Search - Leon McCawley :: Gal: Complete Works For Solo Piano

In the continuing age of discovery, Gál's musical canvas awa

David A. Hollingsworth | Washington, DC USA | 08/01/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The name Hans Gál (1890-1987) had completely eluded me until a friend of mine mentioned him in one of our correspondences during the Fourth of July holiday weekend. Then I began listening to excerpts of his piano music courtesy of Amazon.com and decided to purchase the three-disc album. To say that the discovery was a revelation would be an understatement, and after the purchase of this album, I went on and bought recordings of his chamber music (especially his quartets and trios) and it began to occur to me that what we have here is a major musical voice in twentieth century music. The prolific composer of three operas, four symphonies, four string quartets, chamber works, choral music, and songs, his musical evolution is not so far unparallel to that of his American counterpart, David Diamond (1915-2005), himself a staunch defender of tonal music, and who likewise had a recent insurgence of interest. Ample credits and gratitude must be given to Gál's daughter Eva Fox-Gál and his grandson, Simon Fox-Gál, who boldly yet with vision and conviction, pushed the envelope in getting the composer and his music known, understood, and performed.



Born near Vienna in 1890, Gál's musical gifts were recognized early (his aunt, Jenny Alt, was instrumental in encouraging him to pursue music development further). He studied piano with Richard Robert, a leading professor in Vienna and later Form and Counterpoint with Eusebius Mandyczewski. Before the First World War, when he was obliged to serve in the Austrian army, he produced a string of compositions, many of which he destroyed (including a symphony that won him the Austrian State Prize for composition). After the war, he became a lecturer of Music Theory at Vienna University and the 1920s became a very fruitful period in Gál's life. Among the works he composed included the masterful Second String Quartet of 1929 (available in Meridian CD CDE 84531), his Sonata op. 28, and his opus 18 Trio (Camarata CM-28149). His second opera "Die Heilige Ente" ("The Sacred Duck") was greatly acclaimed at its 1923 premiere under conductor George Szell and some twenty opera houses took the work up soon thereafter. He was offered a position as Director of Mainz Conservatory in 1929 and for the next four years, the period was fertile. But the rise of the Nazi party in 1933 meant that Gál, a Jew, had to flee (his works banned), and thanks to the interventions of Sir Donald Tovey, & Sir Herbert Grierson, professors of Music at Edinburgh University, Gál found refuge in England. But Churchill's anti-alien policy during the outbreak of World War II meant that people like Gál posed security risks, and on March, 1940, he was arrested. Upon his release by the fall, he was offered a position at Edinburgh and spent the remainder of his years in Great Britain as a composer, educator, and musical scholar. It was there where he played an important role in the 1947 formation of the Edinburgh International Festival.



Gál's piano music on this explorative three-disc set serves as a nice introduction to his musical art, for his music is very much consistent in appeal and urbanity. That said, disc one is to me the most interesting and the most searching Gál has to offer: from the lush, profoundly communicative utterances that color most of the works here (especially the later ones like the Three Preludes (1944), whose slow movement evokes the arresting mysticism of late Scriabin & Roslavets) to the lucidity of, say, the Sonatinas. And I do find the composer's slow, meditative music the more striking attribute of his art (whether in his piano works or in his trios, violin sonatas, and quartets likewise available). For instance, if you take the Sonata (1927) that is first on the disc, you'll notice immediately the depth in the writing, its first movement strikingly autumnal in feel that evokes, say, Myaskovsky and Ireland. The playfulness of the second movement is ear-catching, but turn to the third movement (andante un poco sostenuto), and the eloquence and the sublimity in the language are inescapable (quite as moving as in some of Feinberg's sonatas available on BIS). Or take the Suite for Piano (1922) and again, the surface matters remain non-existent, with the sparkling sublimity of the präludium, the strange beauty of the minuet, the lifting capriccio, or the finale (entitled gigue), which is attractively vivacious and witty. But the sarabande funèbre stands out in its quiet, inner dignity and depth: its not-so-easy going beauty almost ethereal.



Gál's music does evolve, though, from some of the opulence, romantic overtones in the earlier aforementioned works (as well as the extremely well-crafted Three Sketches of 1910-1911) to the lucidity and transparency that color the rest of disc one. The Sonatinas (1949 & 1951) are perfect cases in point. The first notes of the C major Sonatina curiously evokes composers like Roslavets (a giant in Russian avant-garde music of the 1920s) before venturing almost immediately in its neo-baroque discourse, not far from the spirit of Bach. The Sonatina in A minor is more interesting: its first movement quite impetuous, the second (arioso) modern & arrestingly restrained, the third clever, and the finale, chirpy, but not innocuously so.



Move onto the second disc and matters get even more intriguing. Composed in 1960 while Gál was in a hospital (and reworked and refined during the rest of that year), his Twenty-four Preludes has the more modernistic variety of styles, from the first that is satirical not far from Shostakovich or Kabalevsky (his Comedians), to the teasing dance of the third, to the Prokofievian march of the fifth, to the broody sophistication of the sixth (moderato) that puts me to mind Nikolai Peiko, a major though now largely forgotten Soviet composer, or to the magical, autunm-like elegance of the seventh. I love the deeply moving tenth prelude in E (grave): the poignancy akin to, say, Myaskovsky's Fourth Sonata (1924) or Weinberg's Sixth (1960). But the inner beauty and elegance of the twelfth and thirteenth are mind-capturing while the bitter sweet melancholy in the fifteenth enraptures. The twenty-fourth and last prelude is mocking, well..., at least to the very end where Gál (perhaps) teases us with a more solemn ending of what is a highly entertaining yet transfixing cycle. So, with all said and done, the melodic profile is very much Gál's own, despite the evocations that prop up.



The third disc comprises of his Bachian Twenty-four Fugues, written in 1980 when Gál was around 90. Overall, the mood is rather abstemious and straightforward, the writing economical and concentrated as far as performance demands are concerned. But empty? Not necessarily. The third fugue, for example, is charming and the final fugue a quite haunting. Although this cycle avoids much of the "heart on your sleeves" rhetoric of his earlier compositions (especially the Sonata and the quartets I alluded to earlier), it nevertheless goes beyond mere piano exercises.



Labor of love and commitment is apparent throughout this far-ranging album by everyone involved. Not only were Gál's surviving relatives (his aforementioned daughter and grandson) instrumental in getting his works known and performed, but to get a pianist who became so engrossed into the music goes way beyond mere words. Pure artistry, commitment, sensitivity, color, verve, flexibility, pinpoint technicality, and just downright identity with the inner psyche and thoughts of the music and its composer are what I must characterize Leon McCawley's performances. This is not only true in the Preludes, but also the works on the first disc where he so captivatingly delve himself into the inner wonders of the music. The Sonata, the Suite, and even the Three Small Pieces not excluded. His sense of color has a nice sense of variety especially in the Preludes, yet deep and absorbing especially in the tenth one. The recording sound is ideally natural and unflattering for this traversal. Furthermore, the overall presentation is excellent, scholastic, and nicely promotional, with essays of Lloyd Moore, Simon Fox-Gál, & McCawley that add to our knowledge and ultimately our appreciation of this major composer. So in closing, I urge you to go for this album, and explore his other works currently available while you're at it.



And besides, why deprive yourself of excellent, highly absorbing music from the composer very much his own idiomatic, soul-searching self?"