What price Hindemith now?

[rauschwerk]

In Pelican's 1961 survey European Music in the Twentieth Century, just four composers - Bartok, Stravinsky, Hindemith and Schönberg - have their own chapters. Is such attention to Hindemith conceivable nowadays? Bachtrack suggests that hardly any Hindemith is being performed anywhere (except Germany) in the 50th anniversary of his death.

As a lover of quite a few of Hindemith's works, I am astonished by this. Do so few musicians like his music nowadays? Are concert promoters all scared stiff of its box office potential? Even if he is not the major figure he was once thought to be, is his best music not as good as much of (say) Prokofiev's?

[Andrew Slater]

There does seem to be a problem. Quite recently I heard an orchestra conductor / director tell the audience that if they ever programme Hindemith in a concert, they don't advertise the fact! At least it implies that from time to time they do play some Hindemith!

Having said that there are notable exceptions: the RLPO has recently played at least two pieces: Nobilissima Visione and Mathis der Maler.

[Dave2002]

In Pelican's 1961 survey European Music in the Twentieth Century, just four composers - Bartok, Stravinsky, Hindemith and Schönberg - have their own chapters. Is such attention to Hindemith conceivable nowadays? Bachtrack suggests that hardly any Hindemith is being performed anywhere (except Germany) in the 50th anniversary of his death.

As a lover of quite a few of Hindemith's works, I am astonished by this. Do so few musicians like his music nowadays? Are concert promoters all scared stiff of its box office potential? Even if he is not the major figure he was once thought to be, is his best music not as good as much of (say) Prokofiev's?

Interesting question. Which pieces by Hindemith do you consider to be most worthwhile?

I hardly listen to any, though I have played his flute sonata. That's a work which I think comes across differently for performers than for listeners.

I tried to get back into Hindemith over a year ago, when I borrowed several CDs from the library, and I also heard the Mathis der Maler symphony a few years ago at the Proms - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00tknf5

[Roehre]

But for our Britain-centred view, don't expect Britten being played that much outside these isles either (and let's face: hardly any record companies outside Britain have been/are recording Britten: Decca did, HMV did, but who else did so extensively?)

It is really shocking to discover how composers we think are generally well known -as they are by us on these boards e.g.- aren't elsewhere. I attended a concert with Sibelius 2 in Zürich last month (Tonhalle Orchester!), and it turned out that the concert going public there hardly knew Sibelius. Bruckner is hardly known in France or Italy and Mahler's star is rising there now, but until recently was laughed at there. And: who knows Hartmann or Henze or Reger (Hindemith tutor!) well on these isles?

Chailly/Concertgebouw made a recording of all the Hindemith Kammermusik (-concertos) for Decca, on the continent a bestseller. All Hindemiths's works have been recorded and IIRC are hardly out of print (look at CPO, MDG, Wergo, DGG, DaCamera sites and see what is available e.g.: all Chamber music works, all orchestral works, all theatrical works).

Works of Hindemith's which I consider to offer a good introduction to his output:
-sinfonietta op.4
-any of the symphonies (Mathis der Maler, Serena, Harmonie der Welt, in B-flat, in E-flat)
-any of his concertos (cello, piano [4 Temperaments], violin [Oistrakh-recording e.g.], Horn i.a.)
-his Konzertmusiken for a whole range of orchestras (brass band, wind band, symphony orchestra, chamber orchestra et al)
-the Kammermusik opp.24 and 36 (chamber concertos in all but name: i.a. viola, cello, piano, organ with small orchestra)
-his 7 string quartets, including the very humorous Minimax (a brilliant persiflage of "popular" orchestral music)
-operas like Matis der Maler and the scandalous Sancta Suzanna
-the sonatas for piano with iirc every orchestral instrument, including trumpet, double bass and heckelphon
-the Mass (one of his very last works)
-Requiem for those we love (on texts by Walt Whitman)

Hindemith does deserve his place in the music-scene of the 20th Century.

[Hornspieler]

In Pelican's 1961 survey European Music in the Twentieth Century, just four composers - Bartok, Stravinsky, Hindemith and Schönberg - have their own chapters. Is such attention to Hindemith conceivable nowadays? Bachtrack suggests that hardly any Hindemith is being performed anywhere (except Germany) in the 50th anniversary of his death.

As a lover of quite a few of Hindemith's works, I am astonished by this. Do so few musicians like his music nowadays? Are concert promoters all scared stiff of its box office potential? Even if he is not the major figure he was once thought to be, is his best music not as good as much of (say) Prokofiev's?

Paul Hindemith was a prolific writer of works for wind instruments. I have his Horn Sonata and a recording of that work by my great friend the late Ifor James. Dave 2002 mentions his flute sonata. He also wrote concertos for Violin, Cello, Piano and Clarinet. I have a recording of Dennis Brain playing his Horn Concerto. His opera Mathis der Maler, written in 1923, is probably unknown, but his Symphony of the same name (extracts from that early opera) is still played fairly frequently - as is his Metamorphosis on Themes of Carl Maria von Weber.

As a string player, he was Leader of the Frankfurt Opera Orchestra in his younger days, played Viola in quartets and chamber music and gave the first performance of William Walton's Viola Concerto.

Constantin Silvestri championed his orchestral works, so I found myself playing quite a few of the in the 1960s. I suspect that his works are played more often in America than in this Country (Bluestateprommer?)

No doubt others on this board know more than me about this prolific composer of music for chamber ensembles.

In answer to the second part of the above quotation, I enjoy Prokofiev's music for its charm and immediatecy. Hindemith's work goes deeper and requires more understanding. It is a mistake to attempt a comparison between the two.
HS

BTW Hindemith had a very promising young pupil called Walter Leigh and I remember a piano concerto of his some years ago, played by Nigel Coxe. Walter Leigh was killed during the German invasion of Crete, but does anyone know anything about his compositions?

Apologies to Roehr, whose post came in as I was still writing mine.

[amateur51]

What an interesting thread, many thanks

My only thought is that in times past it would have been Radio Three that would have taken up Hindemith's anniversary as a reason to look back at his life & works and to offer a re-assessment, new performances, perhaps a little festival putting his work in context, celebrating it.

I'm not holding my breath

[rauschwerk]

Which pieces by Hindemith do you consider to be most worthwhile?

A personal view (these are what I like best, but they form only a tiny proportion of his large output):-

Kammermusik Op.24 Nos 1 & 2 (the later Op.36 set I find to be merely 'interesting'), the organ sonatas (my introduction to his work, as I recall), the Ragtime from the '1922' suite for piano (which sounds to me as though Scott Joplin had studied with Alban Berg), Concert Music for Strings and Brass, Der Schwanendreher, the 1930s Violin Concerto, The Four Temperaments, the Mathis der Maler Symphony (must make an effort to get to know the opera this year), Nobilissima Visione, Symphonic Dances, the piano duet sonata.

I am averse to Ludus Tonalis, however interesting it may be compositionally. Perhaps it's one of those 'learn through playing' pieces? Should I learn to play it? i wonder.

[JimD]

I enjoy the Die Harmonie der Welt symphony especially, being a vulgarian, the big ending.

[Roehre]

....I am averse to Ludus Tonalis, however interesting it may be compositionally. Perhaps it's one of those 'learn through playing' pieces? Should I learn to play it? i wonder.

The Hindemith to avoid are -for obvious reasons- his school and educational pieces. Ludus tonalis is border line, as it is meant to be educational as well as to be performed publicly.
I don't like it either.
Hindemith's solo-piano pieces are IMO not representing the best of his output at all.

[Roehre]

....
BTW Hindemith had a very promising young pupil called Walter Leigh and I remember a piano concerto of his some years ago, played by Nigel Coxe. Walter Leigh was killed during the German invasion of Crete, but does anyone know anything about his compositions?

I only know two of his compositions, the overture Jolly Roger and his 1936 Concertino for harpsichord and string orchestra, the letter appeared on a BBC CD in the 1990s together with Butterworth (another victim of war) and Finzi.
Enjoyable, but a bit dry music.

Apologies to Roehr, whose post came in as I was still writing mine.

Better an interesting post too many as none at all, HS.

[Suffolkcoastal]

I would certainly endorse many of the works mentioned in previous posts. I admit to not knowing as much Hindemith as I should, though I have a reasonable number of recordings of his works and both enjoy and admire his music. My particular favourite is the 'Requiem for those we love' (When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd) which really is very moving.
R3s coverage of Hindemith has been pretty poor in recent years, in the four complete years of my survey so far (2009-12( his highest number of works/extracts broadcast was in 2009 with only 26. My partial surveys from the 1990's show a higher number than this, for only part of a year, so there has definitely been a decline in recent years. I am hoping for R3 to do much better in this 50th Anniversary of his death, but I don't hold my breath. (With the exception of Britten none of the anniversary composers have really got off to a flying start on R3 this year, instead its Mozart and Schubert who have had the flying start to the year!)

[rauschwerk]

My particular favourite is the 'Requiem for those we love' (When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd) which really is very moving.

Inspired by the warm recommendation by Norman del Mar in the book I cited in my first post, I have tried very hard with this piece in the composer's own recording. Curiously, though, it moves me very little.

[Suffolkcoastal]

Try the Telarc recording conducted by Robert Shaw, which is the recording I have.

[Don Petter]

BTW Hindemith had a very promising young pupil called Walter Leigh and I remember a piano concerto of his some years ago, played by Nigel Coxe. Walter Leigh was killed during the German invasion of Crete, but does anyone know anything about his compositions?

I don't know the Piano Concerto, but there have been several recordings of his Concertino for Harpsichord and Orchestra.

George Malcolm plays it on a cheap BBC issue which often turns up in charity shops (I saw it only last Friday! *):

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Banks-Green-Willow-Marriner/dp/B000026F29/ref=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1360492163&sr=1-2

There is also Neville Dilkes on an EMI British Series CD, and Pinnock and Tilney have also recorded it (as did Kathleen Long, on the piano).

Other works are harder to find - about the only sources are much recommended CD of chamber music on Dutton:

http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2005/Mar05/Leigh_chamber_CDLX7143.htm

and a long awaited Lyrita CD re-issue:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Leigh-Agincourt-Concertino-Harpsichord-Strings/dp/B000S75CBW/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1360492932&sr=1-1

Leigh was killed, not on Crete, but by 'friendly fire' when an allied plane machine-gunned troops at Tobruk on 12th June 1942.


* When I passed over a copy of I Musici's 'Four Seasons' at £14.99 - Oxfam's pricing still doesn't get more realistic.

[Ferretfancy]

The Symphonic Metamorphoses on Themes by Carl Maria von Weber has always been popular, and does get broadcast fairly frequently, but the neglect of other works is very strange. Hindemith has a reputation for being a rather arid composer, but it really isn't so. To my mind, it's Reger who deserves that title.
One of my favourites is the symphony Mathis der Maler, especially in Karajan's early recording for EMI. There was a performance released some years ago of the complete opera, and it sounded very interesting in the fragments I heard broadcast. Then there's the Violin Concerto with Oistrakh , Nobilissime Visione, the E flat symphony, and another orchestral work based on Hindemith's opera about Kepler,Die Harmonie der Welt.