Die Natursymphonie
(The Nature Symphony)
“Since his youth, mountains had been
the element in which my father could renew his strength.” Friedrich von Hausegger also said that his father’s happiest hours were
with his family and friends in their summer home at Obergrainau.
Karl Straube wrote to him:
“In every inner and outer respect,
you belong to
need the
rarefied air of its towering mountain peaks.”
It seems
a given that the powerful impressions of the solitude of the mountain peaks (Hochgebirgeinsamkeit,
Hausegger called it) would inspire his greatest and
most ambitious work. He completed the Natursymphonie in Sept. of 1911, but didn’t name the work
till after its premier. He wrote:
“It was only with great difficulty that I resolved to
call the work Die Natursymphonie…
I hoped the expression Natur, combined with the motto on the score and the words of
Goethe’s Proömion which are the basis of the final chorus
might serve as a guide to the listener.”
An
unusual comment from a composer whose every work has a
title. Concerned that words might trivialize the music, he pointed out that he
didn’t mean “Nature” to invoke a specific landscape a la Mendelssohn’s
“Von Gebirg zum Gebirg “From mountain peak to peak hovers the
schwebet der ewige Geist, eternal spirit, prescient of eternal life”
ewigen Lebens ahndevoll”
The
choral finale also sets a Goethe text, the first half of his Proömion; a word
difficult to translate, except as “Proem” or “Prelude”.
In Namen dessen
der Sich selbst In
the name of Him who caused Himself
erschuf ! to be
Von Ewigkeit in schaffendem Beruf; Creating
ever from eternity
In Seinem Namen der
den Glauben In His Name, who made faith and trust
schafft; and
love
Vertrauen, Liebe, Thätigkeit
und Kraft The
strength of things and man’s activity
In Jenes Namen, der,
so oft gennant In
That One’s Name, Who named though
Dem Wesem nach blieb
immer of He be
unbekannt Whose
Essence yet remains a mystery
So weit das Ohr, so weit das Auge So far as hearing holds, so far
as
reicht sight
Du findest nur Bekanntes
das Ihm Thou
findest only known shapes like
gleicht to
His
Und deines Geistes höchster And soon thy spirit’s highest fiery
Feuerflug flight
Hat schon ein Glechnis,
hat am Hath store
enough of symbols,
Bild genug likenesses
Es zieht dich an, es reißt dich
Thou art drawn
onward, sped forth
heiter fort joyously
Und wo du wandelst
schmückt sich And where thou wanderest,
path
Weg und
Ort and
place grow bright
Du zählst nicht mehr,
berechnest No
more thou reckonest, time’s no
keine Zeit more
for thee
Und jeder Schritt ist Unermeßlichkeit And every footstep is Infinity
Die Natursymphonie is in three
movements, the first two played without a break, and lasts about an hour. Leuckart published the music in 1912. To realize his
concept, Hausegger used his largest and most colorful
orchestra:
piccolo,
2 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, D
clarinet, 2 A or Bb clarinets, bass clarinet
3 bassoons (contrabassoon)
6 horns,
D trumpet, 3 C trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba
2 tympanists, 4 percussion- bass drum, snare drum, large tenor
drum, crash and
suspended cymbals, triangle, gong, glockenspiel and
xylophone
2 harps,
celeste, organ, (62) strings, chorus in as many as 11
parts.
The general plan of the first
movement is a slow introduction, followed by a faster main body, with a calm
interlude at its center. The music opens with a solo horn call, expanded by the
trumpets.
Ex. 1
Phrases a and b become much more weighty as the work
progresses. Ex. 1b is the Nature Theme which will pervade the piece like the
motto theme in Elgar’s First Symphony and unite the entire work. Note its “imperfect” intervals; that of the tritone
is an especially important detail. We next hear an expansion of that
theme on the organ pedal.
Ex. 2
The
bassoon continues the theme and the music moves into D flat major, the underlying
tonality of the symphony.
Ex. 3
A
repetition of the horn summons, Ex. 1, impels the music to a faster pace. An
urgent tremolo figure in the basses gets taken up canonically through the
strings. The Nature Motiv reappears on the horns and
trumpets, leading to the first allegro theme, on the high woodwinds.
Ex. 4
There’s
also a brief figure first heard on the D trumpet, then the horns, patently
related to Ex. 1
Ex. 5
Soon,
the actual main theme of the allegro emerges on the flutes, its initial phrase
incorporating Ex. 1
Ex. 6
An
extension of the string entry to Ex, 6 also forms an
important element:
Ex. 7
The
pulse slows and a bassoon theme
Ex. 8
leads
to a more pastoral segment.
Ex. 9
The
music uses interchanges of Exx. 8 and 9, as well as a
further variant of Ex. 4
Ex. 10
A more
impelling theme, derived from Ex. 7, combines with the bassoon motiv
Ex. 11
Now arrives
the calm at the heart of the turmoil. Divisi strings
play a beautifully harmonized orchestral song in B major (but note the errant
bass clarinet).
Ex. 12
Hausegger sustains this lyric output, with an especially appealing
continuation on the violins, including a descending thread which will blossom
later.
Ex. 13
Yet, at the
same time, there’s a more somber call on the bassoons (note portion x)
Ex. 14
Towards
the end of this section, we hear a woodwind chord progression which will return
with greater impact:
Ex. 15
The
allegro music resumes with Ex. 6 in the bass in C minor. The winds take it up
into E minor, interspersed with Ex. 8 and phrases of Ex. 3 churned about.
Although the momentum continues,
impelled by Ex. 7, the character of the music becomes less an allegro and more
grandiose in feeling. Now a crescendo is taken up with this sequential - and consequential - trumpet phrase:
Ex. 16
The
music builds to a peak, topped by an augmented brass version of the bassoon
theme, Ex. 13. we are now at the climax of the
movement. In a broadly paced, luminescent E major, a bed of pulsing triplet
chords, divisi strings and upwardly heaving bass
glissandi bears this long violin theme (Ex. 17):
Ex. 17
The
feeling of triumph subsides. Two oboes play a plaintive echo of Ex. 13. The
strings play a sequence of icy tremolos (mostly 6/3 minor triads) and this
organ progression forms the bridge to the second movement.
Ex. 18
The center movement, a huge
orchestral nocturne, has two elaborate (and one brief) sections. Like the
middle movement of Barbarossa, the last
portion is a contracted version of the first. Over quiet tympani pulsations, it
begins with a wide-ranging bassoon solo; in Hausegger’s
words “a death-cry of Nature”.
Ex. 19
Clarinets
and the English horn (including a glissando for the latter) take up variants of
Ex. 18b. A further extension of Ex. 18a continues the movement. Each phrase
seems a transformation of the last, in a developing variation.
Ex. 20
The
movement broadens out into an orchestral song. At its climax, the orchestra sounds
a theme whose extension will be the focus of the second part of the movement:
Ex. 21
As the
climax dissipates, a solo violin introduces a calmer section in D flat major,
with a feint toward E flat minor.
Ex. 22
A solo
flute picks up the song
Ex. 23
leading
to a wonderful interlude of repose. I can’t help relating this whole section to
the words of Hausegger’s son:
“One spring day…I wandered above Obergrainau…His favorite flowers-
gentians
and primroses - were in bloom, yet the wintry snow lay atop the
mountains.
By accident, I came upon the large stone upon which he’d lay
his
scores…to ‘walk his thoughts’ as he put it, so he could work in complete
solitude.
Here was his world.”
The celeste and divisi violins play a
chordal theme.
Ex. 24
Hausegger works these elements into an expansively songful
segment, completed by a gentle call of the Nature theme on the brass. This
version will assume more weight in the finale:
Ex. 25
After a
last reminiscence of Ex. 23, the second major section of the movement begins. A
somber procession in the Phrygian mode on C#, Hausegger
wrote that its inspiration was the legend of the passage of the souls of the
dead over the Aletsch Glacier into the afterlife.
Over a tympani ostinato, the horn fragment heard in
Ex. 20 is now fleshed out - if one can say that about a theme harmonized in fifths
(Exx. 26 and 27).
Ex. 26
Ex. 27
Underpinned
by the relentless tympani, the procession gathers strength till we hear Ex. 18b
ff on the winds and lower brass. By
now, the entire orchestra stresses the upbeat of the tympani rhythm and the
organ sul pleno adds its weight to a peak of crushing power.
In an elegiacally
extended Abgesang,
the horns and bassoons resume the cortège of Ex. 25, and the clarinets in
thirds sound Ex. 18b. To the accompaniment of throbbing, syncopated viola
triplets, the violins spin out a long extension of the Nature Motiv:
Ex. 28
With a
final sounding of the Nature theme on the organ pedal, the movement settles to
its fundamental C# tonal center (enharmonic equivalent of the work’s basic D
flat tonality).
The first section of the final
movement is a free rondo, beginning with a stormy allegro theme. Both the theme
itself and the interjecting woodwind figure include the Nature Motiv in diminution:
Ex. 29
The
turbulent rhythms soon lead to one of the most important themes in the
movement, resounding on the trumpet over the melee, its soaring contours making
a vivid contrast with the opening gesture:
Ex. 30
A
variant of Ex.15 from the first movement and the high woodwinds again top the
textures with the Nature Motiv.
The first figure (Ex. 27) reappears,
again in E minor, this time more fully scored and vehement. Driven by
overlapping repetitions and chattering fragments of Ex. 8 and the woodwind
interjection from Ex. 27a, the momentum subsides in disjointed phrases. These
coalesce into a lyric theme in B major, its lineage traceable to Exx. 7 and 11.
Ex. 31
The
constant emphases on the leading tone give the melody a yearning quality. Hausegger works this long tune into a more
optimistic-sounding segment which, after a veiled reference to the Nature
theme, is cut off by the reappearance of the initial gesture (Ex. 27) of the
movement. The tension builds, using rushing chromatic moanings
in the lower strings. Fragments of Exx.
27 and 29 toss about in the turmoil, building via the chromatic trumpet theme
from the first movement, Ex. 15.
When the tension ramps up to its
peak, the orchestra stops on a fff unison C and
the chorus enters, at first a cappella, to the words of Proömion (again, note the tritone).
Ex. 32
The
syllable schuf
is accompanied by an upward sweep through the strings and woodwinds, tipped by
a piccolo flourish. Even this figure is thematic, derived from the Nature theme:
Ex.
33
At the
second repetition of der dich selbst erschuf (who caused himself to be),
Ex. 30 again calls out triumphantly in proud augmentation on the trumpet, mirroring
this concept. Ex. 31 reappears, now in the basic D flat major tonality, as a
brief interlude. At the words “In his name, who made faith…” a noble new theme
appears, in Rudolf Siegel’s words “a solemn song of peace”.
Ex. 34
The
meaning of the organ progression, Ex. 18, now becomes clearer, as it
accompanies the words “oft-named and yet unfathomable mystery”. Again, the
organ intones the Nature Motiv.
At the words “Far as thy hearing
holds, far as thy sight…” a small choir sings an E major fugato variant of the
Nature theme. This music is couched in a pious, hymn-like idiom. The full choir
joins in, with the voices now in as many as 11 parts, some of them further
variations on the Nature theme. (This patch, though brief, is a stiff
assignment for the singers, with seriously gnarled chromatic lines which, even
with instrumental support, are no easy task. The WDR Rundfunkchor
on the cpo recording deserves
laurels for its highly competent handling of a thorny mission.)
The emotional climate grows more
urgent. Ex. 31 now recurs in E major, supporting the
words “hath store enough of symbols, likenesses”. At the phrase “where thou wanderest, path and place grow bright”, a new version of
Ex. 30 appears.
Ex. 35
The
music steadily builds over a ground base formed from the first two bars of Ex.
35. Along the way, the music picks up Ex. 32 on the trumpets. Reflecting the
words “And every footstep is Infinity”, with the full power of von Hausegger’s greatest orchestra and chorus, the music
achieves a stunning climax, pausing on a B flat minor chord (relative minor to
the main tonality).
A pp choral progression, accompanied by the organ and Ex. 33 in the
strings leads to the most exalted moment in this masterpiece, when the Natur Motiv is transformed into a
serene hymn of redemption:
Ex. 36
The
final repetition of Unermeßlichkeit (Infinity) brings the huge
orchestral/choral apparatus to a peak on a D flat major chord. With one last
detour towards A major, the return to its home D flat
crowns this transcendental symphony.
Ex. 37
Die
Natursymphonie was, from the outset, recognized as von Hausegger’s finest achievement and the passage of nearly a
century hasn’t changed that judgment. Eugen Jochum conducted it several times before WW II and always
regarded it as a significant work.
The symphony displays the composer’s
mastery of every phase of his art, from formal control to orchestral
virtuosity. The constant presence of the Nature Motiv
and the variously subtle ways it pervades so much of the other thematic
material creates, in retrospect, an unusual sense of overall integration,
despite the length of the work. Music-lovers who have recently embraced not
only Mahler, but the works of Korngold, Schreker, Zemlinsky and other Austro-German Post-Romantics will
welcome this sonic blockbuster.
Luckily, there’s a superior
performance available on cpo
(SACD 777 237-2), with Ari Rasilainen conducting the
WDR Orchestra and Chorus of Cologne. The playing is solid and assured, with
none of the hesitancy one sometimes hears with unfamiliar repertoire and the
choral work, as mentioned earlier, is excellent. Rasilainen’s
sympathetic interpretation is all the more admirable as he has no models to
build on - so far as I can determine, the work hasn’t been played since before
WW II. Let’s hope that, with the chance to hear von Hausegger
at his best, this changes.