On 25 March 2025, YouTube hosted the premiere of the 44th mini-concert Lost Müh'!, with Miriam Alexandra (soprano), Soenke Tams Freier (baritone) and Henning Lucius (piano), organised by our Hamburg sister society. Gustav Mahler's song Lost Müh'! is one of five songs for voice and piano he composed in January and February 1892, which he Humoresken mentioned.
The songs hold a special place in his oeuvre, as he also wrote orchestral versions of them in the following weeks. It is also special that his composing of these coincided with the season at the Hamburg City Theatre, where Mahler had worked with great success as first Kapellmeister since the previous year. Going forward, it was almost exclusively during his summer holidays that he found time and peace to compose. All five songs are based on texts from the collection of German lyric folk poetry Des Knaben Wunderhorn, published by Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano in 1805 and 1808.