Unsung Composers

The Music => Composers & Music => Topic started by: Alan Howe on Monday 04 February 2013, 19:04

Title: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Monday 04 February 2013, 19:04
One composer who receives fleeting mentions in the biography of Raff by his daughter is Eduard Lassen (1830-1904). Toskey describes Lassen's 1st Violin Concerto in D, Op.87 (1891) as being "of dynamic, dramatic nature"; unfortunately, I can't find any recordings of his music.

Wikipedia has the following:

Eduard Lassen (13 April 1830 – 15 January 1904) was a Belgian composer and conductor of Danish birth who spent most of his career working as the music director at the court in Weimar. A moderately prolific composer, Lassen produced music in a variety of genres including operas, symphonic works, piano works, lieder, and choral works among others. His most successful pieces were his fine vocal art songs for solo voice and piano which often used elements of German and Belgian folk music.

He was born in Copenhagen, but was taken as a child to Brussels and educated at the Brussels Conservatory where he earned prizes for piano (1844) and composition (1847). He won the Prix de Rome in 1851, which provided him with the opportunity to make a long tour in Germany and Italy. While touring he met Louis Spohr and Franz Liszt and composed much of his first opera Le roi Edgard. After returning to Brussels in 1855, Lassen actively sought to get his opera performed but was unable to do so. Liszt, however, agreed to produce the opera at the Grossherzogliches Theater (now the Staatskapelle Weimar) and the work premiered in Weimar in 1857. The following year, Liszt recommended Lassen as his replacement as the court music director in Weimar, which involved conducting both the opera and the court orchestra. He happily took the job and remained in that role until his retirement in 1895. While there he conducted several world premieres including the first performance of Camille Saint-Saëns's Samson et Dalila in 1877. He also conducted the first performance in Weimar, and the first outside Munich, of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1874).

He remained in Weimar after his retirement and died there in 1904, shortly after receiving an honorary doctorate from the University of Jena.

A moderately prolific composer, Lassen produced three operas, a significant amount of instrumental music to stage plays, two symphonies (in D major, ca.1868 and C major, Op. 78, published 1884), a festival march for symphony orchestra, two overtures, and 11 Characterstücke for piano. He also produced a significant amount of choral music, lieder, and art songs for voice and piano.

Lassen's operas, Landgraf Ludwig's Brautfahrt (1857), Frauenlob (1861), and Le Captif (1868), did not have lasting success, though his music to Goethe's Faust (1876) gained popularity and was praised by Franz Liszt. His incidental music to Hebbel's Die Nibelungen (1873) was also well known. In 1878-79, Liszt combined excerpts from both these works in a single piano transcription, Aus der Musik zu Hebbels Nibelungen und Goethes Faust (S.496).

Lassen's solo songs and duets show a variety of treatment from the folklike Sei nur ruhig, lieber Robin or the songs with dance rhythms to the through-composed Abendlandschaft (with its more interesting modulations and accompaniment) to the rhapsodic and improvisatory Ich hab im Traum geweinet. Many of his songs, for instance Vöglein wohin so schnell, were translated into both English and French and were popular at the end of the 19th century.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Monday 04 February 2013, 20:00
re symphony no.1 in D major - "ca.1868" should be  "published 1868" (by Hainauer of Breslau). If there's a "ca." to be had, it's "ca.1867", since it was performed in that year; it may have been performed, composed earlier still. :) Will go fix the article...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Monday 04 February 2013, 20:57
Yes, Lassen's a potentially intriguing figure. As far as I know, though, all that has been recorded (by Hyperion and Naxos) are some of Liszt's piano transcriptions of his music
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Monday 04 February 2013, 23:34
Some of the originals, too, on some song recitals. (And two recordings of 2 fantasy-pieces  for trombone on two different labels...? I don't know.)

But even to an eccentric lieder-fan like I sometimes am, your gist seems right.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 25 June 2015, 22:23
Apparently the D major Symphony was highly thought-of at the time. It might prove an interesting discovery...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 25 June 2015, 22:41
Three attractive songs of his are available to audition here:
http://theartsongproject.com/portfolio-item/eduard-lassen/ (http://theartsongproject.com/portfolio-item/eduard-lassen/)
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Thursday 25 June 2015, 23:01
Scores and parts of both symphonies and the violin concerto,  together with a Festival Overture are in Fleisher
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 25 June 2015, 23:20
Thanks, Gareth. Very useful to know that.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Friday 26 June 2015, 12:55
Score and parts of the first sym. are @IMSLP, too, iirc.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 26 June 2015, 13:19
Thanks, Eric.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: mikehopf on Saturday 27 June 2015, 00:10
I've got a recording of Lassen's Festival Overture Op.51 though downloading it may be a problem.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 27 June 2015, 09:41
If you were able to, it would be a great help in trying to get more of his music recorded.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Jonathan on Saturday 27 June 2015, 11:20
Liszt transcribed several of Lassen's works, recorded on these discs (which are both excellent):

http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA66575 (http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA66575)

http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA67004 (http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA67004)

I'd like to hear some of his work untranscribed though!


Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Saturday 27 June 2015, 23:12
There's a song or two of his and some solo piano works- untranscribed, though maybe that's not what you were looking for - on YouTube. (Then again, I find it easy to imagine that I might prefer his song output to his symphonic even if at some point I've heard both, as I do already with some rather well-known composers...)

And also: this (http://www.loc.gov/jukebox/recordings/detail/id/2732/) (Allerseelen, from Op.83- possibly also transcribed; Rita Fornia, Victor Orchestra, conducted by composer-conductor Rosario Bourdon.)
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Saturday 27 June 2015, 23:19
oh, and here's a link to a (partial?) recording of some orchestral music by Lassen (http://www.loc.gov/jukebox/recordings/detail/id/9575/) - an old (1910s?) recording of the Festival Overture (or part of it), St Louis Symphony, conducted by Rudolph Ganz.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 27 June 2015, 23:25
Thanks. I think the way into Lassen would be a CD of the songs available on IMSLP...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Ilja on Friday 03 July 2015, 14:24
The entire Festival Overture (in the recording Eric mentioned) can be heard on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPbpI218hcY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPbpI218hcY)
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Simon on Friday 03 July 2015, 15:12
Listening to the Festival Overture, am I the only one thinking of Wagner's Tannhäuser Overture? There seems to be some influence here...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Wednesday 08 July 2015, 12:39
A new edition/reprint of the Festive Overture Op.51 (there are two Festive Overtures by Lassen at least, but I assume Op.51 is the one meant? The other is from some years before, without op.no. ...) is out from MPH this year- link to preface (http://www.musikmph.de/musical_scores/vorworte/1655.html). (One of two works by Lassen that MPH publishes, the other being a Beethoven Overture.)
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: semloh on Friday 10 July 2015, 02:38
>Listening to the Festival Overture, am I the only one thinking of Wagner's Tannhäuser Overture? >There seems to be some influence here...

Simon, yes, Wagner in all but name; and, even in this old recording, an enjoyable piece! If only we could hear the symphonies and Violin Concerto..... maybe one day.

Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: pcc on Thursday 06 August 2015, 00:42
The Lassen overture was well enough regarded to have one complete and two abridged acoustical Columbia recordings released before the 1923 Ganz/St. Louis version for Victor appeared. The first was a 1-side cut version by the Russian Symphony Orchestra of New York under Modest Altschuler (1912); the second by Columbia's house orchestra led by Charles A. Prince, complete on two sides (1915), and finally another 1-side cut version by the Cincinnati Symphony under Eugène Ysaÿe (1919). Of the four versions, St. Louis's is the best performance, and the Cincinnati reading is the most ragged, if enthusiastic; Ysaÿe wasn't the greatest orchestral disciplinarian, and the orchestra (and Cincinnati itself) had gone through a major upset less than two years earlier with the arrest, internment, and eventual deportation as an enemy alien of its previous conductor, the German-born Ernst Kunwald.

The piece was also recorded several times in band versions in Europe before 1925, but not in the US.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 06 August 2015, 09:03
It's good to hear some of Lassen's orchestral music at long last in that astonishingly clear 1921 recording of the overture. The melody with which it starts and which is blasted out ff at the end is very familiar, but I can't place it. Is it a German folk song or other traditional piece, does anyone know?.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 06 August 2015, 09:15
Answered my own question! The overture's full title is Fest-Ouvertüre, über ein thüringisches Volkslied, and it was published in 1875. That same year Raff composed his fourth Orchestral Suite: From Thuringia, and its fourth movement is Variations on a Folk Song, which turns out to be the same Thuringian folk song used by Lassen as the basis for his Overture. The song, by the way is Treue Liebe (Faithful Love).
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 06 August 2015, 09:37
How interesting! Good bit of research there, Mark.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 06 August 2015, 09:48
 :) Thanks. Well, no wonder the melody is familiar to me!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: vicharris on Wednesday 12 August 2015, 16:05
There is a performance of Eduard Lassen's Violin Concerto on YouTube now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scO_ryQacPo&list=WL&index=7 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scO_ryQacPo&list=WL&index=7)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMBpOYSjWQI&list=WL&index=2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMBpOYSjWQI&list=WL&index=2)
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Wednesday 12 August 2015, 16:45
Thanks! How marvellous. Can anyone rip the audio and upload it here, please? This is a definite candidate for Hyperion's RVC series.

Here are the details:

Eduard Lassen (1830-1904)
Concerto for violin and orchestra in D major, op. 87 (1891)

1. Allegro moderato
2. Andante cantabile
3. Allegro risoluto e capriccioso

Jiří Vodička (violin)
Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra, Ostrava
Heiko Mathias Förster

XXII International Janáček Music Festival in Hukvaldy, Czech Republic: 5th July 2015
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Wednesday 12 August 2015, 18:55
The VC is an absolutely glorious piece, by the way. Do please give it a listen on YouTube and post your reactions...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Wednesday 12 August 2015, 21:47
Oh, wonderful! I really look forward to hearing this when I get home from my trip.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 00:23
Where has this piece been all my life? Just what is the point of continually playing and re-recording the (very) few standard romantic VCs when something as wonderfully melodious and utterly memorable as this has been gathering dust? The public would absolutely love it - if only they got the chance to sample it...


Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: edurban on Thursday 13 August 2015, 03:00
It's terrific...and very effective for the soloist.  The outdoor acoustic takes some getting used to...but push on, it's worth the effort!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 08:16
Spot-on! Listen through the dead outdoor acoustic and you'll find a VC to die for...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: jerfilm on Thursday 13 August 2015, 17:03
If you download from YouTube and have an audio editor like Audacity, try adding a bit of reverb......

Jerry
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Richard Moss on Thursday 13 August 2015, 17:49
Just been listening to the Lassen VC - what a find!  Thought the soloist v good, especially in the upper registers.  Orchestra OK but I've not got an expert's ear.

BTW, the split between movements I & II is at 13'27/28.  Even if Hyperion, CPO or whoever don't take this up, what we have is still, I think, a pure joy to listen to 'as is'.  This, Krogolski and a few others just by themselves warrant our hero administrators getting knighthoods or whatever for facilitating UC

CHEERS

Richard
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 18:01
Thanks, Jerry. I tried boosting reverb on Audacity from 50% to 80% (a pure guess) and the result was an extraordinary transformation. I'm much obliged.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 18:02
Thanks, Richard, also. The find, of course, was vicharris'. Wonderful!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: jerfilm on Thursday 13 August 2015, 18:18
I boosted to 95% with excellent results also.  Amazing.

And this concerto has to be close to a masterpiece......

Jerry
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Thursday 13 August 2015, 18:19
According to the info in the FLP/Fleisher catalog,
the movement names are
    Allegro moderato
    Andante cantabile
    Allegro risoluto e capriccioso.

It was dedicated "Herrn Concertmeister C. Halir in künstlerischer Verehrung freundschaftlichst gewidmet".
Orchestration in shorthand is
so-vn, 2-fl, 1-pc, 2-ob, 2-cl, 2-bn, 4-hn, 2-tpt, 3-trb, tmp, str.
It was published in 1888 by Julius Hainauer of Breslau (in score, parts and reduction) as Lassen's opus 87.

I think it was premiered in late October/early November 1888, Halir violin, Bülow conducting, in Berlin at the 2nd Philharmonic-Concert (see Musikpädagogische Blatter, 12 November 1888 report. (https://books.google.com/books?id=0SQWAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA266))
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 13 August 2015, 18:28
I'm on holiday at present, so I can't (yet) join in all the plaudits, but the reception everyone is giving Lassen's Violin Concerto really does whet one's appetite for those two symphonies.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 19:01
QuoteAnd this concerto has to be close to a masterpiece......

I'd say it absolutely is a masterpiece. Memorable, melodious, original, beautiful: what more could one want? If programmed regularly, this would be as popular as any of the standard repertoire VCs. It's a stunner from beginning to end.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Simon on Thursday 13 August 2015, 20:43
Do we have any idea how Mr Vodička ended up playing that concerto? It would be nice to learn about his journey discovering Lassen's music. Good t know there are some daring violinists out there!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 20:48
That's a very good question. There's nothing on his website - as far as I can see.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Thursday 13 August 2015, 21:31
QuoteI'd say it absolutely is a masterpiece. Memorable, melodious, original, beautiful: what more could one want? If programmed regularly, this would be as popular as any of the standard repertoire VCs. It's a stunner from beginning to end.

I couldn't agree more. I have nothing to add to Alan's comments. My reaction was identical. It cries out to be programmed AND recorded.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 13 August 2015, 22:26
QuoteDo we have any idea how Mr Vodička ended up playing that concerto?

Well, I've been trying to piece together what information I can find (and translate!) from the festival programme information and various Google seaches...

The VC was in fact premiered in Dessau on 13th May 1888, with the composer conducting and the dedicatee, Karel Halír, as soloist. Halír was leader of the orchestra in Weimar at the time.

Recently the Spanish violinist Eduardo García Salas - who is currently resident in Prague doing his doctoral thesis on Karel Halír with the University of Madrid - found the first edition of the score (1888) in Munich and prepared a new edition for performance; he plays with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and is also a member of the Karel Halír Society of Vrchlabí (where Halír was born in 1859).

The soloist on the recording, Czech violinist Jiří Vodička, also plays with the Czech Philharmonic and teaches at the Prague Conservatory.

If anyone fancies contacting Mr Vodička, his email address is: info@jirivodicka.cz
...but it's getting rather late here and I'm a bit bleary-eyed.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 14 August 2015, 00:24
You can find Eduardo Garcia Salas' announcement of the (then) forthcoming performance by Jiří Vodička here: http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9655-lassen-eduard (http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9655-lassen-eduard)
It reads:
QuoteLassen has a wonderful violin concerto op.87.It will be performed again on 5.7.2015 with Jiri Vodicka and Janacek Filharmonie Ostrava.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Friday 14 August 2015, 00:30
The violin/piano reduction btw is @ IMSLP...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 14 August 2015, 00:37
The uploader of the YouTube video is Professor Jan Hališka of the University of Ostrava, the home town of the orchestra on the recording, the Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 14 August 2015, 17:35
Following an email from Mr Garcia Salas, I have corrected some of the details in my post about how the VC came to be performed in July.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 15 August 2015, 18:02
The connection between Eduardo Garcia Salas and Jiří Vodička is as follows:

Mr Garcia Salas studied with Professor Zdeněk Gola in Ostrava (Czech Republic) from 1992-1997 - the same professor under whom Jiří Vodička studied from 2000. Mr Vodička now works as soloist/leader with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague with whom Mr Garcia Salas also plays. They are clearly good friends.

Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 15 August 2015, 19:04
QuoteI think it was premiered in late October/early November 1888, Halir violin, Bülow conducting, in Berlin at the 2nd Philharmonic-Concert

The performance of the VC in Berlin under von Bülow took place on 29th October 1888. After the premiere in Dessau on 13th May 1888, there was a performance in Weimar two days later on 15th May. The Berlin performance was therefore the third that the work received. Performances then followed in St Petersburg, Hamburg, Bremen, Paris, Liège and Weimar (for the second time).
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 15 August 2015, 19:15
BTW I am more than ever convinced that the VC is a major find. I'd say it was fully the equal of any 19thC VC (barring the Beethoven and Brahms). 
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Saturday 15 August 2015, 22:36
My mistake, sorry! Have adjusted the information @ IMSLP. Will link to the videos from that page too...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Saturday 15 August 2015, 22:47
I have been privileged to see an early draft of the English preface to the edition Mr Garcia Salas has prepared for performance. I only saw this today, courtesy of Mr Garcia Salas, so I have merely been the beneficiary of his research. Absolutely no need for an apology, Eric: your sleuthing is a highly valued commodity here!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: JimL on Tuesday 18 August 2015, 21:11
I'm gonna make a playlist out of it today!

DONE!!!  ;D
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: JimL on Tuesday 18 August 2015, 21:21
Hey, wait a minute...a Violin Concerto No. 1 implies a 2nd or more.  Any info on those?
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Tuesday 18 August 2015, 22:48
Good point: Toskey mentions VC No.2, Op.149, published by Breitkopf und Härtel. Unfortunately my searches haven't turned up anything.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Wednesday 19 August 2015, 10:20
Maybe a letter to B. & H.?
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Wednesday 19 August 2015, 10:43
Eduardo Garcia Salas is now on the case...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Wednesday 19 August 2015, 15:59
Good to hear. Thanks, Alan.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 20 August 2015, 21:31
Unfortunately Breitkopf have no record of having published Lassen's VC2. The only thing they could suggest was that they had printed it for another publisher...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Gareth Vaughan on Thursday 20 August 2015, 21:42
Hmph! Pity.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 20 August 2015, 22:12
Harumph indeed.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: eschiss1 on Friday 21 August 2015, 04:40
Weimar Theatre Orchestra Library doesn't seem to have the most searchable of catalogs, that I can tell. Would be nice to know where his manuscripts ended up besides there, though...
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 21 August 2015, 11:07
Quite, Eric.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: pcc on Friday 21 August 2015, 21:37
On the basis of Mr. Howe's (and others') enthusiasm for the Lassen violin concerto, I just heard the YouTube perfomance. It definitely deserves championing, at least from my first hearing. Right from the start I could hear the composer of the Festival Overture; it is richly but clearly orchestrated, melodically very compelling, kind of a bridge between the early 19th century virtuoso concertos and more symphonically integrated concertos where the violin is (in my opinion) sometimes overwhelmed by the orchestral thematic material and texture. The woodwind writing is superb, differentiating them as a distinct choir, and the brass is light but always welcome and necessary, giving weight and point when appropriate.  The entire texture never feels heavy, but has power and grace throughout. The second movement serenade is charming in the best sense of the word and  much more accomplished than some other movements that take a similar approach (it has more harmonic and orchestrational surprises).  I thought the last movement very witty and wry; tremendous style and melodic appeal, plenty of showmanship but always integrated into the movement's dance-like aesthetic, and the same clean but colourful texture that the whole work possesses. I also must say I rather liked the recording's outdoor acoustic; my ears deal with dry early electric recordings all the time, and I often prefer that kind of clarity rather to electronically over-manipulated reverb. It really sounded "alive".
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 21 August 2015, 21:53
Thank you for that full and appreciative assessment. I believe it is a major discovery.

Adding a modicum of reverb does improve the recording, though.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Amphissa on Friday 21 August 2015, 23:03

Alan's post with the VC details indicates Lassen's death as 1894, but Wikipedia (not always reliable) says he died in 1904. Can anyone resolve this discrepancy?


Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Friday 21 August 2015, 23:20
It was a typo - now corrected. Apologies. My original post had it right.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: pcc on Friday 21 August 2015, 23:29
I would say, not as a criticism but as an observation, that the work's obscurity (which I hope will be reversed) might be somewhat due to the qualities we've all enjoyed and appreciated: it's very clear-textured, elegantly structured, and melodically appealing for a work that premiered in 1888, which may have made it date fairly quickly in some circles. (Think of  Strauss's Don Juan and the Mahler First Symphony, both written the same year). It really isn't "Brahmsian" or "Wagnerian", if you want to apply labels (I don't), it's much more spaciously scored than Dvořák's or Mackenzie's concertos (the only near-contemporary "Germanic" violin concertos I know well that spring instantly to my mind), and it really is very much its own work and expressive of Lassen as a personality. The fierce musical progressivism'traditionalism debate raging not only in Germany but all over Europe in the 1880s and 90s, and the battle of "national schools", sometimes got in the way of composers who wrote really good music with personality that didn't have agendas past being really good music.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: pcc on Friday 21 August 2015, 23:40
This may label me coarse, but I should add that before I heard it I noticed the 1888 premiere date and half-expected it, with some trepidation, to sound much "thicker" than it does. How glad I was to be wrong!
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Wednesday 26 August 2015, 17:21
Alan Howe wrote:
QuoteToskey mentions VC No.2, Op.149, published by Breitkopf und Härtel
I have been digging a bit further into the intriguing question of this 2nd Violin Concerto of Lassen, spurred on by the prospect of unearthing something to equal his very fine D major Op.87.

Alas! I suspect that it never existed.  Alan drew a surprising blank when he wrote to the supposed publishers, but Toskey is very specific that they published the work. However, going back to Toskey one sees that he gives three literary references for the piece but doesn't seem to have himself seen it. Looking up the three references just yields single line listings identical to that repeated by Toskey, but this time with no sources mentioned. One of them though (I can't recall which), goes further and says that the 2nd Concerto is in D major. But that's the key of Op.87, and surely Lassen wouldn't have written another concerto in the same key?

Library online searches draw blanks, as we know. I also went through the Berlin library card index, which lists hundreds of copies of Lassen's works, including all the known orchestral pieces, but there's no 2nd Violin Concerto. No other reference work dating back to 1900 that I have looked at mentions Op.149. Hofmeister XIX doesn't record its publication, but it does stop at 1900. However, Altmann's usually very reliable catalogue of 1919 doesn't record it either, so the odds are that if it ever existed it wasn't published.

The opus number itself is odd. Op.149? The latest published opus number of Lassen's which I can find is Op.93, a set of six lieder published in 1895. All the works between it and the Op.87 Violin Concerto (published 1888) are songs, and Lassen was a very successful song composer, so I imagine that his songs at least were published as soon as they were composed. Would Lassen really have written another 46 works between 1893 and his death in 1904? I know that Röntgen managed it, but it seems unlikely in the extreme, given his relatively slow rate of composition up until then and, even if he did, where is the evidence for them?

All in all, I think we have another "phantom concerto" on our hands, like Bronsart's 2nd Piano Concerto or Goldmark's 2nd Violin Concerto. One of Toskey's three original sources (or an ur-source from which they all drew) misplaced another composer's Violin Concerto No.2 in D major Op.149 in a Lassen work list and the others and Toskey perpetuated the error. The question then is: whose concerto?

Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Wednesday 26 August 2015, 17:49
That's great research, Mark, and I think your conclusion is 100% correct. So, as you say, whose is this VC Op.149?
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: cypressdome on Wednesday 26 August 2015, 18:00
I've been through the Hofmeister publications from 1900 to 1940 and could find no Lassen second concerto listed.  What few Lassen works that do appear seem to be re-issues of songs or new arrangements of previously-published works.  Too bad.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Wednesday 26 August 2015, 19:27
That's helpful, thanks. Did you come across anything later than Op.93?
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Wednesday 26 August 2015, 20:40
That's the crucial question. If Lassen's final opus was approx. 93, where does the number 149 come from?
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: cypressdome on Thursday 27 August 2015, 01:49
I found no opus higher than Op. 94 which was assigned to 6 Lieder published in 1895.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Thursday 27 August 2015, 10:09
Thanks, I think that rather proves the point.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Alan Howe on Thursday 27 August 2015, 10:42
Thanks, cypressdome, for that info. Point proven indeed.
Title: Re: Eduard Lassen
Post by: Mark Thomas on Saturday 30 April 2016, 14:23
Here's a full work list for this potentially very interesting composer.

Lassen was born in Copenhagen, but when he was two his family moved to Belgium, where his father became prominent in Jewish circles. When he was twelve he entered the Brussels Conservatoire, where in 1844 he won first prize for piano and in 1847 the composition prize. He won the Prix de Rome in 1851 for his Cantata Balthazar's Feast. After touring Germany he stayed in Rome until 1855, and then returned to Brussels in an unsuccessful attempt to secure a performance of his first opera, King Edgar. His long association with Weimar began when he sent the opera's score to Liszt, who helped him remodel the work and arranged its successful premiere in the city in 1857. Shortly afterwards Lassen moved to Weimar and was its kapellmeister from 1861 until his retirement in 1895. Lassen was an able and highly-regarded conductor. As a composer he was especially well known for his songs, of which he composed over 300. His operas and large scale choral pieces were generally well-received but did not stay in the repertoire, but his orchestral works were praised for their combination of New-German principles with a lighter French-inspired aesthetic, and his close association with the Weimar Court Theatre led him to compose several sets of incidental music for plays. Lassen composed few chamber or instrumental works.

MusikProduktion Höflich has published a short score of the Beethoven Overture, the preface to which (available here (https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/wp-content/uploads/vorworte_prefaces/701.html)) paints an intriguing picture: Lassen chose five obscure themes by Beethoven on which to base the work honouring him. As well as the Violin Concerto Op.87 and the Festival Overture Op.51 discussed in this thread, there is the recently-released recording of the first part of his Incidental Music to Goethe's Faust Op.57 (see this thread (http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,5953.msg62894.html#msg62894)). These three works are each impressive in their own way and indicate a composer of rare quality. It would be fascinating to hear more.

(http://www.raff.org/otherpix/lassen.png)
Eduard Lassen (1830-1904)

Work List

Dramatic Works:
WoO Opera in 5 Acts: King Edgar [Le Roi Edgar]. Revised as the 4 Act Opera:
    Landgrave Ludwig's Wedding Journey [Landgraf Ludwigs Brautfahrt] (prem. 1857)
WoO Opera in 3 Acts: Women's Praise [Frauenlob] (prem. 1860)
WoO Opera in One Act: The Prisoner [Le Captif] (prem. 1865)
WoO Completion and orchestration of Opera in 3 Acts by Cornelius: Gunlöd (1891)

Works for Chorus & orchestra:
WoO Grand Scene in 3 parts: The Shadow Invites Rest [L'ombre invite au repos] for
    mixed choir and orchestra (ms)
WoO Cantata: Balthazar's Feast [Le festin de Balthazar] (prem. 1851)
WoO King Oedipus [König Oedipus] by Sophocles. Introduction, chorus and melodramas
    for men's choir and orchestra (1869)
WoO Festival Cantata for soloists, mixed choir and orchestra (1871)
Op.20 Te Deum for mixed choir and orchestra (prem. 1860)
WoO God Save Our King [Domine salvum fac regem nostrum] for mixed choir, organ
    and orchestra (1881)

Orchestral Works:
Op.6 Festival March [Festmarsch] (1862)
WoO Symphony No.1 in D major (1868)
    I. Allegro con brio  II. Andante  III. Presto  IV. Allegro con fuoco
WoO Beethoven Overture in C major (1870 - 13 minutes)
Op.47 Music for Hebbel's Nibelungen. Eleven Characteristic Pictures
    [Characterbilder] (1873)
Op.48 Two Fantasy Pieces for bass trombone and bassoon or cello with orchestra (1873)
Op.51 Festival Overture on a Thuringian Folk Song in E flat major (comp. 1867 - 8 minutes)
Op.57 Music for Goethe's Faust for soloists, choir and orchestra (comp. 1876)
Op.63 Grand Polonaise in B minor for orchestra (1879)
Op.73 Music to Calderon's Fantasy Play: Circe [Musik zu Calderon's fantastischem Schauspiel:
    Ueber allen Zauber Liebe
] (1883)
Op.77 Symphonic Intermezzo to Calderon's Play: Circe (1883)
Op.78 Symphony No.2 in C major (1884)
    I. Allegro molto vivace  II. Larghetto  III. Presto  IV. Allegro non troppo, ma
       con spirito

Op.86 Music for Goethe's Festival Play Pandora (1886)
Op.87 Violin Concerto in D major (1888 - 32 minutes)
    I. Allegro moderato  II. Andante cantabile  III. Allegro risoluto e capriccioso
WoO Ballet-Pantomime in four Pictures: The Goddess Diana [Die Göttin Diana] (1900)
WoO Epithalme for orchestra (1904)

Choral Works:
WoO Cantata: The Flemings under von Artevelde [Les Flamands sous von Artevelde]
    for four-part men's choir (1852)
Op.69 Six Tales [Gedichte] by A. Schöll for mixed choir (1880)
WoO Song: Goodnight [Gute Nacht] for men's choir (1897)
WoO Festival Song for mixed choir

Chamber Work:
Op.76  Twenty four Caprices for violin solo by Paganini, arranged for violin and piano

Songs:
WoO Two French Songs (Once Upon A Time [Autrefois] etc.) for voice & piano (1857)
WoO Two French Songs (The Message [Le Message] etc.) for tenor & piano (1857)
WoO Six French Songs (Chinoiserie etc.) for voice & piano (1857)
WoO Six Lieder. (Past [Vorbei] etc.) for voice  and piano (1859)
Op.4 Eight Lieder by Hoffmann von Fallersleben (1860)
Op.5 Six Lieder by Peter Cornelius for soprano (or tenor) and piano (1861)
Op.18 Lieder and Songs for voice and harp by Beatrix Fels (1893)
WoO Twelve Lieder for four-part men's choir (Heaven in the Valley [Der Himmel im
    Thal
] etc.) (1864)
WoO Five Lieder (I Once had a Beautiful Homeland [Ich hatte einst ein schönes
    Vaterland
] etc.) (1867)
WoO Three Lieder (The Captive Admiral [Der gefangene Admiral] etc.) for voice and piano (1869)
WoO Six Lieder (Don't Lament [Klage nicht] etc.) for voice and piano (1869)
WoO Three Lieder (Spring [Frühling] etc.) for voice and piano (1871)
Op.45 Six Lieder for voice & piano (1873)
Op.46 Five Lieder for two voices and piano (1875)
Op.48 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1873)
Op.49 Five Biblical Pictures [biblischer Bilder] for several voices with piano, violin, organ,
    cello, horn or harp (1873)
Op.50 Three Duets for soprano and alto with piano (1873)
WoO Song: The Passenger [Der Passagier] for high voice & piano (1873)
WoO Sechs Lieder for voice and piano (1874)
Op.52 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1875)
Op.54 Five Lieder for voice & piano (1875)
Op.55 Six Duets for soprano and alto with piano (1875)
Op.56 The Artist [Die Künstler] for four-part men's choir (1875)
Op.58 Six Lieder and Songs for one voice and piano (1879)
Op.59 Six Lieder for voice & piano (1877)
Op.60 Six Lieder by Bodenstedt for voice and piano
Op.61 Six Lieder for voice & piano (1877)
Op.62 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1878)
Op.64 Music for the festival play [Festspiel]: The Linden Tree at Ettersberg
    [Die Linde am Ettersberg] for two sopranos and alto with piano (1879)
Op.65 Five Lieder for voice and piano (1879)
Op.66 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1879)
Op.67 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1879)
Op.68 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1880)
WoO Two Songs (Memory [Erinnerung] etc.) for voice & piano (1880)
Op.71 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1881)
Op.72 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1882)
Op.74 Three  Lieder (1883)
Op.75 Six Lieder (1883)
WoO Seven Ophelia Lieder from Hamlet (1883)
Op.79 Six Lieder by E von Wildenbruch or voice and piano (1884)
Op.80 Separated Love [Getrennte Liebe] A Lieder Cycle for mezzo-soprano and
    baritone with piano (8 nos. - 1884)
Op.81 Six Lieder for voice and piano (1885)
Op.82 From Springtime [Aus der Frühlingszeit] a Lieder Cycle by Fräulein O. von
    Ahlefeldt-Dehn (1885)
Op.83 Six Lieder (1886)
Op.84 Six Lieder (1886)
Op.85 Six Lieder (1886)
Op.88 Six Lieder (1889)
Op.89 Six Lieder (1890)
WoO Song: Consolation in Sorrow [Trost im Leid] for voice & piano (1893)
Op.90 Four Lieder (1894)
Op.91 Four Lieder (1895)
Op.92 Six Lieder (1893)
Op.93 Six Lieder (1895)
Op.94 Six Lieder (1895)
WoO Song of the Rhine [Rheinlied] for voice and piano (1899)
WoO From the Knaben Wunderhorn. 90 Old Minne-airs and Folk songs
    (90 nos. arr. Lassen) (1903)

Instrumental works:
WoO Suite No.1 from Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg by Wagner. Transcriptions for piano (1869)
WoO Suite No.2 from Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg by Wagner. Transcriptions for piano (1869)
WoO Andantino Pastorale for piano (1883)
WoO Polka-Fantasy for piano

Notes:
Unallocated Opus Numbers: Opp.1-3, 7-17, 19, 21-44, 53 & 70. I have no idea why all these numbers appear to be unused. Possibly the many published WoO works were allocated them by Lassen, but not used by his publishers, but it is very odd.
Sources: HMB, WorldCat, IMSLP, SBB, RISM.
Duplicated Opus numbers: Op.48.
Dates: are generally those of first publication, unless noted otherwise.
Translations: Mine, so apologies for the many errors.