Gustav Mahler Quotes (49 Quotes)

Born at Kaliste in Bohemia, the son of a Jewish peddler, Gustav Mahler described himself as ... three times homeless, a Bohemian in Austria, an Austrian among Germans and a Jew throughout the world, everywhere an intruder, never welcomed.

Fortunately, something always remains to be harvested. So let us not be idle.

It is easier to achieve a desired result in short pieces.

Even if people censure me, they should do so hat in hand.

There is a world of difference between a Mahler eighth note and a normal eighth note.

The impressions of the spriritual experiences gave my future life its form and content.

The spirit can assert itself only through the medium of clear form.

Don't bother looking at the view - I have already composed it.

An operetta is simply a small and gay opera.

Beauty and fullness of tone can be achieved by having the whole orchestra play with high clarinets and a carefully selected number of piccolos.

I am hitting my head against the walls, but the walls are giving way.

All that is not perfect down to the smallest detail is doomed to perish.

I don't let myself get carried away by my own ideas - I abandon 19 out of 20 of them every day.

I have become a different person. I don't know whether this person is better, he certainly is not happier.

Melodic invention is one of the surest signs of a divine gift.

A true personality . . . is like a robust organism that, with unconscious sureness, seeks out and digests the nourishment appropriate to it and vigorously rejects that which is unsuitable.

It should be one's sole endeavor to see everything afresh and create it anew.

The further the music develops, the more complex the apparatus used by the composer to express his thoughts becomes.

Both my marriages were failures Number one departed, and number two stayed

If you think you're boring your audience, go slower not faster.

The real art of conducting consists in transitions.

In its beginnings, music was merely chamber music, meant to be listened to in a small space by a small audience.

I beg of you... never assume an inner or an outer pose, never a disguise.

It is strange how one feels drawn forward without knowing at first where one is going.

A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.

Never let oneself be guided by the opinion of one's contemporaries. Continue steadfastly on one's way.

It's not just a question of conquering a summit previously unknown, but of tracing, step by step, a new pathway to it.

If I weren't the way I am, I shouldn't write my symphonies.

What I wanted and what I visualized while composing has not always been realized.

Behind me the branches of a wasted and sterile existence are cracking.

To judge a composer's work, one must consider it as a whole.

The call of love sounds very hollow among these immobile rocks.

I live like a Hottentot. I cannot exchange one sensible word with anyone.

Life's been nothing but paperwork.

The point is not to take the world's opinion as a guiding star but to go one's way in life and working unerringly, neither depressed by failure nor seduced by applause.

Spring won't let me stay in this house any longer! I must get out and breathe the air deeply again.

I also had a brother who was like me a musician and a composer. A man of great talent, far more gifted than I. He died very young... he killed himself in the prime of his life.

When I have reached a summit, I leave it with great reluctance, unless it is to reach for another, higher one.

I hope you will no longer accuse me of a lack of delicacy. as I now count on your understanding.

I was a crazy young man who let himself be blinded by his passions and obeyed only the impulses of the moment.

The longer you live and the more you learn, the more clearly you will feel the difference between the few men who are truly great and the mere virtuosi.

You must renounce all superficiality, all convention, all vanity and delusion.

The important thing is never to let oneself be guided by the opinion of one's contemporaries to continue steadfastly on one's way without letting oneself be either defeated by failure or diverted by applause.

I have had on the tip of my tongue for some time.

In the theatrical works we love and admire the most, the ending of the drama generally takes place offstage.

Destiny smiles upon me but without making me the least bit happier.

If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music.

With the coming of spring, I am calm again.

Discipline, work. Work, discipline.