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1 CD -
0630-10017-2 - (p) 1995
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| Franz
Schubert (1797-1828) |
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| Symphonies |
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| Symphony No. 5 in B flat
major, D 485 |
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26' 39" |
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- Allegro
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7' 21" |
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1
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- Andante con moto
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8' 46" |
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2
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- Menuetto: Allegro molto
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4' 44" |
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3
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- Allegro vivace
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5' 48" |
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4
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| Symphony No. 7 in B minor, D
759 "Unfinished" |
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26' 22" |
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| - Allegro moderato |
14' 56" |
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5
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- Andante con moto
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11' 26" |
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6
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| Overture in the
Italian Style in D major. D 590 |
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8' 12" |
7
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| Overture in the
Italian Style in C major. D 591 |
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7' 56" |
8
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| Royal
Concertgebouw Orchestra |
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Nikolaus
Harnoncourt, Dirigent
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Luogo
e data di registrazione
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Het
Concertgebouw, Amsterdam (Olanda) -
novembre 1992
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Registrazione
live / studio
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studio
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Producer
/ Engineer
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Wolfgang
Mohr / Helmut Mühle / Michael Brammann
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Prima Edizione CD
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Teldec
- 4509-91184-2 - (4 cd) - 59' 05" + 68'
57" + 77' 39" + 58' 30" - (p) 1993 - DDD
(Symphonies No. 5 & No. 7)
Teldec - 0630-10017-2 - (1 cd) - 69' 29"
- (p) 1995 - DDD (Ouvertures)
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Prima
Edizione LP
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Nota
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La
nostra numerazione delle sinfonie segue
la Neue-Schubert-Gesamtausgabe
(nuova edizione integrale delle opere di
Schubert) e il catalogo delle opere
compilato da Otto Erich Deutsch. Nella
vecchia edizione integrale la Sinfonia
"Incompiuta" era stata catalogata dopo
le prime sette sinfonie compiute come n.
8. In seguito si è dato alla Sinfonia in
do maggiore il n. 9, con l'intenzione di
ordinare cronologicamente
l'"Incompiuta", ai frammenti della
Sinfonia in mi (D 729) è stato pertanto
attribiuto il n. 7.
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A Clash
Between Art and Life
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When Nikolaus
Harnoncourt's complete recording of
Schubert's symphonies with the Royal
Concertgebouw Orchestra was released
in 1993, the world of music was
brought face to face with a wholly new
approach to Schubert's scores, an
approach which, with its unprecedented
expressivity and wide dynamic range,
entailed a radical revision of
existing views of Schubert as a
quintessentially undramatic and
invariably lyrical composer. While
preparing for a performance of
Schubert's Fourth Symphony,
Harnoncourt examined the autograph
score in Vienna and discovered that
this and Schubert's other holograph
scores contain countless corrections
made by Brahms and his team of
editors. The symphonies had neter been
performed in public during Schubert's
lifetime and the autograph scores had
fallen into neglect following his
death. It was not until the 1880s that
Brahms brought out his edition of all
the composer's symphonies, an edition
on which the majority of modern
performances continue to be based. "If
you compare them with Schubert's
manuscript,” Harnoncourt explains,
"you’Il find a whole host of changes
to the dynamics, tempi, articulation
markings, instrumentation and even the
notes themselves. with entire bars
deleted or added. These far-reaching
editorial changes were clearly aimed
at making these inspired works by an
allegedly incompetent composer
playable and enjoyable. The prevailing
mentality - no doubt due to the best
of intentions - was that of a caring
governess who finds that her child is
very talented but that its work needs
improving. There is a clear attempt to
adapt these symphonies to the taste of
the second half of the 19th century.”
Since there is no performing tradition
dating back to Schubert's own time.
Harnoncourt had to study the sources
in detail in order to reconstruct
these symphonies in accordance with
their composer's intentions.
The first six symphonies were written
between 1813 and 1818 and, in contrast
to the later works, are regularly seen
as more or less successful attempts to
perpetuate the symphonic tradition of
Mozart and Beethoven. For Nikolaus
Harnoncourt, however, there is no
difference between the earlier and
later works of a composer who died at
the age of thirty-one: "Franz Schubert
was a born composer. He was a natural.
All his teachers testified that there
was nothing more they could teach him.
There is no doubt that he acquired his
knowledge of the great works of Haydn,
Mozart and Beethoven largely by
studying contemporary scores, but from
the outset he composed with total
independence. Every one of his
surviving works is unmistakably pure
Schubert. They all reflect a frame of
mind, an attempt to come to terms with
death. I know of no other composer who
has tried so honestly to come to terms
with this particular aspect of life
and who saw the tragedy of the world
against the background of his ovm
private destiny, but who never
composed autobiographically."
A comparison between the two
symphonies included here illustrates
Harnoncourt's point. Both works
revolve around the same ideas, which
could be described in the most general
terms as the clash between art and
life, between a desired ideal and
reality. Lyrical outpourings are
forever offset by oppressive tragedy.
The same language is spoken in both
works, even if, in his Fifth Symphony,
Schubert restricts himself to a small
orchestra with single flute, two
oboes, two bassoons and two horns,
whereas the orchestra of the
“Unfinished” also includes clarinets,
trumpets, trombones and timpani, The pianissimo
chord that opens the B flat major
Symphony corresponds with the unisono
motif on the lower strings at the
start of the B minor Symphony, a motif
that gains in importance in the
subsequent course of the movement. The
world of harsh reality that repeatedly
intrudes upon the opening movements of
both these works is largely excluded
from the second movement of the Fifth,
an Andante con moto in 6/8 time that
is lullaby-like in character; with an
intimacy that brooks no interruption.
It is significant that in the third
movement of this symphony Schubert
contrasts two themes from his opera Der
Teufels Lustschloß, which he had
revised and completed only a short
time previously. Whereas the Menuetto
is based on a theme associated with
the allegedly haunted castle of the
title (“Scarce one hundred paces from
this tavern stands an old ruined
castle"), the Trio answers with a song
sung by the servant Robert, "Why
should I care about marshy land, why
should I care about the weather?", the
third verse of which contains the
lines, "We stumble over many stones on
our journey through life, everyone
suffers his own torment and complains
in his own way", with a modulation to
the minor in the orchestral
accompaniment.
The Fifth Symphony was written in
1816. Earlier that same year, Schubert
had noted in his diary in the context
of Mozart's music: "Thus does our soul
retain these fair impressions, which
neither time nor circumstances can
efface and which lighten our
existence. They show us in the
darkness of this life a bright, clear
lovely distance, in which we can
confidently place our hopes." These
words may be applied unreservedly to
Schubert's own works, particularly to
the second movement of his
"Unfinished" Symphony of 1822, the
motifs and themes of which open our
eyes to a beauty that is not of this
world and with which the symphony dies
away, beyond all sense of rebellion,
The extent to which Schubert remains
unmistakably himself at every moment
of his creative life is clear from his
two overtures "in the italian style",
which were written in quick succession
at the end of 1817. They were intended
as an antidote to the Rossini fever
that gripped Vienna at this time, a
fever which, to the dismay not only of
Schubert but also of Beethoven, caused
all other music to be forgotten. Even
if Schubert permitted himself the joke
of quoting the most popular of
Rossini’s tunes, "Di tanti palpiti"
from Tancredi, in the middle
section of his D major Overture, both
works succeed, in spite of their
superficial frivolity, in conveying a
highly individual message. "You can
try playing Schubert like Rossini, and
people have tried to do so, especially
in the contemporary Sixth Symphony."
Harnoncourt explains, “but if Schubert
was inspired by this Rossini madness,
the inspiration he received from this
quarter was completely transformed,
for the simple reason that the two
composers are diametrical opposites.
There is no tragedy in Rossini,
whereaa in Schubert there is only
tragedy. If Schubert took over
superficial forms, it was to invest
them with a wholly new meaning."
Ronny
Dietrich
Translation:
Stewart Spencer
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Nikolaus
Harnoncourt (1929-2016)
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