Lassen Incidental music to Faust Pt.1

[Alan Howe]

Caught me by surprise, this:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/eduard-lassen-schauspielmusik-zu-goethes-faust-der-tragoedie-erster-teil/hnum/8535264

Excerpt here:
http://www.jenapolis.de/2015/12/20/theater-rudolstadt-veroeffentlicht-epochale-faust-schauspielmusik/

[Mark Thomas]

Now that is good news!

[Alan Howe]

There's a lot of dialogue involved, but I can't wait to hear the music.

[Mark Thomas]

The lengthy excerpt is quite tantalising, isn't it, but it's frustrating (for me, at least) that there isn't a download option. All the same, the CD set is on it's way ...

[eschiss1]

Hrm. Mahler seems to have been more interested in this version of Faust (though he only conducted it once, in 1886) than in Liszt's or Schumann's... (according, iirc, to some things I read - Google preview etc - in Mitchell's "Gustav Mahler: Songs and Symphonies of Life and Death" (1985).)

[Mark Thomas]

Interesting. Thanks, Eric.

[Mark Thomas]

My copy arrived yesterday, and I've been enjoying a first listen. Initial impressions of the music itself are very positive. According to the bilingual booklet a contemporary critic described Lassen's style as "very imaginative, with French grace and German warmth", and I think that's a pretty fair description of this music. Although Lassen was closely linked to Liszt, he has a lightness of touch and tunefulness which often reminded me here of Weber. The various songs, both solo and choral, are quite delightful and you can hear why he was such an acclaimed composer for the voice. This is not stormily dramatic music, even the Walpurgsnacht sequence is atmospheric rather than dramatic, but its restraint is in keeping with what appears to be Lassen's objective of supporting Goethe's text rather than replacing or overpowering it.

Overall this is a delightful, melodious, imaginatively scored set of incidental music, intelligently performed to a good standard. Although I enjoyed it very much, there will be a major drawback to this recording for some people: the music is very much subordinate to Goethe's text, and this carries through to the recording. Although the spoken text is by no means complete (that would take several more hours than the two we have here, as the booklet makes clear) there is a lot of spoken German, and it generally isn't separately tracked because much of the music plays whilst characters are speaking. For me it's a measure of Lassen's success that this melodrama seems entirely natural and doesn't get in the way of enjoying the music, but I do have enough German to just about follow what is going on. If you want to hear only the music, then it's going to be a frustrating listen I'm afraid. With that caveat, though, this release is thoroughly recommended, and I can't wait to give it another spin. On the evidence of Faust and the Violin Concerto, I'd love to hear more of Lassen's music.

[Alan Howe]

Mark hits the nail on the head in his review. The stumbling block for the listener here is the amount of spoken dialogue: no non-native speaker is going to want to wade through it all, especially as there aren't any texts or translations included with the set - an egregious error in this repertoire.

However, the music (composed between 1873 and 1876) is uncommonly interesting: it marks out Lassen as a progressive, very much in the Liszt/Wagner camp (he was Liszt's successor in Weimar). On this evidence, Lassen would seem to be a composer ripe for reassessment. Hyperion should start with the VC; then there are his two symphonies - No.1 in D (composed 1867) and No.2 in C (pub.1884).

If you can take the spoken dialogue, this is a must-buy.