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Weill, Kurt [Composer] : Das Berliner Requiem, cantata for tenor, baritone, male chorus & wind orchestraWeill, Kurt [Composer] : Vom tod im Wald (Death in the Forest), ballad for bass & 10 wind instruments, Op. 23 Er erschreckte uns, unser Retter, for chorusAlbum Summary
- Ivan Goossens (Spoken Vocals)
- Jakob Jespersen (Bass)
- Hilde Venken
Notes & Reviews:
After Jean Cocteau had issued tracks such as Le Coq et l'Arlequin (1918) and Le Rappel a l'ordre (1926), arguing against French Impressionism and German Romanticism and in favour of art for art's sake and with prominence being given to accessibility, simplicity and structural clarity, many composers responded to his clarion call. The devastation and emotional misery caused by the First World War and the fear of an impending further cataclysm also struck hard at existing artistic certainties. Through their music Igor Stravinsky, Paul Hindemith, Darius Milhaud and Kurt Weill all endeavored to make sense of this "new Europe" which they were experiencing around them. For its latest Glossa release the Flemish Radio Choir (VRK) has selected an ideal quintet of works to demonstrate these tendencies as well as highlighting the vocal talents of this leading European choral formation.
"This is not your grandmother's requiem - this is an intense, 1920s social commentary that is a bleak pessimistic look at death through the eyes of living people, sort of Threepenny Opera meets post-romantic Gebrauchsmusik, that Hindemith-coined term that refers the entire service of art to the needs of the people. The great movements of world socialism were just getting underway at this time, with its cousin Fascism brewing in Germany while the young Adolph Hitler got his sea legs in early speeches. This is bare-boned, post and pre-apocalypse music devoid of moral character and caught between two gigantic wars. The opening lines sum up the whole thing: "Praise to the night and the darkness that thickly surrounds you!"
This piece has a sort of haunting beauty about it that takes the world as it stood in that time - and maybe has recurred in our own - and tries, perhaps in futility and certainly in vanity, to give the common man some sort of hope in his situation, and to memorialize the deaths of so many millions. It also serves a dual purpose in that it pays tribute to the death of the noted pacifist Rosa Luxemburg. Vom Tod im Wald ("Of Death in the Wood") was originally part of the Berliner Requiem but Weill dropped the music out of concern that its theme, basically a paean to the animal world, didn't quite fit with the rest of Brecht's texts.
Hindemith's odd piece, Death, would not seem to be a particular draw listed on a concert program. But its wider significance is the further nail in the coffin of romanticism, in the wake of WWI and the failed dreams of the Weimar Republic. Curiously enough though, even Hindemith could not escape the harmonic confines of romanticism just yet, and his tonal ambiguities, though still tonality-centered, play right into the hands of the post-romantics in this eerily-comforting work for men's chorus.
Continuing on the theme of post-WWI we turn to the father of neo-classicism and the rejection of overt pathos in music, Stravinsky. His Octet got a tepid response from public and critics, shocking after the great and colorful ballets and reduced to chamber-sized dimensions, though the clarity provided in this now-famous and easily-accepted piece acceded to the ideas already being promulgated in Paris to the point of complete rejection of German romanticism. It was not appreciated at the time, but certainly opened the door to a world of new ideas.
Darius Milhaud wrote his Cantata of War and Cantata of Peace between 1937 and 1940, with texts by Paul Claudel. Milhaud was concerned of course with the idea of "objectivity", as if any composer could remove him or she from direct emotional commentary on any music composed. But Milhaud sought refuge in the halls of polytonality to try and remove any sense of grounded-ness on the forms of the past, and while he may have succeeded in his own eyes and perhaps those of his contemporaries, we now perceive the beauties of his system as just another variant on the basic earthiness of the tonal system. Both of these pieces are quite lovely and affecting, with both War and Peace operating in similar modes of comfort and persuasiveness.
Anything by Paul Hillier is almost guaranteed to be a winner, and this is no exception. I was a little leery about how well the program fits, but it does amazingly well. My one concern might be the Octet - I have heard more energetic readings than this, but it is stilled played very well, and the SACD surround sound serves each piece to full auditory capacity. Very much recommended."audaud.com
Recording information: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007).
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Works Details
Weill, Kurt [Composer] : Das Berliner Requiem, cantata for tenor, baritone, male chorus & wind orchestra - Performers: Ivan Goossens (Spoken Vocals); Jakob Jespersen (Bass); Ivan Goossens (Spoken Vocals); Jakob Jespersen (Bass)
- Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 2 min. 55 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Form: Cantata/Oratorio
- Written: 11/1928-12/1928
Weill, Kurt [Composer] : Vom tod im Wald (Death in the Forest), ballad for bass & 10 wind instruments, Op. 23 - Performers: Jakob Jespersen (Bass); Jakob Jespersen (Bass)
- Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 9 min. 15 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Written: ?09/1927
Hindemith, Paul : Der Tod :: Er erschreckte uns, unser Retter, for chorus - Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 2 min. 49 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Written: 1931
Stravinsky, Igor : Concertino for 12 instruments - Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 15 min. 29 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Form: Chamber Music
- Written: 1923
Milhaud, Darius : Cantate de la guerre, for chorus, Op. 213 - Performers: Hilde Venken; Hilde Venken
- Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 11 min. 25 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Written: 1940
Milhaud, Darius : Cantate de la Paix, for men's choir & children's choir, Op. 166 - Performers: Hilde Venken; Ivan Goossens (Spoken Vocals); Hilde Venken; Ivan Goossens (Spoken Vocals)
- Conductor: Paul Hillier
- Ensemble: I Solisti del Vento
- Notes: Jezuïentenkerk, Heverlee, Belgium (09/05/2007-09/07/2007)
- Running Time: 8 min. 14 sec.
- Period Time: Modern
- Written: 1937
