Clytus Gottwald, Alma Mahler-Werfel

Drei frühe Lieder

Some people search in vain for the specifically Mahlerian tone in Alma's music. This is undoubtedly due to the fact that she was much closer to the ideas of the young Viennese avant-garde around Schönberg and Zemlinsky than to those of Gustav Mahler. In fact, her musical language differs significantly from that of her husband: it is harmonically richer, more complex and sometimes also more daring. Examples of this can be found in the songs here, where in Laue Sommernacht, for example, she finds a musical prose that is only approximately described by the score instruction Sehr frei im Vortrag.