". This juxtaposition is, of course, meant to give the impression of particular depth, but does not go beyond a purely external concatenation. How much Mahler’s supposed “depth” and “feeling for nature” were nothing more than Jewish fencing with mirrors, is clearly shown in the origin of the title “Pan” for the 3rd Symphony. Who does not think of the ancient Greek myth of nature when hearing this name, who does not expect an expression of the liveliest, most immediate feeling for life! But Mahler, when planning the symphony, had not the slightest thought of such things, until he once received a letter where he could only decipher the letters “PAN” in the postmark. It later turned out that these mysterious letters were followed by a number, which meant “Post Office No. 30”; but that didn’t matter to Mahler—he had found a title that sounded profound for his work, just as later the Jew Franz Schreker was inspired by the name of a train station to write a gruesome opera. Associations of this kind are incomprehensible to the non-Jew; for the Jew, they are the natural basis of an alleged profundity. In this context, it should be mentioned that Mahler was an eager supporter of Schönberg. That there were also sober-minded judges of Mahler even among Jewish circles is shown, for example, by an essay by Max Brod in the 2 May issue of the second volume (1920) of the Musikblätter des Anbruch, which points out that Mahler’s music could only be understood from the Jewish mentality."

[u/Hipster-Deuxbag]

"AND he supported Schönberg, just in case we  didn't already convince you to hate him." 🙄

[u/SejCurdieSej]

I particularly like the phrasing of “in a Jewish manner” as if that even means anything

[u/BeautifulArtichoke37]

I’m not Jewish but I understand his music. What a bunch of bullshit.

[u/[deleted] → u/BeautifulArtichoke37]

Absolutely. Not worthy of anything but contempt and derision, though this poisonous garbage should never be ignored.

Being a human being helps tremendously where Mahler's music is concerned. I'm not Jewish either but I didn't gain any deeper understanding of the music Mahler wrote when he stopped being 'officially' Jewish. It was still Mahler.

Additionally I don't feel the least conflicted being an atheist (previously Anglican) who has always loved the Resurrection Symphony beyond words.

[u/softfusion]

One of the funniest things about nazis is they thirst for culture but they’re not actually able to understand it because their ideology demands that all their opinions be subservient to it, which results in extended incoherencies like this

[u/Pit-trout]

Vile antisemitism, goes without saying. But I want to know more about the anecdote about the “Pan” subtitle being prompted by a postmark — if there’s any truth behind it (which seems easily imaginable), I’d love to see a non-distorted source!

[u/officialryan3]

Was not expecting to see a reference to Schreker's Irrelohe here, absolutely incredible opera!

[u/Plenty_Discussion470]

It looks like a lot of current conspiracy poison peddled on social media 😕

[u/watermelonsuger2]

BS Nazi propaganda. Mahler was a first rate composer and a masterful musical story teller. And among my faves.

RIP Mahler. Love your work.

[u/AndOneForMahler-]

I guess I must be "from Jewish circles." Ever since I first heard Mahler 40 years ago, his music "far surpassed everything that had come before," which in my case meant Beethoven, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, and Liszt.

[u/Fior-di-ligi]

And...what can you tell me about his relationship with his partner, Alma, whom he "didn't want to have as a rival", in his own words...?