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Not entirely new.

He was the subject of one thread a few years ago, and also mentioned on another on Russian composers 'of the day'.

I have been reading his essay on composers and performers.

There is A translation here


http://math.stanford.edu/~ryzhik/Feinberg1.html

Although the essay I am reading is either a different essay on the same topic, or the translation is SO different that we have essentially two different essays.

I the next day I'll provide mine to the moderator if he wants to upload.

The (sic) essay is fascinating in a number of ways, not least the resemblance it bears to some of the written work of Kandinsky on the mystic symbolism of color. I have no idea if Feinberg was aware of this work, or if there might be some similar influences (ie Theosophical). I don't know much about Feinberg that I haven't read in Wiki, so I have no idea whether he was an observant Jew of any kind. He survived Lenin and Stalin in a public position of fame and adulation, which means he was certainly a politically savvy one. (Some artists got away with what others did not - Yudina was born Jewish, although she was devout Orthodox, and at one point, when Stalin gave her some money to fix a broken window in her apartment, she sent it to the church and wrote Stalin a note saying that she'd have them pray for his soul (from memory). This was usually a certain passport to death). The site I listed above also has some of the writings of Yudina herself, including a wonderful - but ultimately chaotic - talk on Brahms.

The essay is well worth reading, not only for what it says about composition, but about changing styles, and about one of my favorite topics, the interaction of listener and performer to 'create' one work that is really incomplete if it is not both performed and listened to. It also bears some resemblance to some of the writings of Furtwangler on music, and one wonders, again, about Feinberg's exposure to Schenker.

I've spent the evening yesterday listening to a slew of the Feinberg piano sonatas and concerti on you tube. There is also a site, for those interested, which is  Feinberg 'fan club', here

http://www.skfe.com/aifs/aifs/index_aifs.html

The you tube renditions are good enough that I think I may spring for some of the cds.

I wonder if anyone has listened to him lately, or has any interest in his philosophy.

Richard

Sorry, I love cheesy titles. Live with it <g>

It is wonderful to see that virtually anyone I come up with  has been explored before here, or so it seems, and there have been stray comments in the archives for a while, as well as a compilation of Nielsen's work, which is quite helpful.

Simply put, I think his work in the Third Symphony reminds me of what Mahler said about 'his' work embracing the entire world, and listening to some of his chamber music this morning on You Tube doesn't make me feel he's much inferior (sic) to his eponymous namesake, although it seems to have been a strange career indeed.  The symphony could be criticized as not particularly adventurous in form - something I don't think anyone would say of Carl - but the chamber music doesn't have that limitation and is quite bracing.

Apparently the 3rd symphony (according to program notes for the first performance outside of Denmark, in the US in 1999) was cut down in length and orchestration under Nielsen's authority in order to try to get more performances (predictably that didn't work) and that's the version we have on recording, but there seems to be a new edition (relatively) and that was what was performed in 1999.

Any other thoughts or experiences with this guy's music?

Many thanks
Richard

I have gone through the archives on this composer - I am certainly a Johnny-Come-Lately here - including a very helpful list of symphonic compositions and lots of comments, but there didn't seem to be any single thread that jumped out at me as more likely to revive so I have just made this comment free-standing, although I'd welcome responses.

He's a fascinating guy to me in terms of what I've heard so far (the First Symphony and the smaller pieces) that are on you tube, and equally fascinating because of his history (at least according to Wiki - caveat lector). He's very closely associated with the town of Erfurt in Thuringia (which is otherwise known as the capital of the annual 'blond asparagus' festival, and where I've also participated in my humble way <g>), and I have my own associations (not so close, yet) with the town, which is unusually rich in opera performances of rare repertoire - I just heard a Wolf Corregidor (granted, with piano) and last year also with piano, but stage, Lady Magnesia, and they remain, in hard times, one of the most adventurous of the German theatres (doing I Medici later this season fully staged, which I am going to try to get to, and there's always a few things on the back burner). I'm surprised when I go at how vital the small music scene is as well, and there's a good specialized museum (the Anger Museum - a proper noun, not an adjective); each summer in front of the very impressive Dom there's a relative rarity of an opera performed out-of-doors for much of the summer. Last year it was Attila, though I didn't get to it.

He himself, if not an alte kampfer, apparently threw in his lot with the Nazis very early after 33, and Wiki speculates that this old-fashioined nationalism - epitomized in part by his choosing to stay in Erfurt - is in part responsible for this lack of popularity, but I'm not so sure that's so.  The connections with Bruckner seem to unmistakable that I wonder if, for a lot of folks, he is able to make a case in his own right (not that Bruckner - whom I adore far more than Mahler, still is able to do so for the general public). He seems to think in rather slowly moving melodic units (for lack of a better phrase - although if you sit with it, the First Symphony has got a scherzo which lumbers along like a Bruckner) and I think that he requires an audience, like Bruckner (and like Furt's symphonic works), which is willing to be IMMERSED in the pieces. That's not the Wagner style (and its offshoots) and it's not even the Brahms style, but it is a feature of late German romanticism which most audiences can't grapple with today.

I'd be curious to hear excerpts from the operas, although I don't kid myself that anyone is going to undertake THAT excavation.

Anyway, I seem to have more tolerance for the immersion-requirement than many (I'm a big fan of Wellesz) and I am going to try to explore this more on cd as well as what's available on you tube.

Since I am new here and haven't really looked through the archives yet, I hope I'm excused if I'm repeating a previously covered composer, but the Dutch Julius Rontgen is someone worth exploring if you have not.  I became aware of him initially in the book of interviews with Casals from the mid 50s (I think) called "Conversations with Casals" (and which seems to form the basis of most of the subsequent biographies. Casals is questioned in a lot of detail and gives pretty clear answers to most questions and when he's asked about contemporary (for him - he was born in 1876, you have to remember) composers, Rontgen is one of the three to whom a lot of space and time are devoted. Tovey is another (and Tovey is REALLY worth not only a listen (in the new edition on cd) but a careful read).

There seems to have been something of a Rontgen resurgence on cd in recent years, but as far as I'm aware almost nothing of the large scale works and only very occasionally do you see a chamber piece.

I am currently listening on you tube to his scenes from Faust, but the place to start I think is with the cello concerto that is there (even more than the sonata).

I will  poke around in my collection - I have a few Dutch cds - to see what more exists, but he is a composer who in style and I think, in his ability to tackle big topics (sic), reminds me of Busoni, although = Lord forgive me for saying so - Busoni can seem a little turgid, and the music doesn't always flow easily......that's not the issue to my ears with Mr. Rontgen.

"What an opera represents in itself in the immediate, aesthetic present is not the determining factor, but rather its ability to insert itself in an innovative way into the evolution of compositional methods and musical throughout. And in the end, the operas that do not do this become superfluous."

I don't have the source of the quote, but in the context of our group, I think it's fascinating. I would say it has some limitations, and my own view is that he has a view of historical determinism that I don't, and a view of an 'unseen hand' (as evidenced in implied passive voice of 'ability to insert itself"), but for all that I think it's suitably thought provoking.