Transforming Folk and Traditional Sources
Frère Jacques/Mahler

The simplicity, familiarity, and wide appeal of folk music has constantly attracted and engaged the imagination of composers. Gustav Mahler used the popular folk tune "Frère Jacques" as the subject of a funeral march in his First Symphony. By transposing the tune into a minor key, setting it in the lower, darker colors of the orchestra, and accompanying the tune with the steady, somber beats of the timpani, he successfully transformed the tune into a dirge.