Modern Schubert interpretation in the light of the pedagogical sources of his day

Early Music

Volumn 25, Issue 1, 1997, Pages 101-118

  Montgomery, David ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 63249113376     PISSN: 03061078     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/earlyj/xxv.1.101     Document Type: Article

References (21)

1. Fanfare, Nov/Dec 1995, pp.362-3. The recording appeared on Vivarte, SK 53364 (1995)
2. Reply to D. Montgomery, 'Triplet assimilation in the music of Schubert: challenging the ideal' (Historical performance, Fall 1993)
3. Historical performance, Spring 1994, p.29
4. Badura-Skoda's zeal to discover lost Schubertian treasure has led him not only to a similar clairvoyance concerning the notated score (see 'Triolenangleichung bei Schubert - ein noch immer Ungelöstes Problem?', Üben & Musizieren, iv (1992), pp.8-14
5. where he decides on the basis of his own musical feeling where Schubert's dotted figures are to be taken literally or to be assimilated), but even to the intuiting and composing of 'missing' bars - notably in the A minor Piano Sonata, D845: see D. Goldberger, 'An unexpected new source for Schubert's A-Minor Sonata, D845', 19th century music, vi (1982), pp.3-12. Badura-Skoda's additions to Schubert find their antithesis, perhaps, in Claudio Abbado's equally inexplicable deletion of several bars of music from the exposition of the C minor Symphony, simply because they were reconstructed (by Brahms) from the recapitulation to replace a truly missing page of the manuscript! See notes to Deutsche Grammophon CD 423 653-2
6. As to the bell and the harp (or bassoon?) stop, perhaps the performers read only what they wanted of similar stops on Viennese instruments from c.1810-30 in R. Winter 'The 19th century: keyboards', Performance practice: music after 1600, ed. H. M. Brown and S. Sadie (New York, 1989), p.350. Winter states clearly: 'Although there are no instances in the music of either Beethoven or Schubert where such effects are specifically demanded, they are called for occasionally by Dussek ... Their vogue may have been restricted largely to the plethora of battle pieces that accompanied the Napoleonic wars and their aftermath. Nevertheless, their presence on so many surviving instruments (including those of the finest quality) suggests that they were used quite freely.' The recording of Prégardien and Staier would lead us to believe that Winter's third sentence overrides his first two! I can only point out that considering the amount of inferior but popular dance music being turned out by the likes of Arbter, Asßmayer, Benedikt, Breitschädel, Dolczalek, Fischhof, Förster, Gelinek, Gyrowetz, Halm, Klengel, Lickl, Linke, Maschek, Onslow, Pamer, Riotte, Starke, Szalay, Vesque, Würth, Zepharovich, to name only a few, a good 'bells and whistles' set-up must have been absolutely necessary. But in Schubert's Der Musensohn such pleasantries seem highly unwarranted
7. D. Montgomery, 'Franz Schubert's music in performance: a brief history of events, people and issues', The Cambridge companion to Schubert (Cambridge, forthcoming)
8. Kagan mentions, for example, Seth Carlin, D537 (Titanic) on the forte-piano, and on modern instruments Richard Goode, D850 (Elektra/Nonesuch) and Rolf Gothoni, D537 (Ondine)
9. See, for example, L. von Sonnleithner in Die Erinnerungen seine Freunde, ed. O. E. Deutsch (Leipzig, 1957), p.98
10. See A. Liess, Johann Michael Vogl: Hofoperist und Schubertsänger (Graz/Köln, 1954), chap. 11, 'Vogl, der Schubertinterpret'
11. Neue Schubert Ausgabe, iv, ed. W. Dürr: 2a and Anhang 2b. See also W. Dürr, 'Schubert and Johann Michael Vogl; a reappraisal', 19th century music, iii (1979/80), pp.126-40
12. Schubert: Die Dokumente seines Lebens, ed. O. E. Deutsch (Kassel, 1964), p.314, 12 September 1825: 'The manner and means with which Vogl sings and I accompany him, the way we seem to be one single being in these moments, is for these people really new, really unexperienced'
13. See Montgomery, 'Franz Schubert's music in performance'
14. Louis Lablache, Méthode complète de chant... (Mainz: Schott, 1840-50)
15. Heinrich Panofka, The Practical Singing Tutor (London, 1852)
16. Josephine Fodor-Mainville, Réflexions et conseils sur l'art du chant (Paris: Raçon et Coq, n.d.). Of these, I have only been able to view Lablache's Méthode and Panofka's Tutor
17. See Liess, Johann Michael Vogl, p.129
18. That Hummel's teaching was deeply committed to classicism is revealed in his recommendation (p.111) to beginners to work their way through Aßmeyer, Clementi, Czerny, Diabelli, Dussek, Gelinek, Häser, Haslinger, Hummel, Kuhlau, Lickl, A. E. Müller, Pleyel Wanhall; then the easy works of Clementi, Haydn, Hummel, Kozeluch, Mozart and Pleyel; then to harder compositions by Beethoven, Clementi, Cramer, Dussek and Mozart, plus Cramer's études and Clementi's Gradus ad Parnassum; then finally to Handel and J. S. Bach. (Finally he remarks, collegially, that all of these things are printed by Haslinger in Vienna!)
19. Joel Sach's final summation of Hummel in New Grove (viii, p.785) makes a similar statement, mistakenly placing Schubert and Mendelssohn, however, in the Hummel line. Mendelssohn's passagework and fiorituras may warrant such a statement (not forgetting, of course, how much he also took from Beethoven), but almost nothing about Schubert could substantiate Sach's judgement
20. D. Charlton, 'The 19th century: woodwind and brass', Performance practice, ed. Brown and Sadie, pp.410
21. R. Philip, 'The 20th century: 1900-1940', op. cit.,p.468