Mahler’s early life was not happy. Born in Bohemia to an abusive father, he lost five of his brothers and sisters to diphtheria, and others ended their lives in suicide or mental illness. The family lived near a military barracks, and the many marches incorporated into Mahler’s music — often distorted marches — have been traced to his childhood recollections of parade music.

After studying for a time at the Vienna Conservatory, Mahler began a rising career as a conductor. His uncompromising standards and his authoritarian attitude toward the musicians led to frequent disputes with the orchestra directors. What is more, Mahler was Jewish, and Vienna at that time was rife with anti-Semitism. Nonetheless, he was acknowledged as one of the great conductors of his day and also as a very effective musical administrator. After positions at Prague, Budapest, Hamburg, and elsewhere, he came to head such organizations as the Vienna Opera and the New York Philharmonic.

It was only in the summers that Mahler had time to compose, so it is not surprising that he produced fewer pieces (though they are very long pieces) than any other important composer. Ten symphonies, the last of them unfinished, and six song cycles for voice and orchestra are almost all he wrote. The song cycle The Song of the Earth of 1910, based on translated Chinese poems, is often called Mahler’s greatest masterpiece.

Mahler’s wife was a famous Viennese beauty, Alma Schindler. By a tragic coincidence, shortly after he wrote his grim orchestral song cycle Songs on the Death of Children, his and Alma’s youngest daughter died of scarlet fever.

Beyond this tragedy, Mahler’s life was clouded by psychological turmoil, and he once consulted his famous Viennese contemporary Sigmund Freud. His disputes with the New York Philharmonic directors, which discouraged him profoundly, may have contributed to his premature death.

Chief Works: Ten lengthy symphonies, several with chorus, of which the best known are the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth ◼ Orchestral song cycles: The Song of the Earth, Songs of a Wayfarer, The Youth’s Magic Horn (for piano or orchestra), Songs on the Death of Children

Encore: After Symphony No. 1, listen to the Adagietto from Symphony No. 5; Songs of a Wayfarer.

Photo Credit: Bettmann/CORBIS.