Mahler

Gustav Mahler (1860 – 1911) was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt in what was then Austria-Hungary. Kaliště u Humpolce is now in the Czech Republic. As a composer, his often rather heavy, dark and stormy works acted as a bridge between the 19th century Austro-German tradition and the modernism of the early 20th century. While in his lifetime his status as a conductor was established beyond question, his own music gained wide popularity only after periods of relative neglect which included a ban on its performance in much of Europe during the Nazi era. After 1945 the music was discovered and championed by a new generation of listeners; Mahler then became one of the most frequently performed and recorded of all composers, a position he has sustained into the 21st century.