An unexpected box of delights. I like absolutely everything about this
treasure-trove of a two disc set from CPO. The title "Suites &
Overtures for the Radio" led me to expect some entertaining festival of
light music - which I had no doubt I would enjoy. In fact this is something
altogether more fascinating, rewarding and intriguing.
Aside from the considerable musical delights offered here the set
rediscovers a sub-genre of music I had never been aware of and another that
was crushed and ultimately forgotten by the rise of the Nazis in Pre-War
Germany. Easiest to quote at length from the excellent - yes
really
excellent CPO booklet:-
"
A laboratory of radio history: German
broadcasting was barely five years old when West German Radio issued its
mission statement to progressively minded composers in 1929..... scores
[were] commissioned from the best-known contemporary composers by virtually
every German broadcaster, the object being to produce pieces adapted to the
technical potential of the new mass medium. Among these composers were
Eduard Künneke and Edmund Nick, even though both mainly wrote light music.
But the dividing lines within this field of contemporary music were fluid: a
glance at [the] circle of composers addressed reveals the names of Kurt
Weill, Paul Hindemith, Pavel Haas, Ernst Toch and Franz Schreker..... The
Radio Composition genre arose at a time when Germany's light music
was witnessing its final flowering - before being expropriated and brought
to an untimely end by the Nazis. Radio compositions were like a point of
intersection between the light and the various currents of contemporary art
music that flourished in the Weimar Republic.... music that drew its
strength from the innovations of its day.... knew no musical boundaries ....
jazz and dance music stand cheek by jowl with classical forms and
avant-garde innovations."
At considerable length the booklet explains that there was an idealistic
sense of social engineering underpinning these scores. Away from the
conventions of the concert hall it was perceived that the average listener
would accept music they heard as simply that without preconceptions or
pre-judgements. The other consideration was to create a repertoire which
took account of the technical limitations of the broadcast format - limited
technology at both the sending and receiving ends of the broadcast chain -
and minimise the impact the technology would have on the music. Again the
liner quotes fascinatingly from both an "Artist's
Manifesto" and a technical guide giving composers insights into what
would 'work' best on radio; "treat the percussion with
caution - in particular avoiding the bass drum". What is terribly
poignant is the realisation that this brief musical Spring lasted just four
years from the 17th January 1929 when the Schreker Suite recorded here
became the first time in radio history all the German-language broadcasters
joined together to transmit a so-called 'idiomatic radio
composition' to 1933 with the Nazis gaining power and the
propagandist power of radio being subverted to infinitely more sinister
ends.
So to the actual music. Disc 1 opens with this self-same Schreker Suite.
If like me, you know the composer through the lavishly-scored hothouse
dramas recorded on Chandos by Vassily Sinaisky or Die Gezeichneten recorded
by Decca as part of their wonderful Entartete Musik Series this dapper suite
comes as something of a shock. In six movements and scored for single wind -
which does quirkily include a contra-bassoon and saxophone - two horns,
trumpets and trombones, tuba, piano, harp, percussion and strings this is a
model of clarity of texture and musical form. Even the movement titles
hearken back more to something neo-classical; Präludium, Canon, Fughette
being just three. This is a gem of a work - emotionally detached, which in
Schreker is possibly a good thing! - but with a quite brilliant handling of
the instrumental group. The aforementioned Fughette is a delight. I suppose
it
might be characterised as light but only in the sense that it
does not seek to burden itself with any great extra-musical message or
meaning. Instead the movements conjure moods and impressions - the 4th
movement Intermezzo a rather hauntingly static landscape - imaginatively
scored throughout. Saxophones - either singly or in groups are a common
feature of the works in this set - I suspect because the timbre was
well-suited to recording and broadcast. Schreker doubles his saxophone with
other instruments in a fascinating and interesting way - quite unlike
anything else I know. The closing Capriccio is playful in a way I would not
associate with Schreker either - a stunningly brilliant trumpet solo just
one of many stellar contributions from the excellent Orchester der
Staatsoperette Dresden. This might not be Schreker as we expect to hear him
but I love it.
Ernst Toch has been well represented on CPO already with a complete cycle
of his Symphonies. The Toch of those Symphonies is much closer to the Toch
of the Bunte [Colourful] Suite performed here. Again, another real discovery
and a charmer. There are more echoes here of similar suites for theatre and
film that Shostakovich was producing at around the same time. A fascinating
thought since it must be likely that this music was being written in
splendid ignorance of the other's work. Toch has a more deliberately
gaudy style - the music more raucous, more sardonic. I would imagine 1929
technology struggles with some of the more thickly scored passages - but
nothing to trouble the consistently impressive CPO engineering here. Again
it seems rather pointless to try and fix this music's position on
some light/serious music axis. Part of the reason I have enjoyed this set so
much is precisely its refusal to be categorised. So the coolly poised
Intermezzo of this suite sits next to a very Shostakovichian slyly humorous
Marionetten-tanz, which in turn is followed by a strange ghostly Galante
Passacaglia all rounded off by a riotously neurotic Merry-go-round.
One approach to mass appeal in 1929 was deemed to lie "in adopting
and contrasting the rhythmic elements of modern dance music." Given his
background in operetta, it might seem unlikely that the composer to take up
this challenge most wholeheartedly was Eduard Künneke. Disc 1 of this set is
completed with his Tänzerische Suite Op.26 subtitled Concerto Grosso für
eine Jazzband und grosses Orchester. Another five movement suite this is
pure pleasure from start to end. It seems that once commissioned by Berlin
Radio, Künneke got rather carried away - the scale of the work and the
complexity of its scoring rather overwhelming the carefully laid out
precepts mentioned earlier. Whatever may have caused 1929 sound engineers
headaches is our substantial gain.
This is joyful music but also a score that skilfully integrates the 1920s
jazz idiom into a large-scale symphonic score. Künneke keeps his orchestra
and jazz-band - basically a rhythm section with keyboard and banjo, a bank
of saxes and brass and a solo violin separate leaving them to
'comment' on the other in true Concerto Grosso style. Huge
credit to the players here and conductor/driving force behind the project
Ernst Theis who 'hit' the style of this music to perfection.
Crucially European jazz in the 20's syncopates rather than swings.
Theis understands this and his players find an ideal balance between the
unbuttoned good humour of this music and the slightly placed sense of
syncopation. The CPO engineers have done an excellent job too defining the
two groups. In essence the jazz-band are placed over to the right of the
sound-picture. Within that the solo violin has been given a slightly
'mechanical' tone. To my ear it sounds as if the violin has
been amplified and then recorded from the loudspeaker. Its a neat but wholly
effective touch. Great playing from the uncredited violinist too who finds a
perfect balance between a sleazy schmaltz and characterful playing. Künneke
was by no means the first to try and integrate elements of jazz into
European Art music - seminal scores such as Milhaud's
La création du monde, Krenek's
Jonny spielt auf
and Martinu's
La revue de la cuisine or
Le Jazz
amongst many others pre-date it. Listen to the rather queasy saxophones -
distinctly European not American who have the bustling dead-pan humour of
the style to perfection. The contrast with the languorous chromatic string
lines of the orchestra is brilliantly conveyed and when those same lines
pass to the solo jazz violinist, all smears and slides and a wide vibrato
the sense of period perfection is complete. The second movement
'Blues' is bleary-eyed, one-for-the-road faded glamour -
another great solo violin contribution before the saxes inject a last burst
of tangoing energy into the dawn. The Intermezzo bustles with a
little-disguised homage to the Gershwin Piano Concerto. This is followed by
a Valse Mélancholique which is the closest the work gets to Künneke's
more familiar operetta territory although there are echoes of
Nedbal's Valse Triste too. Again, Theis is very skilled indeed at
pitching the mood of this to perfection - not overly sentimental - another
lovely violin solo but this time from the 'straight' side of
the ensemble - but sadly tender. This could pitch over into the indulgently
maudlin but Theis plays it to perfection, poignant not pathetic. The jazz
reeds lead off the closing Foxtrott - a real theatrical sense of a closing
number. Curiously, this has less of a jazz feel and the melodic shape has
echoes of some of Eric Coates' or Haydn Wood's orchestral
suites - no bad thing in my book. Alert incisive playing from all
departments of the excellent orchestra ensures the work drives to a rousing
ending - briefly reminiscing the previous movements along the way adding a
hyper-active xylophone and some really tricky string writing. Just possibly
the finale
slightly outstays its welcome but what a fun piece. I
could imagine it being effectively used as a ballet is the right narrative
could be added.
If disc one focuses on 'known' composers even if in
unfamiliar musical surroundings, disc two has music by a couple of composers
even less well-known - to me at least. The disc is framed by two
performances of Mischa Spoliansky's Charleston Caprice. The second
version - not referred to in the liner at all - seems to be a shortened
"concert version" by the conductor Ernst Theis. The original
version which opens the disc is about half as long again and one assumes
requires an orchestral line-up that might hinder its opportunities to be
played. This original version was considered lost until 2009 when research
for this project led to the score manuscript resurfacing. Spoliansky was a
leading light composer in Berlin and as such this is perhaps the most
overtly 'light' composition created for these radio
broadcasts. Another absolute hit and great fun and the piece that tries to
recreate jazz for a symphonic ensemble in its most undiluted/unaltered form.
I love the boozy trombone solo that leads off around 1:40 - wittily executed
here.
Max Butting is a composer I had not encountered before. From the writings
that are included in the liner it is clear that he was one of the driving
forces behind the spirit and manifesto of these radio compositions - it is
Butting who analysed musically and technically what would
'work' best for the new medium. The two works presented here
are subtitled Radio Music. His Op.37 is the intriguingly entitled
Sinfonietta with banjo. The liner points out that the inclusion of the banjo
in the title has more to do with marketing than musical choices. The banjo
is audibly present throughout but simply supports the harmony and gives a
little rhythmic impetus. More tellingly in the orchestration is the absence
of double basses but the inclusion of three bassoons. This choice is wholly
to do with the broadcast medium and does give the work a specific sound.
Butting's background in the early 1920s was politically and
artistically avant-garde. He joined groups with social-revolutionary
leanings so no surprise that a central tenet of his compositions was that
music should be intelligible to all. Also, no surprise given this ideology
that post World War II he became a leading musical figure in East Germany.
The Sinfonietta recorded here is in three balanced movements and on the
light-serious continuum that pre-occupies this set sits closest to the
serious end. It is an emotionally distanced work - more concerned with
textures and instrumental interaction. I particularly like his use of
saxophones again - but as an instrumental timbre in its own right with no
jazz implications at all. This occupies a similar aesthetic world to much
Hindemith from the same time. I have never found the latter to be dry unless
one finds the absence of overt emotion in music to be so. This is purely
abstract but beautifully crafted music with an interest in contrapuntal
writing and piquant harmony. The central adagio is particularly impressive -
a slowly unfurling sombre narrative with the melodic line shared around the
instrumental group. Again all credit to the playing and conducting here -
the pace of the music seems ideally judged and the playing has real light
and shade - much more than must have ever made it across the 1930's
airwaves. Although not indicated as such there is a sense of a
passacaglia-type harmonic repetition here underlying the overall structure.
The closing allegro vivace makes an ideal counterpart - the echoes here are
more Parisian with Honegger at his most mechanistic springing to mind.
Balancing the abstract nature of his Op.37, Butting's next work
Op.38 is his Radio Music No.2 "Cheerful Suite". The liner quotes
an autobiographical note where Butting used this work to overcome a period
of artistic questioning and emotional despair. This five movement suite is
another delightful find. The opening Ouverture has echoes of Shostakovich in
his slippery sardonic vein while the 4th movement Tanz is as close to the
Threepenny Opera world of Kurt Weill as anything else in the set. This is a
really entertaining tango led by an edgy viola then suitably sensuous
violin. The closing Finale finds a ideal balance between the high-spirited
and something a little darker. Indeed, in many ways this is the work in this
set that most perfectly embodies the ideals that I guess lay behind the
concept of these Radio compositions; accessible yet challenging, interesting
but also entertaining, 'proper' music without being
elitist.
Walter Braunfels is another composer known to me through works recorded
for Decca's Entartete Musik series. The Divertimento presented here
is another work presumed to have been lost but discovered in the Vienna
archives of Braunfels' publisher Universal. Given the destruction of
many scores by Jewish composers the survival of his handwritten score is all
the more remarkable. Central to Braunfels score is again the saxophone but
he considered it vital that it should be played vibrato-free. This he felt
was the characteristic of the instrument emphasised in jazz performances
that distorted/compartmentalised one's appreciation of it as an
instrumental timbre of considerable interest. The second movement is a very
skilfully written Divertimento that slips in and out of waltz time with
fluid wit - only on reflection does the listener realise just how complex
the metrical changes have been. The third movement has the feel of a lyrical
song led initially by the wind before this passes to the massed violins.
This is very expressive writing indeed but is avoids lapsing into obvious
sentiment by the astringent harmonies that support the melodies and the
halting accompaniment that prevents any sense of the predictable or
foursquare. That being said it reaches a powerful climax. The penultimate
movement is a Sarabande and features a beautifully reflective horn solo.
Indeed, the required level of execution makes it clear that the players in
the Radio ensembles in the late 1920s in Germany must have been of a very
high calibre - this is demanding writing both technically and musically.
Beautifully executed here it now goes without saying. As is the bustling
closing Sehr Lebhaft - fully of tricky turns and unexpected side-slips for
the violins especially. Conductor Theis sums it up in the liner; "the
ability to obtain a maximum with a minimum of means.... each of the short
movements has a unique and inimitable character while remaining part of the
larger whole."
This set is the bringing together of a multi-year project to restore these
works and the genre of music they represent. That being the case we have a
variety of venues, engineers and producers with only conductor and orchestra
the ever-presents. That being said, the quality of the technical
presentation is very very good indeed. The sound is often quite close -
never overbearingly so - but this strikes me as perfect for this style of
music. The balance between acoustic warmth and textural clarity as near
ideal to my ears as makes no difference.
The quality of the orchestral playing cannot be praised too highly both
technically and aesthetically. When the music needs to swing it does, when
it needs clarity and articulation it has it. All solos from all instrumental
departments are played with great skill and personality. I must admit to
never having heard either conductor or orchestra before. One imagines
orchestral life in Dresden is rather dominated by the Staatskapelle. Be that
as it may - this Staatsoperette orchestra are excellent. The CPO liner is
possibly the best of theirs I have ever read. There are 50 pages of close
typed text in German and English only covering very extensive articles about
the music, the composers and the all important ideology behind the concept
of Radio Music. Added to that a large number of pictures of the
protagonists, advertisements and period 'session' photographs.
The only sorrow is the pictures are captioned in German alone. Some of these
photographs are very poignant since they capture the spirit of an
ideal-fuelled age soon to be swept away. All this is topped off by a
suitably decadent thoroughly appropriate Marcellus Schiffer cover
painting.
Nowhere in the set does it says which or how many of these works are
receiving premiere/modern recordings. Certainly the Schreker at least has
been recorded elsewhere and a vintage performance of the Künneke can be
found on YouTube but this is remains a unique and compelling collection. CPO
produce many discs of great interest and worth - perhaps this is one of
their finest and most important yet. A hugely valuable addition to the
discography of music in the Weimar Republic.
By the way, this set is labelled 'Edition RadioMusiken
Vol.2'. If you were wondering about Vol. 1 it is to be found on CPO
777 541-2 issued in 2008. It too comprises two CDs and features the music of
Edmund Nick (1891-1974).
Nick Barnard
