THE YOUNGER SCHOENBERG

New Zealand Listener, Volume 39, Issue 1006, 28 November 1958, Page 4

THE YOUNGER SCHOENBERG

SCHOENBERG’S first significant work, the Gurrelieder, clearly shows the influence of Wagner, Strauss and the Germanic tradition of emotionalism; the 26-year-old Schoenberg, however, expressed emotional intensity not in ‘the warm breezes of Wagnerian harmonies nor in vague melodies laden with the opium of dreams, but in powerful dissonance and in an incessant flow of modulation

and chromaticism. The orchestration is of such _ colossal size (the swollen orchestra includes eight flutes, seven oboes, seven trombones, ten horns, four harps and an assortment of iron

chains. and other odd instruments) that early critics were astounded and baffled. For the first British performance-in 1928- it is said to have cost the BBC something like £2000 merely to rehearse it. The Gurrelieder is set amid forests, castles, tombs and the sea-the same elemental world that inspired Weber,

Wagner and Berlioz to their finest efforts. It is not a drama but simply "Songs of Gurra" which relate the medieval saga of the illicit love of King Waldemar and Tove in his castle at Gurra. King Waldemar’s jealous Queen contrives to murder Tove and when, overwhelmed with grief he curses God," he is condemned with his henchmen to wander the skies in a mystical hunt from sunset to dawn, The story of the murder is given to the symbolical voices of the Wood Doves who fill the: air with lamentations, and the remainder of the work is occupied by King Waldemar’s soliloquies for the dead Tove and his defiant attitude to heaven for destroying her. The King is mocked by Klaus the Fool in a long stretch of mad bitterness; and there is also a Reciter, who speaks only in the final melodrama. The original text of the Gurrelieder was written by the Danish ‘poet Jans Peter Jacobsen-it being the German translation of this which Schoenberg set to music, The story is one that could very easily become ridiculous instead of tragic and Schoenberg avoids this pitfall

re me ----- = with considerable skill. Technically he inclines towards Strauss, creating harmonic colour from melodic strands that weave and interweave endlessly; although the work is stretched across such a vast frame, some of the most inspired moments are derived from simple combinations of a few wind or string instruments. Perhaps the most amazing thing about the whole conception is the youthful Schoenberg’s mastery of his material: nowhere does one find a suggestion of experiment. It must be remembered, however, that for all its charm the Gurrelieder is no longer a vital work, In the sophisticated musical atmosphere of today it seems something of a curiosity: it is not Schoenberg at his greatest and it is a pity that, because it has so long been a subject for controversy, it should be more widely known than some of his later works of far greater merit. It will probably continue for many years to overshadow the true greatness of Schoenberg. _ Gurrelieder: 2¥YC, Wednesday, December 3 at 8.57 p.m.; sung in German with Richard Lewis (tenor) as Waldemar; Ethel Semser (soprano) as Tove; Nell Tangeman (mezzosoprano) as Waldtaube; John Riley (bass) as Bauer; Ferry Gruber (tenor) as Klaus-Narr; Morris Gesell (speaker) and the Chorus and Saree of the New Symphony Society of aris.