Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957)
A Portrait for Piano
Ich ging zu ihm from Das Wunder der Heliane, Op. 20 Act II
Piano Sonata No. 2, Op. 2
Love Scene from The Adventures of Robin Hood
The Sea Hawk
Ramon van Engelenhoven (piano/arranger)
rec. 2023, Grote Zaal, Muziekgebouw Eindhoven (NL)
Reviewed as WAV download
TRPTK TTK0124 [72]
The story of the infant prodigy Erich Wolfgang Korngold, who took the musical world by storm at the beginning of the previous century, was hailed by Mahler and Richard Strauss, had a world hit with Die tote Stadt when he was 23 and in the 1930s went to Hollywood where he became a pioneer of early film music, is too well-known to linger over unduly. The reverse side of the coin is also well-known: that after the golden years in the thirties and forties he was regarded as passé and when he died aged 60 in 1957, he had more or less fallen into oblivion. However, in the seventies he rose from the ashes and there was a sudden stream of recordings – the most spectacular being the first recording of Die tote Stadt – and once the ball began rolling interest grew and now, half a century later, his music still wins new proselytes.
Dutch pianist Ramon van Engelenhoven was captured by Korngold some seven years ago, when he heard the aria Ich ging zu ihm from Das Wunder der Heliane, the 1927 opera that Korngold himself regarded as his magnum opus – and it certainly is enchanting. Few composers have surpassed Korngold when it comes to seducing the listener with his melodies; van Engelenhoven even calls this particular tune “intoxicating”. This portrait for piano of Korngold encompasses music from his operatic output as well as his film scores. His piano compositions are, I believe, less well known, but they are an important part of his œuvre. Besides the brilliant but often disregarded concerto for left hand, written for Wittgenstein, he produced lots of piano music, all of it recorded by Martin Jones some twenty-five years ago and available in a 4-CD-box on Nimbus (review). Korngold was a magnificent pianist himself. ”I play two instruments”, he said, “the piano and the orchestra” – and a lot of his piano writing is orchestral in character, so van Engelenhoven’s decision to “pianise” his orchestral scores is not far off the mark. Further proof of the rightness in this is the fact that among the piano works on Martin Jones’s box there are several piano transcriptions of orchestral works, including a forty-three minute suite of music from the ballet-pantomime Der Schneeman (The Snowman). This was Korngold’s first work for the stage; it was produced at the Vienna Opera on October 4th 1910 by ‘Imperial Command of Emperor Franz Josef’ and was an immediate hit. The precocious boy was thirteen at the time.
That same year he composed his second piano sonata, which is nothing less than a masterwork. It is conceived on a grand scale in four movements with a playing time of all but thirty minutes. It requires considerable virtuosity, in particular in the two opening movements. The Moderato is powerful and exuberant with grand orchestral chords, while the Scherzo, also thunderous but at the same time elegant and playful, shows that Korngold had a glint in his eye, which is obvious in the trio, a waltz more in the Lehár mould than Strauss. The Largo transports us to a quite different mood: melancholy, slightly mysterious, even tragic – not what one expects from a young boy. There is a switch to an optimistic major key towards the end of the movement, but the coda brings us back to prevailing gloominess. However, in the finale all is light and happiness – it is in effect a second scherzo. That it is a great sonata is without doubt; that it was composed by a boy of thirteen is a miracle – not even Mozart and Mendelssohn were as mature at a comparable age. The playing here is very assured and technically impeccable. I first encountered this music about forty years ago on an Etcetera CD with another Dutch pianist, Matthijs Verschoor. There, it was coupled with sonatas 1 and 3. That was a first recording, and I don’t believe that there have been too many other essays after that – bar Martin Jones of course. The differences are not too great. Ramon van Engelenhoven needs an extra minute for the largo movement, which adds to the gloominess, but by and large both are valid interpretations of a fascinating work.
Returning to the transcriptions, one notes that in Ich ging zu ihm the aria proper is preceded by some lines from the beginning of the first act of the opera, inspired by the introduction to Liszt’s transcription of Wagner’s Isolde’s Liebestod. It gives the pianist an opportunity to display his technical wizardly – and impressive it is – and also a contrast to the simple and sparse presentation of the magical melody. It is a lovely melody and it is easy to sympathize with van Engelenhoven’s delight in it, but to my mind nothing can replace the sound of a beautiful soprano voice – listen to Anna Tomowa-Sintow on the complete Decca recording, or Renée Fleming on the recital “Homage” (also Decca).
The two film scores are from films with the enormously popular action hero of the 30s and 40s Errol Flynn. The Love Scene from The Adventures of Robin Hood brims over with beautiful music played with strong emotions. At first one misses the orchestral colours of Korngold’s original, but just as one misses colours in the black-and-white film one can regard the piano transcriptions as a black-and-white version of the colour version – and there are fifty nuances of grey in any good black-and-white photo.
The Sea Hawk is represented by a five-movement suite, giving a mini version of the complete film, encompassing:
I. Main Title and Introduction
II. First Encounter on the Boat
III. To England and Panama
IV. Battles and Duels
V. Reunion and Finale
To follow this half-hour suite is a textbook of how a master drama expresses all the various emotions and events in sounds, and one is impressed by the wealth of melodies, and how they seem to flow effortlessly from the pen of the composer – seemingly born in the moment. One can imagine Korngold sitting at the piano, watching the movie and improvising the piano score. It seems so simple – but it is a genius at work.
The whole disc is a delight, one is impressed by the arrangements and the playing, and this homage is a gem for the many admirers of Korngold’s music.
Göran Forsling
Availability: TRPTK
