Adolf JENSEN (1837-1879)
Wedding Music Op.45 (orch. Reinhold Becker) (1873) [20:28]
On the Road to Emmaus - Sacred Piece for Large Orchestra Op.27
(1862) [20:07]
The Heiress of Montfort - orchestral excerpts (1858-1865)
[25:41]
Philharmonie Baden-Baden/Pavel Baleff
rec. Weinbrenner-Saal, Baden-Baden, Germany, 2014
GENUIN CLASSICS GEN15347 [66:17]
Recently I
reviewed a disc of early Dvořák - written the same year as
much of the music presented here - and expressed an opinion that clumsy
youthful work by that composer tends to be infinitely superior and
interesting than the best endeavours of many a minor composer. If proof were
needed along comes this thoroughly pleasant, wholly well-crafted ultimately
forgettable music by Adolf Jensen.
Jensen was born in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad) in 1837 - the eldest son
of a music teacher. His talents were precocious enough that he was already
concertising on the piano by eleven years old. By nineteen he had the post
as music teacher to the children of the Russian Governor of the province of
Brest-Litovsk. His hope to study with Robert Schumann came to nothing due to
the senior composer's illness and death. By twenty-three he was a
sought-after piano teacher in his home town and within six years was of
sufficient repute to be 'head-hunted' by Carl Tausig as one of
his piano teachers for his newly-founded school for Advanced Piano Playing
in Berlin. After two years he moved to Dresden to concentrate on composition
but his final decade was dogged by ill-health and a nomadic lifestyle trying
to find a climate which would ameliorate his painfully damaged lungs. To no
lasting avail and he died in Baden-Baden in early 1879 aged just
forty-two.
His musical legacy is not large aside from 180 songs. That apart there is
one opera, one symphonic poem, several choral works and 24 compositions for
piano and six for piano/four hands. That being the case, this disc which
gives us the orchestral interludes from the opera, the afore-mentioned tone
poem and an orchestration - by Reinhold Becker - of a piano/four hands work,
would seem to give us the bulk, or at least a good overview of
Jensen's work for orchestra.
For a composer aspiring to learn from Schumann and latterly impressed by
Wagner, Liszt and the New German School the music sounds pretty much as one
would expect. The disc opens with an easily attractive suite entitled
Wedding Music. Cast in four movements and effectively scored by
Becker this has the feel of a collection of 'mood' pieces. The
four movements are titled Procession, The Bride's Song, Roundelay and
Nocturne. For sure there is more than a hint of Mendelssohn here too and not
just in the familiarity of the movement's titles. The style of the
music lies somewhere between the admired Schumann and Raff. It is elegant
and instantly appealing - but also instantly forgettable. Credit to Becker
because this does not sound like an orchestrated piano work. The opening
Procession is bold and strides confidently forward in a very foursquare and
harmonically unchallenging way. The second movement Bride's Song
reminded me of a similarly lyrical movement in Goldmark's Rustic
Wedding Symphony - again very tastefully orchestrated with an appealing
gentle lilt to the assuming main theme shared between strings and solo wind.
The closing Nocturne is the longest section of the suite and also the most
understatedly effective.
The next work on this disc is also the most substantial. By title alone it
is rather unusual - subtitled "Sacred Piece based on the Gospel
according to Luke 24: 13-24" - it is in effect a religious tone poem.
The passage from Luke's Gospel referred to is the journey by two of
Jesus' disciples from Jerusalem to Emmaus after finding the empty
tomb. They are joined - initially unrecognised - by the risen Christ - who
consoles them in their sorrow and ultimately is recognised. Jensen dedicated
the work to Berlioz - who wrote congratulating Jensen on the score - but it
is modelled on Liszt's new concept of Symphonic Poem. The liner makes
a good case for the work but I must admit I found it rather over-extended.
That being said the more I listened to this disc the more I appreciated the
simple skill of Jensen's work. Berlioz's praise is generous -
from such a master of the orchestra - because Jensen uses instruments in
effective but usually predictable ways. There is a conservative stuffiness
about this tone-poem that makes it feel rather pious albeit in a wholly
sincere fashion. The opening comes as something of a shock though because
the tutti unison phrase sounds for all the world like a near-direct lift
from the opening of Schumann's Spring Symphony although
given a rather religious flavour. Throughout the work Jensen seems keen to
underline the 'Christian message' by resorting to hymn-like
themes, plagal [amen] cadences and an atmosphere of sombre piety. In the
closing pages of the work - following the revelation of the risen Lord - the
music lifts upwards - as the liner puts it - towards "redemption and
transfiguration" which it does but without the sense of exaltation or
release that would seem appropriate.
The disc is completed by three extended excerpts from Jensen's only
opera The Heiress of Montfort. The liner writer Joachim Draheim
says that this suffered from a clumsy text (supplied by the composer
himself) and unconvincing dramaturgy. Very curiously, as the work was
neither staged or published in Jensen's lifetime, his daughter - with
help from composer Wilhelm Kienzl - took the existing music pretty much
untouched, reordered it, added a wholly new text and called it
Turandot! Given that the spirit of Jensen's music
does seem appropriate to the concept of the original - a typical
German/Romantic opera set in mid-18th Century France - this transposition to
fairytale China seems quite a leap. The three excerpts are an extended
Overture, a pastoral Prelude to Act II, and some nominal ballet music also
from the second act. Draheim in the liner rightly points to a lineage which
includes Weber and Nicolai although on the evidence presented here without
the drama of the former or the melodic memorability of the latter. Again the
pervading sense is of all-round competence with little if any genius.
All of the music here is given world premiere recordings from conductor
Pavel Baleff and his Philharmonie Baden-Baden. The Weinbrenner-Saal proves
to be a warm and generous recording location and the orchestra make exactly
the kind of rich and dynamic sound that typifies many German orchestras.
Certainly they are more than capable of coping with the technical demands
the music makes of them. The Genuin production is good - a booklet in just
German and English which includes a good essay on the composer and his
works, the usual artist/orchestra biographies and a couple of interesting
photographs including the composer's tombstone. Indeed, this disc
makes as good a case for these minor works as I can imagine. I see that
Toccata Records are being their usual intrepid selves and releasing Volume 1
of a series of piano works by Jensen. I suspect that these might prove more
interesting - my instinct is that Jensen was not naturally suited to
larger-scale forms such as symphonic poems and operas.
Worthy but minor.
Nick Barnard
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