Karl Amadeus Hartmann
by Dr David Wright
Hartmann is arguably the greatest German symphonist since Brahms. He is
everything that a great composer should be. His music is original; his work
develops over the span of his creative life; he is a marvellous craftsman;
he had a truly amazing technique; he is the greatest
orchestrator since Wagner, who remains the finest of them all. His music
has a tremendous energy and élan. He can write tender music of the
highest quality which music is never trite. He was not a composer of pretty
tunes as was Schubert. In fact, his themes, while attractive are also very
profound. But the quality that Hartmann has which is the most immediately
obvious is the sheer excitement which his music generates. He could write
an Allegro and keep it going for ten minutes without easing up. Bruckner,
fine composer though he was, could not do that. Neither could the genius
of Sibelius. Elgar was the worst offender; all his allegros are slow
and get slower at various stages of most of his symphonic works. It should
be remembered that allegro means quick, merry and lively.
Hartmann belongs to a group of great German composers of the twentieth century
and they were few. Boris Blacher was the most innovative, Fortner was a master,
Von Einem was very skilled and Hans Werner Henze also borders on genius.
But the composer that began the German revival was the legendary Paul Hindemith
who is still maligned and for reasons I cannot fathom. He revitalised an
interest in all musical forms; on the one hand, he went back to the past
and the great German tradition, but then so did Max Reger, another maligned
composer and a magnificent one too, but Hindemith also explored the new.
Music Nova was the term used. Both Reger and Hindemith revived the
interest in Bach and composition in clear contrapuntal lines. Reger made
his own compositions highly original, rich in chromaticism whereas Hindemith
majored on the diatonic scale and modes. These composers lifted German music
out of a potentially dull Teutonic tradition and gave it life. Some composers
may have gone too far. For example, Schoenberg wrote some cabaret songs and
Hindemith's early works are erotically perverse.
Hartmann studied with Webern, the supreme master of clarity, and also with
the finest German conductor of the last 150 years, Hermann Scherchen. These
two teachers were very much at opposite ends of the musical spectrum. Webern
was concerned with economy of style and texture and Scherchen had an immense
command of the orchestra and all its capabilities, but then so did Hindemith.
What originally drew me to Hartmann many years ago was nothing to do with
his music but his bravery. He was born on 2 August 1905 and lived all his
life in Munich. He hated Nazism and Hitler and anything that ranked of extreme
socialism and communism. He did not flee Germany. Even in the war years he
stayed in Munich still hating what Hitler and the Nazis were doing to his
people. I remember when I wrote my first book, which was about the life of
Graham Scroggie, I quoted what Scroggie said in 1940, "We have no quarrel
with the German people. We have a quarrel with Hitler and the political ideology
he has produced." Hartmann would have agreed with that truth. Benjamin
Britten fled from Britain when war was obvious. And whatever excuse is given
he did so because he was a coward and non-patriotic. Hartmann stayed at home
in a country he knew was in the wrong, diseased by the evil of Hitler, the
madman. One can only admire a man like Hartmann and when one listens to his
music that admiration increases.
Hartmann witnessed Hitler's attempt to take over the government by his putsch
at the Munich Beer Hall with 300 of his brownshirt soldiers. Hitler was arrested
and spent a short time in prison Hartmann saw the rise of Nazism and the
appalling crime committed by this Socialist group.
Hartmann's music is not for the shallow music lover, Those who are
pretty-tune-music-lovers wanting predictable harmonies will not relish the
genius of Hartmann.
The Symphony no.1 is subtitled Essay for a Requiem and was
written in 1934/5 and revised during 1954/4. It is scored for contralto and
orchestra and uses texts from Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass 1855/92.
There are five movements, the central one being purely orchestral, a theme
and variations in fact. The official Symphony no.1 was the Miserae
of 1923/4 which was withdrawn. This was while he was a student at the
Munich Academy. The present Symphony no. 1 began life as the
Symphonic Fragment of 1935/6 premiered at Frankfurt am Main in 1948.
But in its final revisions, the Symphony no.1 expresses mourning,
despair and rage at the Nazi regime.
The opening movement has a stunning beginning. The contralto sings, I
sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world... The second movement
is a setting of Spring based on words used by other composers such
as Hindemith and Roger Sessions, When lilacs last in the dooryard
bloomed. The Theme and Variations has a wonderful Webernesque
simplicity and the music is never weak. The fourth movement is a setting
of Tears
Not a star shining, not a star
All dark and desolate
Moist tears from the eyes of a muffled heart.
The anguish is simply magnificent.
Hartmann not only laments German politics but German morality. He introduces
a jazz piano indicating the seediness of German life with its nightclubs
and the sadistic sex that was a feature of German brothels.
In the 1850s the French took the earliest form of the camera and used it
to take erotic and pornographic pictures. The Germans seized upon this immoral
activity and in the 1880s a series of books written by German scientists,
some allegedly in the medical profession, wrote books advocating nudity as
healthy and so, nudism, or naturism, was born. It was a natural development
from Socialism which embraced the theory of evolution that man was merely
an animal and animals did not wear clothes and were not sexually inhibited.
Between the wars German would go for 'hikes' in the wooded countryside sometimes
travelling to sites on bicycles. In the woods they would take off all their
clothes and dance and frolic, go swimming and engage in sports. This was
merely a smokescreen for sexual vanity and voyeurism. Hitler capitalises
on this idea by promoting sport among the Hitler Youth knowing that sports
which necessitated few clothes, known as glamour sports, encouraged voyeurism
and sexual activity between his youth and therefore could advance his Aryan
race. Swimming pools and the beach, as well as the sports' field, are regular
hunting grounds for perverts and paedophiles. Hitler was a pervert himself
and he also has a morbid fascination with rotting corpses. This background,
which Hartmann knew, leads me to the finale of Hartmann's Symphony no.
1
The fifth movement is an epilogue, a setting of Supplication, in which
Hartmann's hatred of war, and Nazism in particular, is expressed in visions
of torn bodies on battlefields.
O my earth I charge you, lose not my sons, lose not my
sisters.
When one considers the sad song cycles of Mahler such as Kindertotenlieder
and some of the accounts of soldiers going to war and never coming back
as in Des Knaben Wunderhorn one can admire them but where Hartmann
succeeds is that his utterance is simpler and never grandiose. He avoids
the music of war machinery with all its percussive and military sounds. Hartmann
is more discreet, subtle and even when dealing with anguish and horror
he and his music are in controlm, never pompous, never military since he
not only hated war but the ridiculousness of having to dress up for it. He
would have agreed with A.E. Housman who laments Commanding Officers sending
soldiers off to die.
The Symphony no.1 is not so much an anti-war symphony but an anti-Nazi
symphony. It depicts Hartmann's loathing of Hitler, Socialism, the Jesuit
military tactics that inspired Hitler, and the gross immorality of the German
people.
In this symphony, every note counts; every harmony is exactly right. It is
a profound, moving, evocative compelling symphony. The final pages are staggering
too ... if you have the insight to appreciate the point that is being made.
The Symphony no.2 is a one movement work, an expansive Adagio for
large orchestra with an important part for a baritone saxophone. It dates
from 1945/6. Its songlike theme on the saxophone, reminiscent of a Red Indian
incantation, leads to a towering and glowing climax. The music presents itself
as a lament for a bombed Germany and for a people deceived and destroyed
long before 1939 by a grossly evil man and ideology. The work may also be
a tour of bombed out cities with pictures of Berlin, Cologne, Frankfurt,
Dresden and Leipzig and then on to the camps with the emaciated naked bodies
being shovelled into pits. These were once living people who were loved and
loved, who had lives before them. The saxophone solo seems to depict
single people in their loneliness. Here is an orphaned child looking at the
camera with painful yearning, desperately alone; here is an attractive young
woman knowing that her fiancée is dead somewhere, but where? This
engagement ring ... what does it now mean? Here is a mother searching for
her loved ones. What has become of them? What a waste is war, What condign
shame and disgrace has befallen Germany. Can they ever be forgiven? The whole
world looks upon this nation with shock that has robbed them of the power
to hate. The depth of Hartmann's music is extraordinary but it is not gloomy.
There is an expression of Germany which has been deceived but there is a
quiet optimism. There is also a hint of Hartmann's self-vindication. It is
not a callous I told you so but a lament coupled with hopes for the
future. The horn writing may recall the sunrise in Carl Nielsen's Helios
Overture. Profound distress gives way to brilliant radiance, bustling
excitement, a scurrying perpetuum mobile amid a powerful confidence.
The war is over. Hitler is dead. Germany is defeated and that is the cause
for Hartmann's celebration. He rejoices in the hope that the Nazi brand of
socialism will die too. This is wonderful music of intellectual and emotional
intensity. Very, very special.
The two movement Symphony no. 3 was compiled from earlier works, the
Klagegesang Symphony of 1944 and the aforementioned Sinfonia Tragica
of 1940-3. It begins with a largo and a double bass solo
which passes to a string quintett and the full strings in music of Bergian
warmth which introduces a fugue. It is rich in texture, poignant and utterly
convincing. Music of rare beauty which some will dismiss as belonging to
a modern idiom as if that were a crime. By turn, it soars, it sings, it reflects,
it laments, it lifts and it communicates, which is what all music should
do. But the beauty of Hartmann's music is not restricted to simple or diatonic
terms. When the full orchestra and the timpani enter in the allegro con
fuoco (a tremendous moment) the virtuoso fugue begins and
that is what it is. It makes the great fugues of Bach and Handel seem mundane.
It is such a good fugue that you are unaware that that is what it is. Academia
does not get in the way and spoil it. And when the music becomes frenetic
one is aware of how good the orchestra and the conductor have to be. But
there is more excitement to come. When the timpanist unleashes his powers
and the strident brass enter we are in another world, a world where music
is so ecstatic that one has to remember it was written by a mere mortal.
The sinister chords give way to music-box innocence and playfulness the
simplicity of the string writing in the opening Largo is now with
the woodwind. This is really a Concerto for Orchestra. The music heads towards
a climax but is delayed but the high horns, snarling brass and shrieking
woodwind do not fail both to fascinate and impress. The music is episodic
and needs a great conductor for it to hang together. The second movement
is also strong but also episodic. Its constant shift of moods may not make
for a unified whole but there are some unforgettable moments.
One expects a symphony for strings to be light and brief. It is often the
composer's first attempts in this form as with Malcolm Arnold and Kenneth
Leighton, for example. Hartmann's Symphony no. 4 for string orchestra
started life as a Concerto for soprano and string orchestra in 1938.
In its present form it was presented in 1948 before the Symphony no.3.
The Fourth Symphony last for about 33 minutes being in four substantial
movements. The opening movement is elegiac, a passionate Lento. Although
again rich in texture, it is uneasy in utterance, aurally compelling and
arguably the finest work for string orchestra ever written. The climax of
the movement is one of rugged grandeur unparalleled in string orchestra
literature. The only other composer who could write in such a masterly way
for string orchestra was Bartok. The movement seems to be a narrative, another
personal view of shamed Germany yet the high violin solos at the end may
depict a type of resurrection. The middle movement is usually lively but
somewhat hesitant. It makes references to the composer's String Quartet
no.1, which won first prize in the Carillon competition in 1936. The
uncertainty of Germany's future, its industrial power, the return to family
life and its values (you can hear laughter in this movement), the victory
over Nazism and the recalling of bitter memories are all here. But it will
be too much for some people.
The finale is another slow movement and is also appassionato. It is
incredibly powerful at times and again not for shallow music-lovers. One
climax is simply crushing.
The Symphony no.5 of 1945 is entitled Sinfonia Concertante and
was originally written in 1932 as a Trumpet Concerto which in actual
fact it still is. It is written in an eighteenth century style with three
short moments Toccata, Melodie and Rondo. Again, Hartmann's
political and moral views are here displayed in his retrospective appeal
to a pre-Nazi Germany hence the anachronistic style of the music. The wind
orchestra has the lion's share of it and there are no upper strings. This
is an excellent example of how to write for wind and keep orchestral balance.
The saxophone of the Symphony no.2 has something to say as well.
Arguably, Hartmann's greatest work is the Symphony no.6 of
1951-3. It is based on his earlier work the Symphony L'Oeuvre
after the Zola novel. This appeared in 1938 although only the adagio
was used. The symphony is in two movements, the adagio and a
toccata variata. The adagio is nowhere near as heavy as those
in the Symphony no.4 and has a more airy texture but still that warm
intense romanticism.. Harps, bells, piano duet, explosions and unleashed
power, uncontainable excitement, crashing climaxes and a soaring melody line.
What else do you want? The orchestration is faultless.
And what a start to the second movement. A fugue gives way to an essay of
majestic power, ongoing motion and stirring timpani attacks. The excitement
is almost dangerous. What this ultra-special music does is to stir the maximum
level of real and lasting enjoyment. The fugue returns and the final pages
are electric, dramatic, terrifying, stunning and unbelievably exciting.
Hans Rosbaud gave a memorable performance of this work..
The last two symphonies are not derived from any earlier material as are
the previous six. Symphony no.7 dates from 1957/8 and is in three
movements namely an introduction and ricercare, which harps back to
the past and the Germany before Hitler, an adagio marked mesto
cantanto and tranquillo and a finale marked scherzoso virtuoso. The
opening movement could almost pass for a modern day Brandenburg Concerto.
When the movement reaches its height its clear textures gives the music
a mountain stream freshness and an excitement under control, The Stravinsky
of Dumbarton Oaks is not far away.
The return to the past, as in the Symphony no.5,
is stylistically worrying.
It makes the work a hybrid. In the first four symphonies Hartmann had, and
developed, his very personal style which, for those who like comparisons,
could be described as an aggregate of Mahler, early Schoenberg and Berg but
with a greater intensity and a highly personal stamp.. The slow movement
is one of contemplative beauty and the finale is another virtuoso piece as
are the finales of the Symphony no.6 and of Symphony no. 2 It
is exhilarating and full of energy quite at odds, thankfully, with Teutonic
and Edwardian music.
What can I say of the Symphony no.8 written in 1960-2? It is
in two movements, a cantilene and dithyrambe which is mainly
a scherzo. It uses sections of the orchestra as groups more so than
in previous works and there is a very interesting use of percussion. Yet
what this symphony has is a real sense of space or resignation. It is as
if the composer knew it would be his last. He incorporates his political
and moral views, his hopes for the future, his return to the past and there
are sections rich in polyphony. Somehow, this work is the most personal,
the most sublime and I can say little more other than to say that I loved
it the first time I heard it and still do. For me, it is one of those very
rare examples of music that, whatever its qualities, gives a deep personal
joy that cannot be expressed. This is music beyond praise.
The Sinfonia Tragica of 1940 has an interesting history. It was Hartmann's
response to Nazi tyranny and the misery that Germany had caused the world.
But the symphony fell victim to the war itself. The satirical humour in
Hartmann's earliest pieces was deeply affected by Nazi despotism. He said
that war was the greatest crime of all and therefore Germany was the world's
greatest criminal. His hatred of Hitler and Nazism and every thing that it
stood for, caused Hartmann to ban his music being performed in Germany during
the war years. He stayed in Munich throughout the war and referred to himself
as an internal immigrant.
He sent the only score of the symphony to Paul Collard and a performance
was scheduled in Belgium for 1941. Then the evil Nazi machine entered that
country and Collard was forced to resign. He returned the score to Hartmann
having rehearsed it extensively with the Belgian Radio Symphony Orchestra.
With the war over, Hartmann sent the score back to Collard in 1946
but it was lost. Hartmann was philosophical about this. He revised material
for the first movement to become the conclusion of the Symphony no.3.
He was aware that road and rail communications were still a risky business.
Curiously the score was found in the Belgian radio archives in 1973 and it
was first performed in 1989 by the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under
Udo Zimmerman at a Musica Viva concert which series of concerts Hartmann
had founded in 1946.
Hartmann won the 1949 prize for the most outstanding cultural achievements
in the city of Munich. This was the year of his chamber opera after
Grimmelschausen, Das Simplicius Simplicissimus Jugend In 1950 he was
awarded the prize of the Munich Academy of Fine Arts.
He composed two string quartets, concertos for piano and viola and the sublime
and darkly passionate Concerto Funèbre for violin and orchestra.
He died in 1963 and thirty years on we still await the recognition of this
undisputed genius.
© David C.F.Wright
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