With his extensive three-volume investigation, the author has newly drawn the image of Gustav Mahler for our time. Should Mahler-s symphonies really be categorized as -absolute music-? - Little-known manuscript sources contain significant hints to the contrary: programmatic titles and catchwords or phrases, mottos, literary allusions, associations, sighs, exclamations. Mahler fully understood his symphonies as -erlebte Musik-, music of experience, as autobiography in notes, and as expressions of his -weltanschauung-. All the symphonies, including the purely instrumental ones, can be traced back to programs that Mahler originally made public, but suppressed later on. A knowledge of the programmatic ideas provides access to a hitherto barely sensed interior metaphysical world that is of crucial importance for an adequate interpretation of the works. This first volume uncovers the complexity of relations between Mahler-s wide-ranging reading and education, his aesthetics and his sympho
