Search - Rued Langgaard, Thomas Dausgaard, Danish National Symphony Orchestra :: Rued Langgaard: Symphonies Nos. 2 & 3 [Hybrid SACD]

A Twentieth-Century Romantic Goes His Own Way

J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 07/08/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've fallen head over heels for the music of Denmark's Rued Langgaard (1893-1952), an archconservative who more or less ignored the changes in musical styles ushered in early in the 20th century, staying more or less in the ambit of such great German Romantics as Wagner and Richard Strauss. This CD presents, as part of what appears to be an ongoing series that will ultimately present recordings of all twenty-four of Langgaard's symphonies, two early examples, Symphonies Nos. 2 & 3. Langgaard was an odd duck who, among other things, never had a full-time job until he was in his forties, spent most of his years alone -- often wandering the streets of his town in the wee hours -- until he married his dead mother's housekeeper, and was completely ignored by the Danish musical establishment. (He was known to rail against popularity of Carl Nielsen's music.) His music contains plenty of evidences of his eccentricity, especially in the titles he gave his works; one example is a symphonic movement called 'Amok! A Composer Explodes!'. Another evidence of his eccentricity, heard on this disc, is that his Symphony No. 3 is actually a piano concerto. Go figure! Nonetheless, he wrote immensely attractive works firmly in the mold of the big romantic pieces so popular the world over, those of Strauss, Wagner, Tchaikovsky and Mahler.



The Second Symphony, subtitled 'Vårbrud' ('Spring Awakening'), was written when Langgaard was nineteen and subjected to minor revision seven years later. It is an almost forty-minute work in three movements and includes a soprano soloist in the third movement. The first is a jubilant celebration that expresses the childlike thrill of spring's arrival, especially welcome in Scandinavia. The second movement is a serene hymn that contemplates from a religious perspective the miracle of spring. It consists largely of a beautiful hushed extended chorale-like melody. The third movement adds the human voice intoning a poem by Emil Ritterhaus (1834-1897), 'Lenzklänge' ('Sounds of Spring'), that begins 'When the larks sing all around me/And the sun sheds gentle rays/I feel as if I ne'er had wept/O'er the world and its ways' ... 'For the sweetness of springtime/Is the Sunday of the world.' These words are sung in a silvery soprano by Inger Dam-Jensen. In this and the Third Symphony the Danish National Symphony conducted by Thomas Dausgaard play with depth of tone and unflappable virtuosity. The recorded sound they are given is notable for its richness.



Symphony No. 3 is a post-romantic, three-movement piano concerto written in 1915-16 but extensively revised (and tightened) between 1925 and 1933. The original version is lost; we hear the work in its final form. The piece started life as a solo piano work; when Langgaard recast it for orchestra he retained great bits of the piano writing so that although he called it a symphony it remains, in effect, a concerted piece. He subtitled it 'Ungdomsbrus - La Melodia' ('The Flush of Youth - Melody') but gave no clue what this refers to. Certainly there are a number of memorable melodies in the work and one wonders if indeed he meant the piece as a celebration of the notion of Melody; he wrote an article about the first version referring to 'an eternally sounding harmony.' Langgaard was a Theosophist (as were his parents) and one wonders if there is some theosophical subtext here. The work is played without pause. The outer movements are fairly standard sonata-allegros with inserted cadenzas for the soloist. The middle movement is a short funeral march in which the piano is less prominent. The piano writing is typical of late Romantic concerti occasionally sounding like that of Grieg. The big surprise in this work is the use of a wordless chorus towards the end of the third movement. The score indicates this is optional but Dausgaard includes it, and the Choir of the Danish National Symphony sing their relatively minor part nicely. Pianist Per Salo is an effective soloist.



This CD adds to the growing evidence that Langgaard is a composer who must be taken seriously and given more performances outside his native Denmark.



Scott Morrison"