Schulhoff Schoenberg

Schulhoff Schoenberg Fenwick Smith flute Mark Ludwig viola Edwin Barker double-bass Sally Pinkas & Randall Hodgkinson piano CHAMBER WORKS CHAN 10515 Erwin Schulhoff (1894 –1942) Sonata (1927)* 12:02 for Flute and Piano À René Le Roy © Decca / Lebrecht Music & Arts Photo Library 1 I Allegro moderato 4:40 2 II Scherzo. Allegro giocoso 1:34 3 III Aria. Andante 3:11 4 IV Rondo-Finale. Allegro molto gajo 2:28 Concertino (1925)† 15:30 for Flute, Viola and Double-bass Herrn H.W. Draber in Zürich 5 I Andante con moto – Subito più mosso – Tempo I 5:52 6 II Furiant. Allegro furioso – Pesante 3:18 7 III Andante – Più mosso – Tempo I 3:58 8 IV Rondino. Allegro gaio 2:12 Erwin Schulhoff 3 Schulhoff/Schoenberg: Chamber Works for Flute Erwin Schulhoff and Arnold Schoenberg were The first movement of the Sonata is innovators who pursued widely differing in 6/8 metre throughout; it opens with a Arnold Schoenberg (1874 –1951) musical styles – and who met very different conventional figuration in the piano. But Sonata (1926)‡ 38:14 fates. They apparently knew each other; gradually, oddly placed accents and quirky starting in early 1919, they corresponded, and harmonic dislocations intrude, obsessive Transcription for Flute and Piano by Felix Greissle (1899–1982) later that year met at a concert conducted sequences (harbingers of minimalism?) go of the Quintet for Wind Instruments, Op. 26 (1923–24) by Otto Klemperer. Our three pieces were on way too long. The movement winds down 9 I Schwungvoll 11:43 completed between August 1924 and March to a brief recollection of the opening piano 10 II Anmutig und heiter; scherzando 8:30 1927. figuration, and stops. Composers and performers often signal 11 III Etwas langsam 9:24 Schulhoff: Sonata the end of a movement by broadening 12 IV Rondo 8:29 Erwin Schulhoff was born in Prague to a the tempo and inflating the dynamic. But TT 66:03 wealthy Jewish family. A prodigy, he began Schulhoff seems allergic to any hint of piano studies at the Prague Conservatory at grandiosity. Of the eight movements in our the urging of Dvořák; by his early twenties he two pieces, six go straight to the double-bar; Fenwick Smith flute*†‡ had won the Mendelssohn Prize twice, once the listener hears the approach of the ending Mark Ludwig viola† for piano performance, once for composition. through the logic of the music itself. This is In 1919 Schulhoff settled in Germany, coming demonstrated in the brief Scherzo, whose double-bass† Edwin Barker to maturity in the heady years of the Weimar toccata-like figuration runs its course until Sally Pinkas piano* Republic. As a composer, he was receptive its time is up. Randall Hodgkinson piano‡ to the progressive musical influences then In the Andante we have a searching, current – principally jazz, neoclassicism improvisatory aria. As in the first movement, and Dadaism. He composed in a variety of the listener hears groupings of 6/8 time, but styles and media, including chamber music in the metre here is actually 4/4. The conflict traditional forms. Both the Flute Sonata and between the virtual and actual metres leaves Concertino, for example, are in the traditional the music floating in a persistent ambiguity four movements. resolved only in the final bars. 4 5 The Rondo-Finale has no such leftists. He was deported to the Wülzburg Schoenberg’s Violin Concerto, Schoenberg transcription, find that the transcription complications. Like the Scherzo, it is a high- internment camp in the winter of 1941, where allowed him to place impractical or brings certain advantages. The contrasting spirited moto perpetuo that runs its merry he died of tuberculosis. He had been working unplayable voices in small notes outside timbres of the five woodwinds do make it way and ends with a Puckish wink. Schulhoff on his eighth symphony. the staff – and he agreed that this did not easier to follow individual lines, but when dedicated the Sonata to the superb French unduly compromise the realisation of his three or more contrapuntal lines are in play, flautist René Le Roy. Schoenberg/Greissle: Sonata musical intent. Had Schoenberg reached this the denser texture can become a liability. The The transcription of Arnold Schoenberg’s concession earlier, the Sonata might by now agility of the piano – and in this recording, Schulhoff: Concertino Quintet for Wind Instruments, Op. 26 was be better known in the concert hall. the flute – gives the transcription a welcome Schulhoff’s Concertino is dedicated to ‘Herrn made, at Schoenberg’s suggestion, by Felix In 1933 Schoenberg emigrated from Berlin; clarity and transparency, especially in the H.W. Draber in Zürich’ – a friend and associate Greissle (1899 – 1982), a Viennese composer later that year he arrived in the USA, settling faster movements. of Busoni’s. The instrumentation is unique: who was a student and close associate of finally in Los Angeles in 1934. Greissle and © 2009 Fenwick Smith flute doubling piccolo, viola, and double-bass. Schoenberg’s. He was living in Schoenberg’s his family escaped from Austria in 1938 and The first movement describes a large arc house at the time (and later became settled in New York City, where Greissle became that begins and ends tranquilly. The second Schoenberg’s son-in-law); the two conferred involved in the music-publishing business. The flautist Fenwick Smith retired from the is a fine example of a furiant – the energetic regularly to decide on various particulars of Late in his life, when I was preparing the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 2006 after Bohemian folk dance characterised by the the work. Sonata for performance and recording, I twenty-eight distinguished years with that alternation of 3/4 and 2/4 time. The third Dedicated to his grandson Arnold, the had several telephone conversations with institution. He began his Boston-based movement is a contrapuntal conversation Quintet was the first strict twelve-tone Greissle. His advancing emphysema made performing career in 1975 when he joined among the three instruments, alone, in pairs, composition that Schoenberg ventured. At speech difficult, but he described to me his the New England Woodwind Quintet and and in threes. In the ‘Rondino’, the top line is the time the transcription was made, he was consultations with Schoenberg as work on the contemporary music ensemble Boston played on the piccolo – with the exception so concerned that the original be accurately the transcription progressed. When I asked Musica Viva. After winning his Boston of a middle section in which the violist plays represented that he obliged Greissle to Greissle to what practical use the Sonata Symphony Orchestra audition in 1978 pizzicato on the open strings with both stuff into the keyboard part every note not might be put, he ventured the opinion – with he continued his active participation in hands, and the flute plays a skirling, squalling accounted for in the solo line. Schoenberg was a trace of embarrassment creeping into his recitals, radio broadcasts, chamber music episode in its top register. The effect is rustic well aware of the practical difficulties – and voice – that it might make interesting after- performances, and teaching. He remains and rude. Schulhoff provides an explanation: impossibilities – this caused, and expected dinner Hausmusik. One can imagine such a member of the Boston Chamber Music ‘Moravian seller of shepherd’s flutes in the some material necessarily to be omitted in a scenario in the Schoenberg household, Society, which he joined in 1984. As a streets of Prague.’ performance. But he was unwilling to make but public performances – not to mention concerto soloist he introduced to Boston The streets of Prague – to which Schulhoff such compromises himself. recordings – have been rare indeed. audiences the Renaissance Concerto of Lukas had returned in the late twenties – were In later years he relented. When Many musicians familiar with the Foss and the flute concertos of John Harbison becoming increasingly perilous for Jews and Greissle undertook the piano reduction of Woodwind Quintet, and with Greissle’s and Christopher Rouse. He has taught at 6 7 the New England Conservatory since 1976; which is used in schools to explore the the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s 100th Piano Duo. She has participated in summer in 2001 he received the Conservatory’s lives and music of composers who perished Anniversary Season with performances of festivals at Marlboro, Tanglewood, Aspen, Laurence Lesser Award for Excellence in the Holocaust. His work in fighting Koussevitzky’s Bass Concerto, and gave the Kfar Blum in Israel, Rocca di Mezzo in Italy and in Teaching. With his Boston Symphony intolerance has been featured in numerous world premiere of James Yannatos’s Concerto Pontlevoy in France. She has also appeared Orchestra career behind him, he has taken national and international television and for Contrabass and Chamber Orchestra as a soloist with the Boston Pops, Aspen on an expanded teaching commitment at radio programmes in the United States, (written especially for him) and Theodore Philharmonia Orchestra, Jupiter Symphony the Conservatory. Verne Q. Powell Flutes, South America and Europe, as well as in Antoniou’s Concertino for Contrabass and Chamber Players and, in Bulgaria, the Dobrich Inc., where he worked as a flute maker documentaries examining the role of music Chamber Orchestra. He was the featured Chamber Orchestra. As a chamber musician earlier in his career, will be sponsoring him during the Holocaust. In addition to being soloist in the New England premiere of she collaborates with the Adaskin Trio and in master-classes and recitals, nationally a member of the advisory board of the Gunther Schuller’s Concerto for Double-bass with the Blair, Ciompi, Lydian and Biava string and internationally, as an emissary of the Terezín Memorial Museum, he has served and Chamber Orchestra.

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