Franz Lachner Catharina Cornaro

[petershott@btinternet.com]

And thank you from me, Mike. I'm rather a Lachner neophyte (as it were), and your recommendation is appreciated. The Requiem duly ordered!

Methinks that without this invaluable site there would be a danger we'd all remain locked up in our own closets unaware of anything beyond our own particular preferences and prejudices!

[Biarent]

Is anyone ever going to perform and record Lachner's Sixth Symphony (Schumann's favorite)?

[eschiss1]

You can hear a MIDI recording of it in the archived performances while waiting - on the basis of that stopgap, I can only say, I sure hope so, it sounds like a really good piece! (Though the scherzo seems "recorded" at a low level (besides being a quiet movement anyway, I suspect) when I play it on my iPod at least - you may want to go into iTunes or similar, go into get-info and turn the volume up for that movement after downloading )

[Mark Thomas]

I have mp3s of the opera broadcast and will upload them sometime later this week.

[Mark Thomas]

A good recording of the broadcast is now available in the Downloads board.

[Derek Hughes]

A good recording of the broadcast is now available in the Downloads board.

Many thanks for this.

I've been curious about this work for some time, because of references to it in Wagner's writings and Cosima's Wagner's diary: a planned performance of Rienzi in 1870 was pulled in favour of Catharina Cornaro. Hearing Donizetti's version this morning prompted me to Google for Lachner's version, and it was with considerable frustration that I found that I'd just missed a web broadcast of it. So discovery of the downloads provided a happy ending, and I have experienced two Catharina Cornari in a single day. All I need now is Halévy's La Reine de Chypre.

Donizetti's setting seems to me very run of-the-mill, and the announcer's puzzlement at its neglect seemed quite unnecessary. I was puzzled by its revival. Lachner's struck me as far more powerful and interesting, and reinforced my sense of anomaly: that rare opera buffs will go to any lengths to disinter not only minor Donizetti but even minor Pacini, but leave largely untouched the repertory of new German opera performed while Wagner was active as a composer. I know only a handful of such works.

That said, I don't agree that Lachner's opera sounds particular advanced for its time. The idiom seems to me the bog-standard lingua franca of early Romantic German opera, though without the harmonic mobility or melodic flexibility of Marschner or Spohr; more in the line of the serious Lortzing or Lindpaintner. Most of all, I was reminded of Fierrabras and Alphonso und Estrella by Lachner's friend Schubert.

I checked the Times Digital Archive for early British references to Lachner and found the following from 1836: 'we had a new symphony by Lachner, a composer of some genius, but who requires to be heard more before he can be understood'. So he had a brief spell as an avant-gardist before becoming the traditionalist despised, and ousted from his job, by Wagner. Coincidentally, while listening to the opera I read a letter from Ludwig II to Wagner, stating scornfully that Lachner had let the Munich theatre decline into an institution dedicated to trivialities and worthless amusements. Hard to believe, considering the earnestness of this score.

[eschiss1]

Wonder if that might have been the 4th symphony in E they were referring to, which an issue of AMZ mentions was conducted by Lachner around February 1836. The 5th I think wasn't premiered until several years later, I'm not sure when the 6th got its premiere - it could be one of the first three though... I really don't know their performance history (or anything about them except that I've heard one of them a few times and a few others once each.)

[eschiss1]

Very very very very belated response: have just found, at the Munich library, and mirrored @IMSLP a vocal score of this work which may be visible (if it passes copyright review- I assume and hope it will, as it was published in 1846) in a few days or so. So if you have the recording and can follow along, feel free.

here, when ready.

[Alan Howe]

...forthcoming from cpo:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/detail/-/art/franz-lachner-catharina-cornaro/hnum/3097613

[Mark Thomas]

I was at the original performance broadcast live from Munich five and a half years ago (well, this is cpo) and can confirm that it is a strongly dramatic and lyrical piece, which on the night received a very lively and convincing performance -  see the thread in which it was discussed. I'm afraid that my recording of the broadcast itself is no longer available, but I can thoroughly recommend the work.

[adriano]

And I think Mauro Peter will be doing very well! He has such a beautiful voice. Incidentally, I am living a couple of houses nearby but met him for the first time in Salzburg in 2012... And I am sure Maestro Weikert will be doing a great job as well. We know eachother since  over 25 years, from the time he was principal conductor at the Zurich opera. He likes unsung repertoire very much. He recorded D'Albert's "Die Toten Augen" for cpo in 1999, and, in the same year, Rossini's "Tancredi" (with Marilyn Horne) for CBS.

[Alan Howe]

My copy of the cpo recording arrived this morning. I can't say I'm that impressed: it's a German attempt at an Italian opera - so it has much better orchestration than most Italian operas of the period (good!), but little of the memorable melody so typical of that era (bad!). Oh, it's pleasantly lyrical and pleasing on the ear - but I fear I'm damning the opera with faint praise.

The singing is good-ish; Kristiane Kaiser as Catharina gives the stand-out performance, although one can imagine what a great singer such as Caballé might have done with the piece. Daniel Kirch (tenor) as Marco is OK: he has the range, but not the bel canto elegance or tone to give much pleasure. Mauro Peter (tenor) as King Jakob has a more attractive voice.

So, a nice momento of an entertaining evening at the opera; but no more than a middlingly good discovery overall and not a cast one would listen to for vocal pleasure. This is German bel canto, after all.

Wonder what Donizetti's version is like...?

[Alan Howe]

...actually, we can find out here:
http://www.opera-rara.com/caterina-cornaro.html

Oh, joy unconfined!!