Floros's study of Mahler's music is an attempt to interpret it comprehensively, taking into account especially Mahler's intellectual background. In these semantic analyses, the author discusses borrowings and quotations of all sorts: (1) quotations of tunes and their integration into compositions (e.g. Bruder Martin in the First Symphony), (2) borrowings of complete sections (e.g. in the Second Symphony), (3) reuse of whole songs (e.g. Urlicht in the Second Symphony), and (4) quotation of short motives (such as the beginning of Dies irae or Liszt's tonisches Symbol des Kreuzes ["sounding" symbol of the cross]) to symbolize titles or programs. Decoding these borrowings is one of the most important steps in finding the program that is the basis even of the purely instrumental symphonies. Above all, some passages can be interpreted by comparison to similar passages from works by Richard Strauss where their meaning is clear. These comparisons may throw light on composition dates, for instance that of the Scherzo of the Sixth Symphony.

Index Classifications: 1800s, 1900s

Contributed by: Andreas Giger