Klughardt Symphony 5 from cpo

[Gareth Vaughan]

Dear Dennis,

See this article which I mentioned above: http://www.raff.org/resource/krueck/3lenores.htm

Gareth

[FBerwald]

Sterling (in the booklet accompanying the Cello Concerto & other works) mentions that Lenore of 1873 is his first symphony but remained unnumbered after an earlier withdrawn Waldleben of 1871. [BTW Liszt had high opinions about Klughardt's Lenore.... Hopefully someone familiar with the Sterling version can give a review of it! ] any reference to Lenore as No. 2 will be because of the reference to the earlier Forest Symphony so there should be no more confusion. Hopefully this is the end to this mild confusion.

I just returned to the Violin Concerto after all this talk of the forthcoming release. I can't believe that my ears were so closed to this magnificent beast! Beautiful, big boned and masculine, this has entered my fav. list. Listened to it 2 times in a row. As for some mentions in the forum as to the numbering of this concerto, I wrote to Mr. Rob Barnett who reviewed the CD on musicweb asking him if he had a source for making a claim that the recorded violin concerto [1895] was the second of two, the first dating from 1894. He replied that any references would be based on CPO or Sterling booklets ".. or from some internet source unverified." Since neither CPO nor Sterling make any claims to the existence of two Violin concertos, I wrote to him that CPO mentions that the " ...violin concerto is 2 of Klughardt's solo concertos one for Violin and another for cello. ". He wrote that he may have misread the booklet causing the mistake and he would correct this when he would get a moment! The imslp entry might be an error unless someone can identify the source and verify these "claims". Personally, I wouldn't mind another Violin concerto from Klughardt. 

[DennisS]

Many thanks Gareth and FBerald for your replies. It was quite fascinating reading Alan Krueck's masterful paper on "A tale of 2 Lenore's or is it 3?"I now understand exactly why some refer to Klughardt's Lenore Symphony as his symphony no 1 and why others refer to it as his symphony no 2.

Thanks again,
Dennis

[eschiss1]

Well, as I think I'm responsible for the mistaken entry in the list of works by Klughardt on IMSLP, that would indeed be the case. Will fix.

[DennisS]

Gareth, I meant to add to my earlier post "apologies for not having read your previous post on Alan Krueck's article".

Cheers
Dennis

[John H White]

I've just had delivery of the new CPO CD  of Klughardt's 5th symphony and I certainly find it a completely different kettle of fish from No3! I particularly enjoyed the dramatic outer movements. Its very difficult for me to imagine this music being played by a string sextet. I think I like both Nos 3 & 5 equally but for different reasons. He's certainly a symphonist worth hearing in the concert hall.
      Cheers,
            John.

[Alan Howe]

That's good to hear, John. My copy's on its way...

[Alan Howe]

As John has said, Klughardt 5 is quite different from No.3. It's certainly much more of a Sturm und Drang work in its outer movements (hardly surprising for a C minor Symphony, I suppose). What's interesting, I think, is the idiom of the work. Though pretty conservative for 1892-7 (the period in which what was originally a String Sextet became a fully-fledged orchestral work), it is nevertheless recognisably of a more advanced cut than, say, his Symphony No.3. There are, for example, echoes of Wagner (the sleevenote suggests Tristan) in the slow movement, even of Bruckner (in the majestic climax about 4-5 minutes in); it's certainly an advance on Brahms' idiom.  And the first movement is without doubt the most powerful thing I've yet heard by this composer.

All in all, a very convincing and enjoyable symphony. Recommended without reservation - and the performance sounds authoritative and well-prepared. The audio quality is just superb.

[Mark Thomas]

For some reason (unimportant now) I was less impressed than I was expecting to be by my first hearing of Klughardt's Fifth. A couple of airings later, though, and I must say that this is a very fine work. I very much like the way that Klughardt is his own man, how he resisted the then-modern trend towards giganticism and produced a convincing and satisfying work which belies its relatively modest proportions. The outer movements, particularly the opening one, are powerful statements, by no means all pretty music, which have plenty of drama and incident. A very different listen to his Third. The second movement, a glowingly lyrical Adagio, is quite lovely with, as Alan has written, a wonderful Brucknerian climax two thirds of the way through, and it's followed by an attractively propulsive Allegro vivace movement in the best "open-air" style. Personally, I'm less convinced by the fourth of the five movements, an intermezzo-like Andante. It's pleasant enough in a Griegian way but, for me at least, seems out of place beside the other four and provides four minutes of relaxation which I don't feel the Symphony needs. I think that the work would have made even more impact without it. The big finale picks up the mood of the opening Allegro, and is just as successful a piece of writing. Klughardt's writing for the orchestra is transparent and full of detail, the textures clean and crisp. One might regard this mature style (so different to the Wagnerisms of Lenore) as harking back to Mendelssohn, but it is perhaps more akin to the Raff of twenty years before, and looks forward, like Raff's late works, to the palette of the next century's neo-classicists.

The two overtures are both attractive pieces; the early Im Frühling is pretty much what you'd expect from a romantic composer portraying the onset of spring, and it's none the worse for that, whilst the shorter Festival Overture is better than many such pièces d'occasion, and again I was reminded of Raff's several essays in that genre.

Overall, some very worthwhile discoveries.

[LateRomantic75]

Thanks for your detailed reports, Mark and Alan. It appears that the symphony would be right up my alley!

[semloh]

Thank you, Mark and Alan, for those detailed descriptions. There are so many I want, but maybe there will just be room in Santa's sack to add this one! (it is only 8 weeks away - and a good excuse to make a dent in the wants list!) 

[sdtom]

Just received my copy in the mail and will play today for sure.
Tom