Toch enjoyed considerable success as an opera composer, before he left Germany.
In America this could not continue. In 1921 he had set poems from Bethge's Die
chinesische Flöte (The Chinese Flute), the textual source of Mahler's
Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth), for soprano and orchestra,
using a form of recitative, and other works sometimes include spoken parts.
His Cantata of the Bitter Herbs, based on the Passover Haggada, is scored
for solo voices, narrator, chorus and orchestra. His symphonies often draw on
extra-musical associations, sometimes indicated in their titles, as with Jephta,
Rhapsodic Poem (Symphony No.5).