The Story of Moses

[Richard Moss]

Is anyone aware of any 'romantic' orchestral works (opera, symphonic poem, suite or other) depicting the story of Moses?

(If I'm missing the obvious, excuse my ignorance, otherwise I'm most interested in what there might be!

Best wishes

Richard

[thalbergmad]

My knowledge is somewhat feeble to many here. I only know of the opera by Rossini.

Never heard it, but it did provide some excellent material for the likes of Thalberg, Czerny, Herz, Henselt and Parish Alvars.

Thal

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Trying to exercise the brain in thinking of Biblical oratorios - there surely must be a number.

But off the top of the head:

Rossini's 1818 opera Mose in Egitto
Bruch's 1895 (?) Biblical oratorio Moses
Hummel's (c early 1800s) Der Durchzug durchs Rote Meer

[arpeggio]

Rossini's Moses in Egypt was of course also paraphrased by Paganini.
Anton Rubinstein wrote an opera/oratorio on Moses, I believe.

[eschiss1]

Also, S. de Lange Jr., oratorium Moses, Op.57 (published 1891) and Anton Rubinstein's opera Moses, op.112 (pub.1887).

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Splendid, Eric! Rubinstein's 'sacred opera / oratorio' Moses has slumbered so far back in the murky recesses of my mind that I don't think I've even thought of it for at least 30 years! (I'm now busy googling it to find out more, and of course 30 years ago you couldn't do that).

Poor Rubinstein. We have folk here throwing bricks at the 4th Symphony (or rather at some recorded performances of it - which isn't the same thing at all), and none of his many operas these days ever seem to get performed, or recorded, or even much talked about. With the exception of The Demon - and when I last heard that I thought it was a terrific piece. Wonder what his Moses is like? Or for that matter the other operas (haven't looked, but aren't there at least 10 plus?)

[eschiss1]

(hrm. Amsterdam library claims composed 1885-1891. maybe it was revised...)

well, the vocal scores of quite a few of them are scanned online. Not Moses, apparently, but Kalashnikov, Maccabeen, and others are at IMSLP, for instance. Maybe Moses is online somewhere else. ("Moses : Geistliche Oper in acht Bildern", Libretto by Heinrich Mosenthal, interestingly!) (Hrm. anyhow, the vocal score is at quite a few libraries, and I have no idea where if anywhere the full score and parts are... RISM online is quiet (unlike, say, for the Siberian Hunters, where the autograph score is at Bern, Switzerland (107 pages...) or even the 1861 Die Kinder von Heide..., etc. ...

(Unless this , "Partitur", is indeed a full score at least of a particular section. It's hard to tell sometimes with the British Library at least from this distance.)

[Mark Thomas]

Talking of Rubinstein's operas, I have a recording, taken from a 1940s Melodiya recording of excerpts from his Merchant Kalashnikov and more modern ones, both of unknown provenance, of his Paradise Lost and Christus (the latter lacking the Prologue scene). I'm not at home at present, but from memory the orchestral sonorities in Christus struck me as surprisingly modern, with some very spare and almost spiky sounds. Das verlorene Paradies, a very much earlier work, had less individuality than The Demon, but inhabits Rubinstein's familiar sound world, whilst the recording of Kalashnikov is so strident that it's difficult to draw many conclusions.

Apologies for the diversion from Moses.

[eschiss1]

Other answers to the question that I hope are relevant?

*Oratorium "Mose" by Adolf Bernhard Marx (ca.1841)

(other searches keep turning up texts by Moses Mendelssohn, not in itself a bad thing, mind...)

[edurban]

Premiere Opera, a live recording specialist, recently offered a decent 2 cd set of a live October, 2011 performance (from Moscow) of Christus conducted by one Anton Shoroev.  I no longer see it on their website, but they sometimes offer items not listed there.  Contacting them might well produce the goods:

http://premiereopera.net/

A better piece than I expected it to be, I confess.  The subject had struck me as way out of Rubinstein's league... a gap no battery of orchestral harps could bridge.  But very interesting stuff, and sometimes powerful.

David

[alberto]

There is also the oratorio "Mosè" by Lorenzo Perosi (1900).

[Richard Moss]

Many thanks everyone for all the above info - I'm 'gobsmacked' there is so much when I thought there was possibly zilch! 

I look forward to using this info to learn (and hear) more.

Best wishes

Richard

[Wheesht]

The not always relaible, but quirkily fascinating "Lexikon der musischen Kuenste" by Friedrich Leipoldt (published in Germany around 1986) lists the following musical works not mentioned in other posts in this topic:
Opera - F. Hérold (presumably, this refers to Ferdinand Hérold, but I have been unable to trace any other references to this opera).
Oratorio: C. David 1846; Ed. Grell 1850; Franz Lachner 1833.

Another source, the "Geschichte des Oratoriums" by Arnold Schering (first published in 1911) has this information for the Grell piece: "Die Israeliten in der Wueste", Berlin about 1840. He also names K. Kreutzer (1815), correctly dates the Lachner (Mannheim, 1836), and further lists L. Drobisch (Augsburg, 1839); Aloys Schmidt (Mainz, 1841); Anton Berlijn ("Moses auf dem Nebo" Magdeburg, 1844); Rud. Thoma (about 1855, Breslau).

It doesn't look as if there were (m)any orchestral pieces, though.