Search - Othmar Schoeck, Werner Andreas Albert, Musikkollegium Winterthur :: Elegie Op 36

Schoeck's Threnody of the Long Nineteenth Century...

Sébastien Melmoth | Hôtel d'Alsace, PARIS | 12/01/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

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Even after World War I, much of the music of Schoeck seems to exist in a quasi-Victorian mauve dream-world. Most of his lyrics are drawn from mid-19th Century poets, his tonal palette is pre-war, and the overall effect of Schoeck's art (specifically in the lieder and song-cycles) is unmistakably one which reflects Matthew Arnold's dictum of "truth and seriousness" in style and matter. Schoeck's work is gentle and sincere in substance and manner, resulting in an art which lends consolation and understanding to life.



Schoeck's Elegy (Op. 36) of 1922 is a prime example, beginning with its title evoking mouring, lamentation, melancholia, regret, and loss; but also ultimately engendering reflection, meditation, acceptance, consolation, and calm: a "transfigured serenity."



As Arnold notes in "Human Life" (1852),



Even so we leave behind,

As, charter'd by some unknown Powers,

We stem across the sea of life by night,

The joys which were not for our use design'd;--

The friends to whom we had no natural right,

The homes that were not destined to be ours.



Schoeck's poets of Elegy do not include the Victorian Englishman, but rather a Romantic Austro-Hungarian (Nikolaus Lenau) and a noble Prussian (Joseph von Eichendorff); but it is notable that Lenau's ethos reflects the quintessential Romantic Weltschmerz (Pain of Life), while Eichendorff exercises the Natural emphasis of Romanticism.



In the Elegy, Schoeck sets 18 lyrics by Lenau interspersed with 6 by Eichendorff resulting in a total of 24 poems in a 3÷1 ratio. The work is a "sequence"--like a string of grey pearls: the poems are discrete, without musical bridges in between: this tiny void of silence between the poems actually lends an unique ambience to the overall effect. Scored for baritone and small chamber ensemble, the orchestration of the solo instruments is impeccably delicious in its piquancy, translucency, and subtileness.



Of the Elegy, H. H. Stuckenschmidt says "This work, one of Schoeck's most important, lies on the borderline between drama and lyricism. In its desire for an excess of expressiveness it [becomes] a kind of ultimate music, wrested from a spirit which could no longer come to terms with the problems of the world."



The style somewhat recalls the vocal declamation in Wagner (cf. Siegfried); too, one is reminded of Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde in Schönberg's chamber transcription.



As to Elegy's narrative, there is not a specific story line which can be exactly followed, but rather an overall impression is given of eroticism in a sylvan environment of yesteryear: love was found and lost amongst the beech groves. But ultimately Solace is accepted: "O, Trost, O Trost!"



Schoeck's Elegy effects a strange melancholy beauty which induces a deeply moving and transfiguring experience of nearly an hour's duration.

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Stuckenschmidt also recommends Schoeck's following cycle saying, "In 1926 he completed a song-cycle for baritone and orchestra, based on fourteen poems in Gottfried Keller's Lebendig begraben (Buried Alive), which in its deeply moving seriousness recalls the earlier Elegy."

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Pfitzner: Von Deutscher Seele / Schoeck: Lebendig Begraben

Othmar Schoeck: Lebendig Begraben, Op. 40

Schoeck:Lieder

Othmar Schoeck: Mit einem gemalten Band - Lieder

Schoeck: Complete String Quartets

Schoeck: Elegie, Op.36

Othmar Schoeck: Das Holde Bescheiden

Schoeck: Penthesilea

Schoeck: Violin Sonatas

Othmar Schoek: Venus

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Gorgeous

G.D. | Norway | 02/10/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This must be one of the most achingly beautiful discs I have ever heard. The music, atmospheric, rich late-romantic, is gorgeous and the performances are excellent; there are, apparently alternative recordings available as well, and I admit that I have not heard any of those, but I cannot really imagine that this one could be bettered.



The 24 songs comprising the cycle Elegie are settings of Lenau and Eichendorff. Tempi are mostly rather slow but the music is immensely varied in colors and subtly shifting moods (mostly in the range of melancholia or nostalgia), and everything is very well laid out for the voice. Some of the songs also have a darker undercurrent and some are beautifully bittersweet (such as the marvelous Herbstklage); they do form a coherent cycle culminating in the nostalgic masterpiece Der Einsame - and the musical experience is utterly captivating.



Credits should also go to Andreas Schmidt, who delivers a fabulous performance, giving what appears to be perfect characterizations of each song and who is fully able to draw out all the nuances in moods and shadings, and he is sensitively accompanied. Sound quality is outstanding as well. This is, in short, a completely enchanting disc, and I honestly wish to give my thanks to everyone involved in producing it. An essential acquisition."