Andreae Symphony etc from Guild

[Alan Howe]

The Andreae Symphony is a splendid work: beautifully written for the orchestra and well played by the Bournemouth SO, it is primarily late-Romantic in style with some absolutely gorgeous melodies, as the exhilarating close to the finale demonstrates. Altogether, not an undiscovered masterpiece of the first order, but yet another fine work that doesn't deserve to have fallen into the chasm of oblivion.

[M. Henriksen]

Thanks for the info about Paul Paray. I've never heard of him before, but after listening to some excerpts I've added a couple of discs to the never ending "must-buy"-list.


Morten

[Dundonnell]

Thanks, Alan

I have ordered the symphonies disc

[Alan Howe]

Glad to help.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

True, Alan doesn't press the point, and only mentions it in the context of a rough 'triangulation'.

But I was puzzled by the reference to Paray. Of Paray, apart from his wonderful conducting of Ravel, Roussel, Schmitt, Chausson, Chabrier etc on the old Mercury label, I only know the 1st Symphony together with some of the chamber works and many songs. Yet all those works are thoroughly French.

Andreae is surely solidly in the Austro-Germanic tradition. He writes within the traditional classical forms (both the symphony here, the string quartets, the piano trio etc), and the language is post Brahmsian. Hardly a surprise that he was a renowned conductor of Bruckner. There is surely a far greater kinship with another Swiss master, namely Schoeck, than there is with Paray?

But I'm certainly not out to pick quarrels over the issue. Maybe I've just missed out on one possible perspective on Andreae?

[Alan Howe]

In my (tentative) view Andreae's Symphony is essentially a synthesis of the German and French traditions - it has a lightness of touch and an approach to colour that seems more French than German, and yet there are clear echoes of the great German tradition in its form (four movements rather than three) and its post-Brahmsian style. He was, after all, a Swiss...

[Alan Howe]

Interestingly, the MusicWeb review of Andreae's 2nd Piano Trio (written five years before the Symphony) says this:

Andreae’s language adopts a mixture - something approaching French Impressionism yet all the while holding on to a basis of Germanic seriousness.

[Mark Thomas]

I've now listened to the Andreae Symphony too and it is indeed a thoroughly enjoyable and rewarding late romantic work which, to my ears at least, is pretty firmly in the French tradition of Franck, Chausson, Boëllmann, Magnard et al. It has a certain breeziness and openness which some of theirs lack and impressionist touches which I guess were difficult to avoid in music written in 1919, but I honestly don't hear much of the German tradition in it until one reaches the boisterous finale, which is a very successful movement. It does have four movements, that's true.

[Alan Howe]

Of course, the composer whose influence looms large over these composers is....Wagner.