Schoenberg: Gurrelieder at 100

[Petrushka]

The first of this year's major centenary celebrations. This Saturday, February 23 it is exactly 100 years since Schoenberg's mighty Gurrelieder had its first performance in Vienna. In so many ways it was the end of an era with the last of the great 19th century compositions being blown away, first by the premiere of the Rite of Spring ushering in the 20th century a mere 4 months later and then by the catastrophe of the Great War.

I shall be playing Rafael Kubelik's wonderful recording, still for me the best one out there and sadly unavailable on CD. DG have missed a trick in not including this in their 'Originals' series.

[Bryn]

It has been issued on CD, and can still be found, new or used, at a price.

[Petrushka]

It has been issued on CD, and can still be found, new or used, at a price.

Thanks, Bryn. Yes, that's the one I bought a couple of years ago having bought the LP set in 1975. I've got a few other versions but none surpass this in my view.

[Petrushka]

No-one else marking this anniversary?

[BBMmk2]

I have James Levine and the Munich PO, etc.

[LeMartinPecheur]

No-one else marking this anniversary?

Not a work that's right up there in my Top 10 but I got to know it a bit through an Ozawa LP set, and more recently was very impressed by TV (Proms??) and CD performances by some young whipper-snapper called, um? ... yes ... Rattle.

One of those works for special occasions, preferably live rather than home listening?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

No-one else marking this anniversary?

No; after last week's Mahler #6 intensivity, I didn't feel up to Gurrelieder. When I next listen, I shall hunt out my discs of the Stokowski recording - appalling sound, totally inadequate for Schönberg's masses, but the closest to a premiere of the work that we have.

It must have been peculiar for Arnie; this work from a bygone aesthetic and as misunderstood (for completely different reasons) by the cheering audience as his most recent work. He'd finished everything (save for the orchestral songs) in his "free" "Atonal" "style", and the last Music of his own that he heard before the War was this masterpiece. Astonishing.

[Nick Armstrong]

Not a work that's right up there in my Top 10...

One of those works for special occasions, preferably live rather than home listening?

I'd second that. I was in the RFH for the Salonen/Philharmonia performance which was issued on Signum:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gurrelieder/dp/B002QO9QXU

It was a magnificent performance. I don't think I've listened to it since.

I have the Chailly version, and haven't added to that.

[Pabmusic]

I have the Kubelik, but also this 1953 recording, which is wonderful:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Schoenberg-Gurrelieder-Richard-Lewis/dp/B000E3LJBC/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1361750856&sr=8-6

[JFLL]

I wonder whether for the less adventurous of us there’s something a little guilty about enjoying Gurre-Lieder, Verklärte Nacht, the first two string quartets and the First Chamber Symphony when we feel we ought to be getting to grips with, say, Moses and Aaron and the String Trio. Schoenberg said after the belated premiere, when he showed intense irritation at its evident success: “I certainly do not look down on this work, as the journalists always suppose. For although I have certainly developed very much since those days, I have not improved, but my style has simply got better...” If that’s true I feel I ought to like the later Schoenberg pieces more, since they represent the same man’s musical thinking in a more developed phase, but, as a very average listener with little musical education, I do find it difficult. I think if I knew more about the technicalities I would probably respect, and maybe even like, the later Schoenberg pieces.

Very naïve thoughts, but maybe shared by others? (Perhaps I should go back to Hans Keller!) My version is Chailly’s, btw, which I’m very happy with.

[jayne lee wilson]

Well JFLL, I had the opposite problem, drawn at first not to postBrahms postWagner etc., but to those Orchestral Pieces sets (Op.16, Webern Op.6 & Op.5) from the get-go. I even found the Berg Op.6 a bit prolix!

Whilst fond early on of Transfigured Night, I still found it hard work and I never really fell for The Gurre. I dread to think how little I've played the Rattle or Kraft CDs I have here. In the 1970s, ransacking the local record library for the 2ndVS., the excitement only really began with those pieces, with the air from other planets, with Webern's Op. 7&9, like musical neutron stars. Playing Webern's Op.1 Passacaglia today from the marvellous Audite Rias set,, I enjoyed&admired it hugely but felt as always that, like Verklarte or Gurrelieder Part 1, it represents "the stage before" creation, a ground-clearing before new seed can be sown.

But my early experiences prove that you can respond instinctively to Schoenberg's more radical music, without training or tutoring, especially if demagogues like Howard Goodall aren't around to tell you how impossible or unenjoyable it is. The first AS LP I ever borrowed was The Op.31 Variations/1st Chamber Symphony, LAPO/Mehta. The second was the Mercury of LSO/Dorati with Op.16, Webern OP.10 & Berg Op.6. Love at first bite!

[teamsaint]

I was interested in JFLL's comments.
I'm still finding my through Schoenberg's music.
My experience is that, beyond the First Chamber symphony, Verklarte Nacht, etc, what really helps is devoting time and concentration.(always the case , I suppose).If people are at a similar stage to me , I would recommend a listen with "Five pieces for Orchestra" Op 16,http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXdJfabr-6I
with perhaps some brief notes.
these are useful.

http://www.laphil.com/philpedia/music/five-pieces-for-orchestra-op-16-arnold-schoenberg

These are a useful start point in listening to this music, perhaps . I found this work very rewarding, very quickly.
Edit, meant to say, JLW's thought about responding instinctively is how I feel about this music.

Edit:If sombody like Goodall were to tell me how difficult a piece of music is, I should make in my way to sort it out as a matter of urgency !!

[amateur51]

I agree with LMP that, for me, Gurrelieder is simply not for listening to at home. It demands a 'live' performance, an occasion and I've never been to a less than sold-out performance. I have recordings by Rattle, Craft and Stokowski but I never play them.

Thanks for the alert about its significant anniversary Petrushka

[Sir Velo]

No-one else marking this anniversary?

Not especially. I love the work but see no reason to commemorate a purely artificial milestone. Sorry.

[JFLL]

Thank you very much, JLW and teamsaint, for your thoughts and encouragement. I do agree with what you both say about the need to respond instinctively to the music, and for a musical illiterate like me that’s really the only course open. Actually, I do like some later Schoenberg – the Five orchestral pieces, op. 16, the Variations, op. 31 and the Chamber symphony no. 2, also some Webern, particularly the Six orchestral pieces, op. 6, the Six bagatelles, op. 9 for string quartet, and the Five orchestral pieces, op. 10 – so all is not lost. (I have the fine Rattle/CBSO version of Schoenberg op. 16, Webern op. 6 and Berg’s Lulu suite.) And I like pretty well all of Alban Berg, though I probably listen to him ‘as’ a late Romantic, despite the serialist trappings (guilty pleasure again?). I tend to think of his op. 6 as Mahler’s 11th.

@JLW: I like your story very much. There’s no substitute for discovering things for yourself, especially when people tell you something is ‘difficult’ or ‘impossible’!

@teamsaint: ‘what really helps is devoting time and concentration’. Very true – and thanks for the interesting link to the programme note on the Five orchestral pieces op. 16. Interesting that Schoenberg said ‘that is what they are all about – completely unsymphonic, devoid of architecture or construction, just an uninterrupted changing of colors, rhythms, and moods.’ And astonishing to think that they were first performed here by Henry Wood at a Prom!

These ramblings are possibly OT here, but, suitably encouraged, I shall have another go at the String Trio.