III.

Mahler as Conductor

Mahler’s work as a conductor shaped a generation of conductors who followed, including Willem Mengelberg, Bruno Walter, and Otto Klemperer. His clarity and strictness of interpretation, his discipline of the orchestra, and his focused and thorough rehearsals were especially influential. The operas he conducted achieved a new, heightened unity of musical and dramatic interpretation that included staging and other production elements. His interpretations of Wagner operas became the standards for the time. Mahler also interpreted the operas of Carl Maria von Weber and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart with great effectiveness.