Langgaard's 3rd Symphony

[kolaboy]

Was listening to Stupel's recording of Langgaard's 3rd symphony and wondering if he may have been inspired by Gade's fifth to add a piano? Apparently, the piece began as a concerto/fantasia, and morphed into what we have today. I'm not very familiar with Langgaard's biography, and don't know to what degree he may have been influenced by Gade. Personally, I tend to hear more Strauss than Gade in early Langgaard...

[Alan Howe]

Friends can judge for themselves here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUi9r52weSo

Personally, I don't hear any Gade in this - it sounds more like a late-romantic piano concerto which morphed into a strange hybrid. Langgaard was always a one-off...

[Holger]

Later in his life, Langgaard felt very much akin to Gade as documented in this interview:
http://www.langgaard.dk/litt/interv/etdramae.htm
and the classicism of many of Langgaard's later works does mirror this in some sense. However, the Third is an early work, and at least in terms of music Gade does not play a major role here. Whether the scoring is influenced by Gade is a different question, it could of course but on the other hand Langgaard was kind of an eccentric (mildly put) all over his life, so he did not necessarily need a role model for an unusual scoring, labeling or whatever sort of artistic decision.

[eschiss1]

It didn't exactly begin as a concerto/fantasia. See DaCapo: "The symphony was begun in 1915 in the form of a solo piano work which Langgaard expanded so that, at the beginning of 1916, he was able to finish the work under the title Symphony No. 3, "La melodia". Despite the genre designation it is a classic piano concerto." This version, performed in 1918, is lost, and was longer than the revised version (rev. 1925-33) that is the only surviving version.

[kolaboy]

Thanks for the replies. I detect a bit of Gade in the 5th and 7th symphonies (especially in the writing for timpani).
Langgaard is difficult (for me, anyway) to get a hold of. He's as oddly beautiful as a shoebill stork.

[eschiss1]

I adore the brief 11th and 12th symphonies...

[kolaboy]

The only piece by Langgaard that I haven't been particularly impressed by is the 1st symphony - and that may have been down to the performance (again, Stupel).

[eschiss1]

There is, tangentially, a new Langgaard recording coming out in July, but that's for the other board (if it even fits in this group after all- it's his opera (apparently the 2023 Berlin being released on video), which may not be within our orbit. Hrm.)

[Ilja]

The only piece by Langgaard that I haven't been particularly impressed by is the 1st symphony - and that may have been down to the performance (again, Stupel).

I posted a much better recording by Sakari Oramo and the Berlin Phil in the downloads board sometime last year. Both because of its style and instrumentation, I'm convinced the symphony was largely a collab between teenage Rued and his father, Siegfried. Rued used material by his father in later works as well, most notably the Piano Concerto From Arild.

The Stupel recordings were - to my knowledge - the first complete cycle of Langgaard symphonies, but they've been entirely outclassed by Dausgaard's cycle, which also incorporates the wordless choir in the 3rd Symphony. That alone turns it into quite a different work, and takes some emphasis away from the piano. It is truly a lovely piece (from a composer who doesn't always incite the term "lovely").

By the way, am I the only one hearing an allusion to Brahms' Third Symphony in the opening of the work?

[Alan Howe]

Agreed, Ilja. Dausgaard's the man in Langgaard's symphonies.

[Maury]

If I may ask given his dates, which parts of Langgaard's output are considered in the purview of this site?

[Alan Howe]

I don't know all the symphonies (even though though I have the complete cycle), but I think they're a safe choice for discussion here.

[Ilja]

Langgaard did foray outside the standard romantic idiom at time (most famously with the Music of the Spheres (although even that...) and to a lesser degree, the opera Antikrist) but most of his orchestral material remains quite firmly rooted in romanticism. The piano stuff's a different matter, though.

[Maury]

Thanks Mr Howe and Ilja for the go ahead on the symphonies. I am quite impressed with them as a group. I have Sym 4, 10 and 14 on vinyl and plan to get the collected Dausgaard CD box soon. The late 1890s-20th C Scandinavians and Swiss composers carried on the romantic symphonic tradition in ways that I am still working on understanding better.

[eschiss1]

with always some exceptions; I doubt we'll be talking much about, say, Frank Martin's mature output (his full-orchestra symphony e.g.) here, or much of Honegger's lovely but not strictly Romantic stuff. (ntm say one of my own Scandinavian favs, Vagn Holmboe.) But you have a point!