‘Storytelling in song’: Mahler's songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn

It would scarcely be an exaggeration to suggest that Mahler's compositional ‘genetic code’ can be located in his Lieder output. Many of Mahler's songs show a distinct ambiguity: even the texts of folk songs or children's songs often contain a note of tragedy, farewell, separation or death. Songs on the subject of war or military life, for example, often depict grotesque and disturbing images. It is particularly in the songs of Des Knaben Wunderhorn that Mahler emphasized an unmediated proximity to life, and he was well aware that his choice of texts contrasted sharply with the Lied tradition up to that time. In a letter to Ludwig Karpath from 2 March 1905, Mahler revealed not only his distinct awareness of being the pioneer of a new Lied aesthetic but also his attempts to return to the roots of artistic creativity, and to unveil these as yet untouched by the controlling power of the artistic process – something which is also expressed in his textual additions to the poems. His vivid description of the Wunderhorn texts as ‘blocks of marble’ should be understood in the sense of their being raw or natural materials which first require individual moulding and shaping.