When Gustav Mahler was six years old, he discovered a piano in his grandmother's attic. He had his first public performance four years later.¹⁾

The Mahlers emigrated from eastern Bohemia and settled in the German town of Kalit.²⁾

In 1878, Mahler graduated from the Vienna Conservatory. Unfortunately, few of his student compositions have survived, so it's uncertain what he would have sounded like at the time.³⁾

Following his employment at the Leipzig Opera, Mahler relocated to Prague in 1885 to assume a position at the Neues Deutsches Theater (New German Theater).⁴⁾