Heinrich Gottlieb Noren (1861-1928)

[Rainolf]

In 2024 the Richard-Strauss-Tage in Garmisch-Partenkirchen will take place from 1 June to 11 June. The program includes two works by Heinrich Gottlieb Noren.

Heinrich G. Noren (1861-1928, born Heinrich Gottlieb) was an Austrian composer and violinist. His compositions for orchestra achieved international success in the early 20th century. In 1907 his work Kaleidoskop was premiered, a set of variations on an original theme, culminating in a double fugue. As an admirer of Strauss, Noren quoted (with Strauss's permission) two themes from Ein Heldenleben, but was accused of plagiarism by Strauss's publisher Leuckart. The lawsuit was put to an end by a court in Dresden in Noren's favour. The court declared that only melodies were protected by law, but the quoted themes were no melodies. This judgement was used by satiric writers, most prominently by Edgar Istel in a parody on the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein, of which Strauss was president.

Here you can find a good introduction to Noren and his work:

https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/wp-content/uploads/vorworte_prefaces/1827.html

Kaleidoskop will be played together with Ein Heldenleben by the Pilsen Philharmonic, conducted by Rémy Ballot on 8 June 2024.

https://www.richard-strauss-tage.de/event/sinfoniekonzert-5/

On 11 June the Phaeton Piano Trio will play Noren's Piano Trio in D minor, together with Strauss's piano trios.

https://www.richard-strauss-tage.de/event/kammerkonzert-iii/

[eschiss1]

Thank you- there's quite a few scores of his at IMSLP and there was a time when performances were at least an occasional thing (the New York Philharmonic played Kaleidoscope in March 1914 under Stransky , his symphony "Vita" was premiered in Leipzig in Jan. 1912, -- and that MPH preface- also the preface to his violin concerto, too- have more to say on this subject, now I look (and note that the US premiere of Kaleidoscope, under Stock, was given in late 1908 in Chicago)...

As one can see from the background in the (common material to both) preface(s), the coupling of Kaleidoskop and Ein Heldenleben is at least ironic , yes.  Stransky's performance of Kaleidoskop, btw, was also coupled with some Strauss works though not Heldenleben.
(Unfortunately IMSLP does -not- yet have Kaleidoskop - this would be a nice lack to fill...)

[Rainolf]

Surely, the contemporaries of Noren and Strauss would never have placed both, Kaleidoskop and Heldenleben, on the same concert programme (at least there is no such case known to me), but for a Strauss festival that wants to show the composer in dialogue with his contemporaries, Kaleidoskop is the ideal piece to be coupled with Strauss's tone poem.

Noren's music was played regularly during the years before the First World War, but the composer fell in obscurity during the 1920s. In his last years he seems to have spend all his energy for securing a performance of his opera Der Schleier der Beatrice, which never materialized.

After his death, Noren's wife Signe, who was a Norwegian singer, went back to Bergen, where she must have lived until at least 1955. In this year she renewed the copyright of one of her husband's songs:

https://www.google.de/books/edition/Catalog_of_Copyright_Entries/MTohAQAAIAAJ?hl=de&gbpv=1&dq=signe+noren&pg=RA1-PA30&printsec=frontcover

It seems very possible to me that Noren's estate, including his unpublished compositions, is located in Norway.