Call for Papers

CFP: Mahler and Humor, Toblach, 17-19 July 2025

International Symposium. Gustav Mahler Research Centre Innsbruck/Toblach

17-19 July 2025, EUREGIO Cultural Centre, Toblach

Organisers: Anna Stoll Knecht (University of Fribourg) and Alice Verti (University of Innsbruck)

Conference committee: Anna Stoll Knecht (University of Fribourg), Alice Verti (University of Innsbruck), Morten Solvik (IES Abroad European Union, Freiburg University), Lóránt Péteri (Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music), Susanne Rode-Breymann (Hochschule für Musik Nürnberg)

Invited speakers include: Federico Celestini (University of Innsbruck), Morten Solvik (IES Abroad European Union, Freiburg University), Lóránt Péteri (Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music), Renate Stark-Voit (Internationale Gustav Mahler Gesellschaft), Milijana Pavlović (University of Innsbruck), Jeremy Barham (University of Surrey), Christian Glanz (Unviersity of Performing Arts, Vienna)

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Next year’s appointment with the Gustav Mahler Research Centre Innsbruck/Toblach Conferences will focus on the topic of Mahler and Humour. This Call for Papers aims to reach potential contributors from all stages of their academic career, who would deliver their paper along with invited speakers. PhD candidates and ECRs are therefore also encouraged to submit their proposal.

The pivotal role of humour and irony in Mahler’s compositional practice and worldview is undisputed, and has inspired a wide array of articles, monographs and theses ever since the composer’s lifetime. Yet some facets of humor and irony still deserve more scholarly attention. As a rhetorical device, as well as a compositional attitude, humour can take a grotesque, caricatural, or satyrical form, but it can also serve as an agent of self-reflection, socio-political criticism and carry both tragic and comedic value in musical performance. 

Contributors are free, but not required, to focus exclusively on Mahler’s œuvre and persona. Any foray into adjacent thematic areas or into the life and work of other composers/figures will be taken into consideration as long as it displays a reasonable degree of pertinence to the reflections presented above.

Proposals appertaining to the following fields of research will be particularly welcome: Music Aesthetics, Music Hermeneutics, Music and Literature, Music and Philosophy, Music and Media, Music and Politics, Music and Society, Music History with a focus on 19th- and 20th-Century Music, Musical Analysis.

Format: 20-minute paper + 10-minute discussion

Submission deadline: Please send a 250-words abstract, in English or in German, to alice.verti[at]student.uibk.ac.at by December 1st, 2024, 11:59 pm CET.