Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)
Austrian conductor and composer. He directed the Vienna Opera to much acclaim from 1897-1907 and the Metropolitan Opera in New York from 1907 to 1910. Mahler's music seems to encompass the total range of human emotions. He expanded the symphonic form by infusing the poetic psychological, and religious content of vocal music. He is said to have prefigured atonality.
"The symphony must be like the world. It must embrace everything."
"If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music."
Best known works: Nine symphonies (particularly the 5th), Kindertotenlieder, Das Lied von der Erde.