Felix Weingartner - Symphony No. 5; Ouvertüre 'Aus ernster Zeit' (Marko Letonja)

Information

Composer: Felix Weingartner

1. Overture "Aus ernster Zeit", Op. 56
2. Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 71: I. Allegro agitato
3. Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 71: II. Allegro scherzando ma poco moderato
4. Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 71: III. Andante solenne
5. Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 71: IV. Fuge di due te mi

Basel Symphony Orchestra
Marko Letonja, conductor

Date: 2007
Label: cpo

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Review

On the subject of another famous conductor, Wilhelm Furtwängler, who also assigned pride of place to “composer” on his résumé, I have found myself in strong disagreement with more than one of my colleagues in this journal, once going so far as to call Furtwängler’s note spinning “wearisome, wandering, and life-sapping.” How very different is Felix Weingartner, (1863–1942) who may indeed have been an even greater composer than he was a conductor.

My introduction to Weingartner’s music was, you might say, through the back door of his chamber music rather than through the front door of his large symphonic works. In 2005, cpo— which appears to be promoting Weingartner in a series of recent recordings—released a CD (777 049) of his E-Minor Sextet for two violins, viola, cello, double-bass, and piano, coupled with his G-Major Octet for clarinet, horn, bassoon, two violins, viola, cello, and piano. The sextet in particular, written in 1906, was as immediately and strikingly beautiful a work in 19th-century Romantic vein as any I’d heard. It reminded me of the sparkling chamber works by Philipp Scharwenka more than anything. Having been smitten by Weingartner, the composer, I proceeded to acquire his Second Symphony, written even earlier than the Sextet, in 1898, and his Third Symphony, written in 1914. Both of these recordings are also available on cpo.

Barry Brenesal, in 29:6, reviewed the Second Symphony, and called it “focused and co-gent . . . appealing and frequently memorable, with idiomatic and often striking instrumentation.” And the same recording made Michael Carter’s Want List in 30:2. Weingartner’s Third and Fourth Symphonies, to the best of my knowledge, have yet to be reviewed in these pages. So we jump forward to the composer’s Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, op. 71 (1924).

All commentary one reads on the subject places Weingartner’s compositional vocabulary directly in line with the Liszt-Wagner axis. Some writers also include Brahms in the alliance, to which latter reference I say “not so.” There is not a drop of Brahmsian blood in this score. There is indeed, however, a little of Wagner, more of Liszt, and smatterings of Richard Strauss, Schreker, and Zemlinsky—a heady brew of 19th- and early 20th-century late German Romanticism. Yet I think note author Eckhardt van den Hoogen strikes pay dirt in citing as a strong influence the one composer Weingartner was possibly the least sympathetic to as a conductor, Anton Bruckner.

There is something quite Brucknerian in these massed brass declamations, the themes that simultaneously quest and soar as they emerge from fragmentary motives, the grand, if sometimes grandiose climaxes that shatter and then restore faith, and the driving triple-meter but march-like rhythm of the Scherzo. And yet, what Freudian subtext lurks in the subconscious of a man who writes music that sounds not a little like Bruckner, but had this to say about him? “Here a marvelous torso, there an arm, a leg, a head, each valuable in its own way. But how is it possible to weld these fragments together into a gigantic four-movement symphony?—they are blocks, but not an organic structure. Moreover, one symphony is very much like another. The same form used to present the themes, the same kind of polyphony, the same transitions, and everywhere the same lack of uplifting power, which is felt to be all the more embarrassing in the face of the superior quality of many of the themes.” How ironic is it that one composer should find flaws in the works of another, only to emulate the very target of his criticism? Many readers and listeners may agree with Weingartner’s opinions about Bruckner, admittedly not the most universally beloved of composers; but if you happen to be a Bruckner fan, as well as of the whole fin-de-siècle Austro-German school, I can almost guarantee that you will instantly take to Weingartner’s Fifth Symphony. It’s a sweeping canvas, at once tragic and triumphant, with a complex fugal finale and an Andante solenne to rival the suicidal musings in any of Mahler’s slow movements.

Weingartner’s lengthy 1914 Overture, “Aus ernster Zeit” that opens the disc is less an overture than it is a tone poem of sorts. It’s hard to know exactly what its subject is. If the opening sounds familiar to you, it should; it’s a thinly veiled quotation of the opening chords of Beethoven’s Overture to Coriolanus . The piece goes on to quote, paraphrase, or otherwise satirize passages from Beethoven’s Wellington’s Victory , Brahms’s Academic and Tragic overtures, Schumann’s Manfred , Liszt’s Mazeppa , the Marseillaise , the Austrian national anthem, and the Star Spangled Banner . The note author describes it as an occasional piece, but never quite tells us what the occasion was it was written for. This “blaring turmoil of anthems” is a real tour-de-force for the orchestra that reminded me of nothing so much as Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben . Musically, “Aus ernster Zeit” is pure nonsense; but it takes a composer of means—as well as the stones—to dress such drivel in such sequined splendor.

This appears to be the only recording currently available of Weingartner’s Fifth Symphony. Fortunately, it’s a fantastic one. I can’t imagine it being bettered any time soon. You will enjoy this disc immensely, even for the frivolity of the Overture; and the Symphony is magnificent. Top recommendation.

-- Jerry Dubins, FANFARE

More reviews:
ClassicsToday  ARTISTIC QUALITY: 8 / SOUND QUALITY: 9
https://www.amazon.com/Weingartner-Symphony-Overture-Ernster-Zeit/dp/B000X24QSC

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Felix Weingartner (2 June 1863 – 7 May 1942) was an Austrian conductor, composer and pianist. He studied at the Leipzig Conservatory, and was one of Franz Liszt's last pupils in Weimar. Weingartner was the first conductor to make commercial recordings of all nine Beethoven symphonies, and the second to record all four Brahms symphonies. Despite his lifelong career as a conductor, Weingartner regarded himself as equally, if not more importantly, a composer. Besides numerous operas, Weingartner wrote seven symphonies, a sinfonietta, violin concerto, cello concerto, orchestral works, string quartets, quintets and lieder.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Weingartner

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Marko Letonja (born August 12, 1961) is an Slovenian conductor. Letonja studied piano and conducting at the Academy of Music in Ljubljana. Following his studies with conductor Otmar Suitner at the Academy for Music and Theater in Vienna, Letonja went on to be music director of the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra from 1991 to 2003 and Music Director and Chief Conductor of both the Symphony Orchestra and the Opera in Basel from 2003 to 2006. Since 2012, Letonja has served as the chief conductor of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg and as the chief conductor and artistic director of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/marko-letonja-mn0002189240

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