Hans Franke (1882-1971)

[Alan Howe]

Thanks, Mark. And a special vote of thanks to Ilja for making the time to visit the Archive in Dresden.

My I simply echo Mark's request that, having reached this point in our investigations, what we need now is first-hand documentary evidence of Franke's activities, particularly pertaining to the period before World War 2 when biographical facts about him are at best sketchy and at worst completely false. For example, it appears doubtful whether he ever studied under such luminaries as Reinecke or Draeseke because we have not been able to find any evidence that he did.

[Mark Thomas]

A final report, for now at least, on the Franke Case.

The only major development is that Ilja managed to have a helpful discussion with the principal of the Franke Foundation and former owner of the publishing company which issued the CDs and published "Franke" scores. She's certain that his daughter had no idea of his plagiarisms and was greatly upset to learn of the first to be unearthed (Rheinberger's Taming of the Shrew Overture masquerading as the finale of Franke's 5th Symphony). The Foundation has not actively promoted his music for some time and instead has been funding music scholarships. It will probably now be renamed and focus solely on that activity. In the last few days the CDs have been withdrawn from sale although the scores are still available under his name.

The professionals involved in establishing the Franke Foundation, in recording and selling the CDs and publishing the scores, all clearly took his biography and authorship of the music on face value, never checked facts as we have done, never questioned the startling inconsistencies of style (although some at recording sessions at least recognised it). They continued with recording the "Symphony No.6" and "Piano Concerto No.1" despite the irrefutable proof of plagiarism which had halted the earlier recording project only a few moths before. All in all, the impression one gets is of a complacent, incurious German musical establishment which was not interested at all in Franke or his music but was happy to help Franke's daughter establish her foundation and secure funding from it.

We think that we have reached the limit of what can we can usefully achieve: Franke has been exposed as a lying plagiarist, the Franke Foundation has acknowledged and accepted that and the recordings at least have been withdrawn from sale. Our final step will be to hand the case over to the German press and it will be up to them whether they wish to pursue the investigation any further.

Thanks to everyone at UC who has contributed to this thread and to uncovering Franke's deception: to Reverie, whose digital realisation of Kauffmann's Symphony unwittingly set the ball rolling and who subsequently digitised extracts from a couple of Franke's other symphonies, to eschiss1 for identifying some of Franke's plagiarisms, but most of all to Alan Howe for initially identifying the various conflicting leads and following them up so doggedly, and to Ilja for his huge amount of research spadework in German, visiting the archive in Dresden and copying scores there and for contacting all the principals involved and persuading them to talk about the case.

[terry martyn]

I am very pleased to hear all of this and, particularly, that the baton should indeed now be handed to the German press. It's wishful thinking, but it would be splendid if the CD containing Woelfl and (especially) Kauffmann could be re-issued with the correct attribution, as it is a fine recording of an excellent symphony, and it would be a shame if a by-product of our investigations results in permanent suppression of such lovely music.

[Mark Thomas]

Agreed, Terry, and we've started the process of trying to interest appropriate CD labels in discussing with the owners the prospect of taking over the rights to the Kaufmann Symphony recording in particular, though of course we've no control over whether that happens in the end.

[Ilja]

Dear all,

It's been a while since the last update from the musical swamp that is Hans Franke's legacy.

The good news is that Felix Graf Lambsdorff, with whom I've been corresponding about the case, has been able to identify three more plagiarisms by Franke:

• The Abendstimmung für English Horn und Orchester in F major, Op. 839 is in fact Johannes Meinardus Coenen's Morgendämmerung (1868) for French horn and orchestra.
• The Suite Renaissance in G major, Op. 802 is in fact Jules ten Brink's Suite d'orchestre No. 1 (1874).
• The Suite Dramatique in D major, Op. 862 is in fact Franz Kretschmer's Suite D-Dur für Orchester (1889).

Two Dutch composers, then; it seems that Franke was of a more international inspiration than we'd assumed. Although it is perhaps worthwhile to emphasize that both these works were supposed to have been composed after the war.

The bad news is that we're still searching to identify the first three movements of the 5th symphony (the fourth being Rheinberger's Taming of the Shrew overture) and all of Nos. 9 and 17. Sometimes it seems as though I've seen and eliminated just about every F major and G minor symphony ever written at this point.

Everyone I've talked to is convinced that No. 17 must originate somewhere in late 19th or early 20th century Russia, probably from somewhere around the Belyayev circle. By the way, the manuscript of the 5th does no longer exist; apparently Franke's daughter destroyed it after being exposed to her father's duplicity. The incipits in Schaller's catalogue are all we have to go on.

Likewise, we're no further in determining the provenance of the Piano Trio No. 4 in D-minor, Op. 792 and the Piano Quintet No. 3 in F♯ minor, Op. 795. The latter is particularly frustrating considering the rarity of F sharp minor piano quintets.

If anyone has any brilliant moments of inspiration, I encourage you to share them with Felix and myself, either here or in a DM.

[eschiss1]

I know who Edmund Kretschmer is, but - not Franz ditto... --  (hrm, MusicSack lists Franz Xaver Kretschmer among others. (1863-1939) - Wikipedia-de attributes the Suite to this Kretschmer. Ok, problem maybe solved.)

[Alan Howe]

Thanks, Ilja. This is going to be a long drawn-out process. Let's hope there are other people out there willing and able to help us.

[terry martyn]

My Cambridge History days trained me to be particularly interested in the chronology of all this. Mark has talked about musical establishment complacency,but a striking new fact that Ilya has just revealed is that the shock of the discovery resulted in the destruction of the manuscript relating to the Fifth Symphony. It would be good if someone summarised for readers the sequence of events,say,from the setting up of the Foundation and the performance of what turned out to be Rheinberger through to the respective dates of issue of each of the various CDs. The laying out of the bones of this matter in such a way might ease  my fears that it was not just complacency but ,at least in part, a cover-up,or could point to something more disturbing. It was not just one CD,after all.

John Boyer referred in jest to all this being the stuff of films.  To my mind, and on a far smaller scale of course, this is a musical equivalent of Piltdown Man. If not quite the stuff of books,this farrago is surely worthy of a lengthy academic article one day.

One final thought for now: is it still possible that one or two of these works either recorded already or available to peruse in the archives as attributed to Franke were so banal that he might have actually been the original composer?  Or has that now been absolutely discounted?  It would indeed be ironic that Franke purported to compose nearly nine hundred works, left in actual fact quite a number for us to dissect, and because of his plagiarisms some of his actual compositions could now be dismissed by posterity as fraudulent. Whatever he was, he certainly knew, and had access to, a lot of buried and more than half forgotten international compositions ,which demonstrates something about the man. -

[Ilja]

Yes, it's a lengthy process, and it's necessarily hampered by the conditions. Moreover, we can only focus on published works. If Franke ever got his paws on a manuscript, the chances of recovery are close to zero. Still, I feel that in order get a grasp of his MO we needed a wider sample than just the handful we had. I'm particularly gratified with discovering the origins of some of the "lesser" compositions.

That leads me into Terry's question whether Franke ever composed anything at all. Eike Tobler-Vogt suggested he might be the author of the Kleine Suite für Streichorchester, Op. 863, and I tend to agree with her mostlly because of its utter banality. Because for all you might say about Franke, he had decent taste in deciding what to pilfer. Of course, I have very little to back that opinion up.

Because if there's one thing that's infuriating about the Franke case, it's that every single checkable "fact" turns out to be total bogus. It seems to me that there was a constant push and pull within him between the craving for recognition and the fear of being found out. As Felix pointed out, he only stole a single work from any composer that we know of; but on the other hand, the easily verifiable claims (even pre-internet) of Furtwängler performances show a brazenness that doesn't square with that carefulness. 

The best example, perhaps, are the lies about his education. The student body of the Leipzig Conservatory is available online in its entirety, and of course there is no hint of the name Franke there. In fact, there is only a single student that studied under Sitt, Reinecke and Nikisch, the Russian Wassilij (Bazilius) Woltschok (1.4.1877-?). And there are moments that I wouldn't be amazed if Franke wasn't born as Franke at all (because here, again, he doesn't show up where he's supposed to show up).

So there's still a lot to uncover here...

[terry martyn]

Maybe there is a film in this,after all,Ilya,and perhaps you are the man to write the screen-play. But I am beginning to think that there is a book waiting to be written here, when researches have gone as far as they can.

For what it's worth, I too thought that the Kleine Suite could be the genuine article. Banal it certainly is,and,to my ears,originally composed somewhere between the 1920s and the early 1950s,probably nearer the  end of that range. It sounds unlike any other plagiarism so far discovered - much more spiky and modernistic. And I wonder if Franke would have dared to poach such a contemporary work - risking exposure.

I'll also put my tuppence-worth in about the Fifth Symphony. I am not at all sure that the first three movements will turn out to be as far afield as the Russian Empire,if Rheinberger was chosen to be the choice by the thieving magpie for the finale.  And the Rheinberger is an overture - what if some or all of the other movements were filched from some obscure Central European's orchestral preludes and the like,and not from symphonies at all?

{EDIT)  Suppe's recently rediscovered and dreadful symphony was a medley of overture-sounding movements cobbled together from themes that Ernst II unmemorably concocted. Come to think of it, Duke Ernst is the perfect candidate  foil for a man of Franke's calibre.

[Ilja]

To avoid confusion: we imagined a Russian origin for the 17th (G minor) symphony, not for the first three quarters of No. 5. And yes, it probably consists of separate orchestral tidbits that evoke the sought-for atmosphere. At least for the first "movement" we have a key to help us.

[4candles]

With some sense of shame (unnecessary of course), I have only really now come upon this full discussion on Franke.

• The seam of the story running through this thread is almost unbelievable – I haven't been so engaged in a musical subject in some time!
• The scholarly efforts by all here in attempting to and successfully get to the bottom of some of this mess are to be very highly commended. It's quite the collective achievement.
• With appropriate deference to those closer to this than I, can we have a list here (with any/all relevant details) of all the 'Franke' works for which the provenance is so far unidentified – I don't think we have one yet, unless I've missed something obvious?
  

Many thanks.

[eschiss1]

I will add though that her destroying the manuscripts while understandable is maybe unhelpful (I mean, if this were, hypothetically, a legal case, which it isn't, that would be destruction of evidence and something worse than just unhelpful )

[4candles]

Apologies, Eric, I thought it was only the manuscript of the 5th Symphony she destroyed?

[eschiss1]

You're probably right and I've probably inferred.