SubmittedFriday, 03 May 2019
symphonic poem
But the rancour of his failure at the theatre still remained with Strauss, and he turned his attention again to the symphonic poem, in which he showed more and more marked dramatic tendencies, and a soul which grew daily prouder and more scornful. You should hear him speak in cold disdain of the theatre-going public–«that collection of bankers and tradespeople and miserable seekers after pleasure»–to know the sore that this triumphant artist hides. For not only was the theatre long closed to him, but, by an additional irony, he was obliged to conduct musical rubbish at the opera in Berlin, on account of the poor taste in music–really of Royal origin–that prevailed there.
The first great symphony of this new period was Till Eulenspiegel’s lustige Streiche, nach alter Schelmenweise, in Rondeauform («Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks, according to an old legend, in rondeau form»), op. 28.[173] Here his disdain is as yet only expressed by witty bantering, which scoffs at the world’s conventions. This figure of Till, this devil of a joker, the legendary hero of Germany and Flanders, is little known with us in France. And so Strauss’s music loses much of its point, for it claims to recall a series of adventures which we know nothing about–Till crossing the market place and smacking his whip at the good women there; Till in priestly attire delivering a homely sermon; Till making love to a young woman who rebuffs him; Till making a fool of the pedants; Till tried and hung. Strauss’s liking to present, by musical pictures, sometimes a character, sometimes a dialogue, or a situation, or a landscape, or an idea–that is to say, the most volatile and varied impressions of his capricious spirit–is very marked here. It is true that he falls back on several popular subjects, whose meaning would be very easily grasped in Germany; and that he develops them, not quite in the strict form of a rondeau, as he pretends, but still with a certain method, so that apart from a few frolics, which are unintelligible without a programme, the whole has real musical unity. This symphony, which is a great favourite in Germany, seems to me less original than some of his other compositions. It sounds rather like a refined piece of Mendelssohn’s, with curious harmonies and very complicated instrumentation.
[Footnote 173: Composed in 1894-95, and played for the first time at Cologne in 1895.]
There is much more grandeur and originality in his Also sprach Zarathustra, Tondichtung frei, nach Nietzsche («Thus spake Zarathustra, a free Tone-poem, after Nietzsche»), op. 30.[174] Its sentiments are more broadly human, and the programme that Strauss has followed never loses itself in picturesque or anecdotic details, but is planned on expressive and noble lines. Strauss protests his own liberty in the face of Nietzsche’s. He wishes to represent the different stages of development that a free spirit passes through in order to arrive at that of Super-man. These ideas are purely personal, and are not part of some system of philosophy. The sub-titles of the work are: Von den Hinterweltern («Of Religious Ideas»), Von der grossen Sehnsucht («Of Supreme Aspiration»), Von den Freuden und Leidenschaften («Of Joys and Passions»), Das Grablied («The Grave Song»), Von der Wissenschaft («Of Knowledge»), Der Genesende («The Convalescent»–the soul delivered of its desires), Das Tanzlied («Dancing Song»), Nachtlied («Night Song»). We are shown a man who, worn out by trying to solve the riddle of the universe, seeks refuge in religion. Then he revolts against ascetic ideas, and gives way madly to his passions. But he is quickly sated and disgusted and, weary to death, he tries science, but rejects it again, and succeeds in ridding himself of the uneasiness its knowledge brings by laughter–the master of the universe–and the merry dance, that dance of the universe where all the human sentiments enter hand-in-hand–religious beliefs, unsatisfied desires, passions, disgust, and joy. «Lift up your hearts on high, my brothers! Higher still! And mind you don’t forget your legs! I have canonised laughter. You super-men, learn to laugh!»[175] And the dance dies away and is lost in ethereal regions, and Zarathustra is lost to sight while dancing in distant worlds. But if he has solved the riddle of the universe for himself, he has not solved it for other men; and so, in contrast to the confident knowledge which fills the music, we get the sad note of interrogation at the end.
[Footnote 174: Composed in 1895-96, and performed for the first time at Frankfort-On-Main in November, 1896.]
[Footnote 175: Nietzsche.]
this was: Symphonic Poem
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