Female Schatz writes:

>Mahler just barely missed the beginning of the age of recording.  Does
>anyone know of any good sources that discuss Mahler's conducting technique
>and/or what it was like to attend a performance that he led? Did any of
>Mahler's contemporaries ever point to a conductor who has been recorded
>who bore a resemblance to Mahler?

I just finished an interesting biography of Mahler by Jonathan Carr.  I
will leave it to others who are more expert to determine where it fits
among studies of Mahler.  However, it does provide something of what you
are looking for by speculating about his mind and feelings.  It is not a
technical description of his conducting style, but it paints a picture of
what it might have been like to be there.  In fact, he could be a difficult
man to work for.

When Mahler left the Vienna Opera in 1907 after ten and a half years and
648 performances, he left a written farewell message to the company.  He
wrote: " Instead of the whole, the complete creation, that I had dreamt
of, I leave behind something piecemeal and imperfect--as man is fated to
do.  It is not for me to judge what my work has been for those for whose
sake it was done.  But at such a moment I am entitled to say of myself:
I was honest in my intentions and i set my sights high...In the throes of
the battle, in the heat of the moment, neither you nor I have been spared
wounds, or errors.  But when a work has been successfully performed, a task
accomplished, we have forgotten all the difficulties and exertions; we have
felt rewarded even in the absence of outward signs of success.  We have all
made progress, and so has the institution for which we have worked."

Carr reports that the notice, which had been pinned to a message board was
torn off and the pieces left scattered on the floor.

>On a somewhat related question, I am aware that Mahler reorchestrated some
>of the Beethoven symphonies for performances that he led.  Can anyone point
>me in the direction of a recording of these reorchestrations?

Mahler did rework music of Beethoven, Schumann and Schubert.  His
claim was that he was adapting them to the requirements of larger halls.
However, he is also reported to have said that his rescoring of Beethoven
string quartets for a full string orchestra was because the music was too
powerful to be left to four musicians.

Critics were dismayed by this practice.  One compared it to the painting
over of an old master's picture.  One wrote:" We are among the most genuine
admirers of Director Mahler.  All the more reason why, in this case, we
must loudly and clearly call a halt."

It should also be noted that Mahler's first success came from a completion
of an opera by Weber, *Die Drei Pintos.*

Hope this helps.

Ed