Strauss During the War Years Author(S): Willi Schuh Source: Tempo, No
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Strauss during the War Years Author(s): Willi Schuh Source: Tempo, No. 13 (Dec., 1945), pp. 8-10 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/944389 Accessed: 08-11-2017 01:41 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Tempo This content downloaded from 70.103.220.4 on Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:41:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 8 TEMPO STRAUSS DURING THE WAR YEARS By Willi Schuh little in common as with those previous to WJ HEN arrangements the second for the world celebration war of began, it. Strauss has always gone his own way, Strauss's seventy-fifth birthday had as the artist he wanted solely to be, without been. completed despite the shadows cast caring for worldly favours. As a member by the approaching catastrophy. They of an older generation he was unable to culminated in performances of six Strauss perceive that things were happening which operas which, given before an audience were not only at variance with the world he still international in character at the Munich had grown up in, but were alien to the whole State Opera in August 1939, testified to concept of European civilization. In this the endeavours of Clemens Kraus and his he was by no means alone. Strauss felt collaborators to produce Strauss's stage that he belonged to Germany as the heir of works in exemplary performances with the a great musical culture, and that he was its composer's closest collaboration as to his last great representative. final intentions in respect of style. During Strauss stayed in Germany, and did so the first years of the war it was possible to for the sake of his family, who would other- extend this plan, and in October 1942 the wise have been in serious danger. His ninth of Strauss's operas, 'Capriccio,' was daughter-in-law and grand-children needed first performed in Munich. The outbreak the protection afforded by his name because of war took Strauss by surprise in Baden of their " non-Aryan " descent. This (Switzerland); and in the course of dis- struggle for the toleration of his family cussing the opera the composer revealed during the past twelve years has darkened his deep concern at the disaster which the Strauss's life. Tension between the com- Hitler reygme had brought about, and his poser and certain official circles grew contention that the war would end in during the war, and resulted in repeated catastrophy for Germany. clashes (as in 'Stagma,'* where Strauss The affair of 'Die schweigsame Frau' defended the claims of serious music and the Stefan Zweig correspondence (see against the light music championed by the Tempo No. 7, June 1944) had already Propagandain Minister). For a time it was forbidden to mention Strauss's name in the 1936 caused Strauss's resignation from the office of President of the Reichmusikkammer, Press, and official persons were not allowed and revealed the chasm which lay between to contact him. Permission to visit him and the Nazis. He had accepted that Switzerland to take part in the Zurich office in the general belief that the regime Festival performances of ' Elektra' and would either become more normal or would 'Capriccio '-the latter with a Viennese be superseded by another; and he had ensemble-was withheld, and Strauss's de- hoped to do some good and prevent wrong. fiant remark, that he had nothing to do with He soon realized however that it was the the war and that so far as he was concerned Party and not the President of the Reichmtus- there was no reason for waging it, was ikkammer who took the decisions on reported and spread, and is indicative of Germany's musical life. IIHe had, in fact, his personal independence. Strauss's task already resolved to resign before the well- was to testify for another Germany with his nmusic. That he did so is shown by the known Furtwingler affair, and it was only his entirely non-political nature and his works of the years 1934-45, which give no aversion to demonstrative gestures that indication of compromise. lie wrote made him wait until events precipitated nothing which had any direct connection the issue. with the circumstances through which he Peace and war had alternated in Strauss's passed. When the Nazis came to power, Strauss long life. He had served the Duke of was in close collaboration with Stcfan liciningen, the (;rand Duke of Weimar, ihe Bavarian King, and the German Kaiser. Zweig, and even in 1936 he was urging the lie had seen the Republic in Germany and latter to further literary effort. He believed Austria, and had never concerned himself that the " thousand-year Reich " would with the form of the State. Now the new soon vanish, and that they would eventually nlgime had come, the effects of which he * Te tficiat German org:niLation tor the collcctiot, .t could not realize, and with which he had as perfrming-right, fes.-(Ed.) This content downloaded from 70.103.220.4 on Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:41:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms T-E MPO 9 appear Viorica with Ursuleac (who sang many of their joint work. Some ob- servers Strauss's interpreted operatic roles in Munich) on the military atmosphere of the June 19,opera 1942. On April 5 Clemens Kraus ' Friedenstag,' so unusual in Strauss, performed as in Munich, togethera withgesture the to the military spirit of Hitlerism. ' Josephslegende' - after a prolongedThis is contradicted by the oratorio-like struggle because of the Biblical subject !-praise of peace at the conclus- ion, and a ballet basedby on a new sequence ofthe Couperin fact that the first sketch of the libretto pieces in Strauss's orchestration, ' Verklun- came from Zweig himself. It was the latter who later recommended gene Fest.' With some additional pieces Joseph Gregor to finish it, as he could notit was given at concerts under the title of agree to secret co-operation with the com-Divertimento (first in Vienna on January 31, poser. The only work written by Strauss 1943) and was later published. In 1942 on official commission was the Hymn Straussfor wrote in Vienna-to where he had the Olympic Games, and this was declared moved in I941-some as yet unpublished the official hymn," for all time" by songs, the and for the centenary of the Phil- International Committee. The ' Japanese harmonic he planned a little symphonic Festival Music,' too, has no political signifi- poem, 'Donau,' which however was not cance. Written in 194O to commemorate finished. the 2,6ooth anniversary of the founding of the Japanese dynasty, it was one of several After the completion of' Der Liebe der works commissioned by the Japanese Danae,' intensive work on 'Capriccio' Government from leading composers began, in and the full score was finished on various countries, including some which August 3 I941. The splendid first per- formance on October 28 1942 was the last later went to war against Japan. great event before the destruction of the So far as Strauss's major works are German opera-houses. It is understand- concerned, they continue the great line able of that the destruction of the two opera- his life's work. There are three operas- houses in Munich, with which he had had 'Daphne' (1938), ' Die Liebe der Danae' many ties since his early days, and where (based on a scenario of Hofmannsthal), during recent years something like a and' Capriccio.' That is, two mythological Straussian Bayreuth had been built up, was operas with libretti by Joseph Gregor, aand particularly heavy blow for the eighty- one conversation-piece, in the setting year-oldof a Master. Paris rococo salon, which treats the problem With 'Capriccio,' which is the con- of text and music in opera in the manner summation of of the light and transparent a private conversation. These are works conversational style begun in the ' Ariadne ' which both musically and scenically address prologue and continued in ' Intermezzo' themselves to the ilite, and have nothing and in ' Arabella,' Strauss regarded his life's common with the present time. work as finished. Here a theoretical proposition is illustrated in human action ' Der Liebe der Danae,' an heitere Mytho- with incomparable mastery. Conversation logie in drei Akten combining the Jupiter- and easy-flowing melody are combined with Danae episode with the tale of Midas, wasrecitatives, arias, duets, trios, and great the main work with which Strauss was ensembles (up to octets) and even with a occupied at the outbreak of the war, Thefree fugue. In this one-act opera, Strauss's score was finished on June 28, 940o. final style has found it most perfect expres- Strauss wanted to withhold the work until sion. The work is full of almost Mozartian after the war, but at Clemens Krauss's music which has lost all heaviness, and is request consented to a festival performance illuminated by the smile of a philosophcr at Salzburg in 1944. As a result of the closing down of the German theatres, only who knows that he has reached his goal.