Walter Braunfels: Essay

“Timelessly unfashionable” by Frithjof Haas: About the compositional work of

English translation by Maroula Blades and Joerg Heinrich

After the premiere of the “Die Vögel” (“The Birds”) the critic Alfred Einstein wrote in April 1922: “I don’t think that over the opera stage has played such an absolute artistic work like this ‘lyrical fantastic game to Aristophanes’. One can and must in his need compare it with the ‘mastersingers’ and with the ‘Palestrina’ by Pfitzners.” 1 By a re-performance, 50 years later the Stuttgart Opera director Wolfram Schiwinger wrote: “Today, one does not only remember the 19th century, but also the after-pains, everywhere there is a new receptiveness to feel for musical poetry and lyrics. This opera may be heard again. Only a few deserve it out of that time.” 2

What is out standing in this creation, this in two verdicts, these lay apart in half a century, as deemed important and nevertheless almost completely forgotten? Walter Braunfels, born 1882, was raised like , who was half a generation older, in the classic romantic tradition, the following of Wagner and Brahms. But unlike Strauss, Braunfels has written his most important works after the drastic experience of being a soldier in the First World War. The terrible impressions of the thirty year old, which the successful fifty years old

Walter Braunfels, ‘Die Vögel‘ (‘The Birds‘): Figurine des Wiedehopf (Figurine of the Hoopoe) for the Cologne performance that Hans Strohbach made in 1930 with the proscription through the National Socialism in the Second World War even had to suffer much more, marks a creation, which in our presence is significant to accommodate. The breakdown of an intellectual world order did not influence Braunfels, like by the new-tone

Walter Braunfels (about 1908) musicians of the twenties, the avoidance of tradition, but conscious of its essential values. This tie on the traditional customs was called for a long time contemptuously, ‘neo-romantic,’ while one has only been aware of the independent value of this style direction recently and so the important contemporaries of Braunfels, Anton Zemlinsky, Hans Pfitzner and Franz Schreker were rediscovered. Braunfels has not chosen the way to emigration despite proscription and performance ban by the national socialistic cultural policy; he remained a silent stone of annoyance in the country where enemies stood against him, where however the roots of his artistic makings still lay.What are the sources of these musical works, which finds renewed interest today? During his childhood and teenage years in , Braunfels began to study at an early age with his mother and later by the works of Bach, Beethoven and Schumann. However, beside his interest for Greek antiquity which woke in high school, he found no role model in his musical environment that seemed worthwhile striving after. The early Frankfurt theatre impressions by the of Flotow, Lortzing, Gounod, and Meyerbeer could not persuade him to a musician’s life. Only in where he studied law and national economy, he became so fascinated by the performances arranged by that he decided to become musician. While he studiously worked for one year on the piano tutored by Theodor Leschetitzky in Vienna, as a composer he remained largely autodidactic. The contact to the important master teacher of the neo-romantic Munich school, , was only confined to guiding advice and compositional encouragement. More important were the experiences as a trainee-conductor, sitting in the rehearsals and the performances of Wagner’s ‘Ring’ and ‘Tristan and Isolde’ under the direction of Felix Mottl.

Ludwig Thuille characterized the of the new romantic Munich school

These experiences clung so deeply, that decades later Braunfels could still play these works off by heart to his pupils, as he had heard them under Mottl. Even more defining for him was the many performances of the stage works from , who Mottl at that time in Munich passionately propagated. The glowing fascination of this music had a stirring effect on the inspiration of the young composer. His own gift, the improvisational strength of invention, found conformation here. Like the young Belioz, who had wandered through the Italian Campagna (Italian Campaign) improvising on the guitar in addition to singing, Braunfels improvised at the end of public piano recitals, after he had played the late sonatas from Beethoven.

The opera composer found his fantastic imagination’s gift an attractive subject by E.T.A. Hoffmann. After the unfinished ‘Golden Topf’ (‘Golden Pot’) he succeeded with a ingenious throw with the opera ‘’ (‘Princess Brambilla’), which premiered in 1909 through Max von Shilling in Stuttgart. In the libretto of this early work, the hero is not able distinguish his unreal visions from the real I, so that the ideals become reality, this engaged the composer in a second version (1930) and in a third version (1953) to end of his life.

Out of the same spirit of ‘visionary fantastic’ from the steady changing I derived the first orchestral masterpiece, the ‘Phantastischen Erscheinungen eines Themas von H. Berlioz’ (‘The fantastic appearance of a theme from H. Berlioz’), Wilhelm Furtwängler conducted in Frankfurt and in Munich. In the same year 1914, in which Reger wrote his Mozart- Variations, Braunfels invented a new variations technique through the identification with Berlioz: Mephistos Floh-Ballade (Mephitis Flea Ballad) from ‘Faust’s Verdammnis’ (‘Faust’s Damnation’), it wasn’t only changed in its formal musical structure, but always appeared in new transformations: as if an always changing personification of the composer Belioz would continue through the following epochs. In a similar way, a few years later, Braunfels had written orchestral variations over the so-called Champagner-Lied (Champagne Song) out of ‘Don Giovanni’. Perhaps this composition is less fortunate because the perfect sound of Mozart’s originals oppose the transmission to the modern orchestra.

In addition to the meeting with Berlioz there was a second emphatic experience in the Munich years: Anton Bruckner, his fundamental religiousness overwhelmed Braunfels. This as well as the terrible war experiences induced him to think about his religious point of view and to confront himself with theology. He converts to Catholicism. From now on a definite deep Christian conviction determines the rest of his creations. Under the influence of his highly admired father-in-law, Adolf von Hildebrand, the important sculptor and representative of a late classic, he understood his Catholicism as having a continuous effect on a changing antiquity. And so he was led to the comedy of Aristophanes, the ‘Vögel’ (‘Birds’), which provided the substance for his most successful opera. His own libretto initially follows the Greek original, but the second act takes a Christian turn and ends with the religious hymn from a humble human race: “Great is Zeus,

Hans Strohbach, figurine of the ‘Kiebitz‘ (‘Lapwing‘) for the Cologne performance of the ‘Vögel‘ (‘Birds‘) (1930) eternal, all bountiful he is, holy He! Praise him, eternal praise!” The composer paraphrases his roll as a librettist as follows: “It was never possible for me to compose a finished text, the word only forms itself in the moment of musical spirituality.” 3

At the première of the ‘Vögel‘ (‘Birds‘) Fritz Brodersen portrayed the ‘Wiedehopf‘ (‘Hoopoe‘) The text is usually simultaneous with the music; often it even arises after the musical idea. The composer therefore doesn’t raise any claim with his libretto on independent literary quality. He also liberally handles quotes from foreign texts. In the libretto the ‘Vögel’ (‘Birds’) there are processed verses from Eichendorff, since the composer could not find any suitable words by Aristophanes on which he could compose the love scene between the nightingale and the man.

The opera ‘Die Vögel’ (‘The Birds’) became Braunfels most successful opus because here was a timeless, uniquely musical substance that became its very own opera theatre. The musical language of the ‘Vögel’ (‘Birds’) has an unmistakable independence. Already from the affectionate string melody in the first bars the magic releases, which this fantasy world conjures, freed from the earth’s heaviness.It is hard to find role models for this music; Hans Pfitzner is still the most likely choice, Braunfels highly estimates him under the contemporaries.

Hans Knappertsbusch brought ‘Don Gil von den grünen Hosen‘ (‘Don Gil of the Green Trousers‘) to the première in 1924

Despite the declared belief in ‘Tristan’, hardly any chromatic isfound in the ‘Vögel’ (‘Birds’); also nothing is to be felt of the simultaneous avant-garde atonal trends. The music seems timeless, without being imitating. A listener from the first performance formulated the following: “One feels pleasure by the melody formations of classical purity and beauty, pleasure with astonishing harmonic logic even with the boldness.” 4

The most important work that followed from this epoch of substantial productivity is the oratorio ‘Te Deum’, premier in 1922 by in Gürzenich by Cologne. A contemporary report speaks about the “largest success that a première ever had in Cologne.” 5 Wilhelm Furtwängler called the work in a letter to the composer “with reference to the emotion, the most beautiful and the most open” 6 what he has written. The composition of the Latin hymn is an ecstatic passionate confession of the convert to Catholicism. A comparison with the ‘Te Deum’ from Anton Bruckner is noticeable. While Bruckners composition radiates a firm, quiescent devoutness, the work from Braunfels shows an immense exuberance: in the first and third set a never ending jubilation, in the second set a threatening apocalyptic vision; the final set is a grave mourning music for the deceased father-in-law, Hildebrand, and ends with the “non confundar in aeternum” in a hymmnic apotheosis as the assurance of redemption. The formal structure of the four sets binds this over-foaming confessio with a symphonic scheme. Opera and oratorio remains also in the following years the genre, for which Braunfels wrote his most important works. The musical comedy ‘Don Gil von den grünen Hosen’ (‘Don Gil of the green trousers’), after Tirso de Molina, conducted by in 1924 at the Munich première, follows the style from the cheerful vocal opera.

Leo Pasetti: Two Figurines for the opera ‘Don Gil von den grünen Hosen’ (‘Don Gil of the green trousers’)

A ‘Große Messe’ (‘Great Mass’) with colossal instrumental and vocal means premieres in 1926 again in Gürzenich by Cologne, directed by Hermann Abendroth, uses Gregorian church tones, which still increases the tonal and formal dimensions of the ‘Te Deum’. Despite his absolute admiration for Beethoven’s, ‘Missa solemnis’, Braunfels finds, “that the size of the object can never be indicated, and that, who has so much love for the object and believes to see it so clear, also has something to announce about this.” 7

At the beginning of the thirties obligations pressured the Cologne high school headmaster and the concert pianist, who played all the piano concertos from Mozart on the radio network with his own production in the background. The first symptoms of disastrous political developments and bad ideas of a dark and gloomy future, also let the compositional production decline. Only after the expulsion from the high school duty, the publicly announced ‘dead composer’ in complete seclusion revived extraordinary creative strengths from out of his spiritual resistance.

Theodor Caspar Pilartz, stage sets for the première of the ‘Verkündigung‘ (‘Annunciation‘) (1948) the background leaflet

While concentrating on religious topics as a response to the banality of the ruling environment, the later works finds a decisive orientation. Without the prospect of a performance arises a cantata cycle for the high feasts of the church year likewise the composition of the mystery ‘Verkündigung’ (‘Proclamation’) from the play ‘L’Annonce fait à Marie’ from . This gave the impulse to change the means of musical expression. The confrontation with the uncompromising Christian thinking Claudels – though in an unfamiliar German broadcast through Jakob Hegner – he was able to find a new sharp and powerful musical language. The topic of the undeserved suffering and out of this the growing moralistic strength, corresponded to his very own living situation. Here ignited a new, musical condensed style from the composer. The verses of Chaudels from the “trumpet that summons all people from time to time, so that their lots are distributed once again, … the voice, which replaces the word” inspired the composer to the characteristic woodcut style motif in which the trumpet in the orchestra plays a special roll. The dialog is treated like a recital,

Meta Kochen-Driver: Chalk drawings to the ‘Verkündigung‘ (‘Annunciation‘) (1948) Mara takes her dead child to Violaine. occasionally even spoken . Consequently at the highlights there is an even more impressive effect in the arios overhanging moments. Also here the sparse appointed choir has an important function. Some important motifs are taken from the Gregorian or derived from it. The harmonic is harder than in the earlier operas and shows stark dissonant frictions primarily in second- passages, which draw the terrible sphere of lepers.

The plot of the “Verkündigung” (“Proclamation”) with the central miracle occurring in the Christmas night and the symbolic language having many associations doesn’t represent the character of the romantic opera. The substance requires the stylisation. That is why the realistic operatic production in 1948 couldn’t find a broad understanding at the municipal stages in Cologne (Städtischen Bühnen Köln).

From the polyphonic orchestra set of the ‘Verkündigung’ (‘Proclamation’) and with the musical motifs of the works, Braunfels developed a late chamber music style with the so-called ‘Verkündigungs-Quartett’ (‘Proclamation Quartet’), and then two more string quartets and a string quintet followed. The works create the feeling of a lifelong occupation with Beethoven’s late quartets.

Chalk drawings to the ‘Verkündigung‘ (‘Annunciation‘) (1948) Peter from Ulm carries the dying Violaine home

An important stimulation for this late style from Branfels was the only theatre attendance that he made during the ‘dritten Reiches’ (‘the third empire’) from his refuge at Lake Constance; the premiere of Hindemiths opera ‘Mathis der Maler’ (‘Mathis the painter’) 1938 in Zurich: “I was really immensely impressed… I felt very stimulated from this opus.” 8 In this manner he reported to a friend and after this he began with his last opera, “Szenen aus dem Leben der Heiligen Johanna” (“Scenes from the life of the Holy Johanna”). For this he wrote once more his own libretto inspired by the handed down case files: Stationen aus dem Leben der Jungfrau von Orléans, (Stages from the Life of the Virgin of Orleans, Joan of Arc) Berufung (vocation), Triumph und Leiden (triumph and suffering) in a rich contrasting sequence of dramatic opera scenes. The composition only exists as a manuscript and still waits to this day for its première. After the war years Braunfels returned once more as director at the Cologne High School and as concert pianist to the public. He fulfilled several composition orders, primarily works in concerto form. For the young Gürzenich conductor Günter Wand, himself one of the few that emphatically supported the composer Braunfels, he wrote a ‘Sinfonia brevis’(‘Symphony brevis’). The great success of the twenties did not occur again. Now the public was interested in the music of the avant-garde. Braunfels felt rightly misjudged; his most important works, the compositions of the inner emigration from 1933 to 1945 were hardly staged: the operas, the church cantatas, and the chamber music. – His last composition was a commissioned work for the German television a ballet “Der Zauberlehrling” (“The Magic Apprentice”) from Goethe, as well as the music to a medieval resurrection game, a simple, but very insistent bequest with which rounds off the life’s work. –

In the following decades the composer was almost completely forgotten. Performances of his works were rarities. Two new opera productions of the ‘Die Vögel’ (‘The Birds’) in Karlsruhe and Bremen drew attention. Will the creation by Walter Braunfels for concert halls and opera houses be rediscovered?

In a lecture at the opening of the Staatlichen Kölner Musikhochschule (State Cologne college of music), Braunfels as new appointed director in 1925 formulated the following, what for him seemed essential as composer and educationalist: “The world’s value, how it is expressed in the eternal classical works, to connect with the knowledge of the over-temporal in the temporal conditions of the creations of today.” – The works from Braunfels are creations from yesterday, but they are not a brief expression of fashion, but a reference of a great artistic inheritance of an old tradition that is thousands of years old, which the presence cannot escape from. Also for us today’s listeners this music can be essentially important, if we recognise and try to understand the world’s value to which it is obliged to.

Meta Kochen-Driver: Chalk drawing to the ‘Verkündigung‘ (‘Annunciation‘) (1948) Violaine on her deathbed. These are the values of a Christian art grown from the antiquity, which the music of Bach to Stravinsky felt compelled to. “Timelessly unfashionable” also for them – to pick up a word that Alfred Einstein in regard to Walter Braunfels’ compositional work characterized in 1931.

Remarks: The musical estate of Walter Braunfels is located at the Bavarian National Library Munich. The personal correspondence lies in the families archives Cologne, abbreviated as follows: FA

The most important source for life and work of Walter Braunfels: Ute Jung: Walter Braunfels; Studies to the History of Music of the 19th Century. Bd. 58, Regensburg 1980, abbreviated as follows: UJ

1 - Rhenish Thalia, 1 st year 4 th exercise book, 09-04-1922, P. 625 2 - Stuttgart newspaper 28.09.1971 3 - From libretto, source as No. 2, P. 628 4 - Albert Noelte in Münchner Abendblatt (Munich evening newspaper), 01.12.1920 5 - G.Tischerin the Rheinische Musik und Theaterzeitung (Rhein music and theatres newspaper) 01.03.1922

6 - Letter v. 22.07.1922, FA 7 - Conversation with a Reinhard Schwarzschilling, UJ S. 202 8 - Letter to Gilbert Schuchter v. 16.11.1938, UJ S. 517