Fritz VOLBACH (1861-1940)
Es waren zwei Königskinder, symphonic poem, Op.21 (1900) [18:36]
Symphony in B minor, Op.33 (1908) [43:01]
Münster Symphony Orchestra/Golo Berg
rec. live, January 2019, Münster Theatre, Germany
CPO 777 886-2 [61:52]
‘I am so glad that the Symphony was such a great success…and I have had great pleasure in reading the score…It is indeed wholesome good music that makes one feel happy to see and hear.’ Thus wrote Elgar to Fritz Volbach in August 1909 after the performances of the latter’s symphony in Stuttgart. Volbach had been an early and strong supporter of Elgar’s and the German composer’s music was by no means unknown in Britain and elsewhere. The symphonic poem performed here, Es waren zwei Königskinder, was heard at the Proms in October 1901 and in Chicago in January 1903. It was taken up by Nikisch, who performed it often. The Symphony meanwhile was heard as far afield as St Petersburg.
Volbach’s professorial and conducting duties may have served to draw some attention away from his compositions but it’s clear he enjoyed considerable esteem. The opening of the symphony is steeped in Beethovenian turbulence. From the stabbing opening, garlanded with some ferocious writing, through woodland horn calls, the fiery and the lyrical confront each other. The musical defiance has a certain Eroica-like ring but it also sounds like Volbach has listened to Dvořák’s symphonic poems – the Golden Spinning Wheel and the Water Goblin in particular - as well as the Seventh Symphony. The result is music of trenchancy and dance drama, though it’s a shame he has to throw in a fugato in this opening movement as it rather dissipates tension.
The Symphony’s strongly accented dance motifs are most apparent in the scherzo, placed second, which evoke expressive conviction and structural integrity. There’s a certain bluffness here, along with delightfully chattering winds, which Volbach sets against a caustically avuncular bassoon line. Given his prestige as pedagogue, it’s not surprising that his contrapuntal control is so assured. The slow movement however admits another clear influence, that of Bruckner, where cadences reflect the later symphonies and it’s not hard, too, to hear the kind of Parsifalian solemnity that Volbach must have admired when refracted via The Dream of Gerontius. The fifteen-minute span of this movement shows Volbach at his most eloquent and powerful. The finale offers a curious blend of light-hearted and purposeful in its reminiscences from the previous movement. The passages for solo violin, notably over harp, are either indicative of elevated spiritual longing or rather strangely interpolated salon effusions – and after several hearings I can’t quite make up my mind which predominates. The close is, by contrast, resplendent.
This is the symphony’s first appearance on disc.
Königskinder is based on a popular folk ballad – the German text and English translation are helpfully printed in the booklet – and reveals Volbach to be steeped in folk lore. He can conjure up a noble theme or two, opulently orchestrated, and project music of untrammelled turbulence as well as lilting romance. The love-over-death peroration is grandly done in the context of writing that looks as much to Dvořák and Smetana as to specifically German models.
The recording is rather reverberant, with a very generous echo. It sounds as if it has inflated the Münster Symphony’s size somewhat, but the results are convincing and confident, not least because these are live performances. Let’s hope there is more Volbach from this team.
Jonathan Woolf
Previous review: Rob Barnett
