Ravinia 2023 Issue 3

discovered an untitled copy of Blumine nes- tled within this score and instantly recog- nized its melodic similarity to the opening movement—“Ein Ständchen am Rhein”—of Mahler’s now-lost incidental music to the romantic-comic epic poem Der Trompeter von Säckingen by Joseph Victor von Schef- fel (1826–86). Mitchell had remembered the serenade melody from a six-measure quota- tion in music critic Max Steinitzer’s reminis- cences of Mahler. Benjamin Britten conduct- ed the modern premiere of the rediscovered Blumine on June 18, 1967, at the Aldeburgh Festival. The Königliches Theater in Kassel had com- missioned Mahler to write incidental music to accompany seven tableaux vivants based on Der Trompeter von Säckingen —the final work on an end-of-season benefit concert on June 23, 1884. In the original theatrical con- text, “Ein Ständchen am Rhein” provided a tender serenade sung by the hero Werner while crossing the Rhine in search of his be- loved Margareta. This music also might have been partly autobiographical, a memorial to his affair de coeur with the striking blonde coloratura soprano Johanna Richter, who also inspired the song cycle Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen at about the same time. Mahler abandoned any hope of a romantic relation- ship with Richter in June 1885. Three years later, in the midst of composing his Symphony No. 1, another woman ignited his passion—Marion Schwabe von Weber (1856–1931), the wife of composer Carl Maria vonWeber’s grandson, whomMahler hadmet in Leipzig when he was assistant conductor at the opera. According to some accounts, it was Marion who encouraged Gustav to create his first symphony. Mahler resurrected the Rhine serenade as the new work’s second movement ( Blumine ) and presented the autograph man- uscript—written “in glücklicher Stunde” (in a happy hour)—to his secret lover, Marion, as a birthday present on March 25, 1888. Marion Schwabe von Weber ALMA MAHLER (1879–1964) Four Songs (Orchestrated by David and Colin Matthews) Scored for two flutes and piccolo, two oboes and English horn, two clarinets and bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, harp, timpani, tam-tam, triangle, strings, and voice The artistic environment of Alma Schindler’s youth—cultivated by her father, the famous landscape painter Emil Jakob Schindler, and her mother, Anna von Bergen, a singer— shaped a charismatic, gifted young musician. Alma studied piano and, later, composition and counterpoint with the blind Viennese pianist, organist, and composer Josef Labor, whose students included the one-armed pia- nist Paul Wittgenstein and composer Arnold Schoenberg. She developed a close relation- ship with her father, spending endless hours in his studio as a young girl, and was devas- tated by his sudden death on August 9, 1892. Anna had by that time begun an affair with one of Emil’s students, Carl Moll, whom she married in 1895. Thus, Alma learned early about amorous adventure and, very soon, the power of her beauty over creative men. During a trip to Italy in April 1899, she had a brief romance with artist Gustav Klimt— most famous for his Beethoven Frieze in Vi- enna’s Secessionist Building—but that rela- tionship ended in betrayal. Music provided a salve for Alma’s wounded spirit. “Music, my hope, my strength, don’t abandon me, as the others have abandoned me,” read her di- ary entry on September 9, 1899. She resumed compositional studies in the fall of 1900 with 20-year-old Alexander Zemlinsky, the teach- er and soon-to-be brother-in-law of Schoen- berg. Despite her constant condemnations of his appearance, Alma and Alexander slowly fell in love. She described the pattern of their composition lessons in another diary entry on October 18, 1901: “We worked, kissed, worked again, kissed again, and so on.” Alma produced many of her first piano pieces and Lieder for voice and piano—reportedly more than 100 in number, although only 14 have survived—under Zemlinsky’s guidance. Their relationship cooled and was replaced by Alma’s latest infatuation with another Viennese musician, the conductor and com- poser Gustav Mahler, whom she met at a dinner party on November 7, 1901. A torrid romance followed. Alma and Gustav public- ly announced their engagement on Decem- ber 23 and married on March 9, 1902. Before formalizing their commitment, Mahler need- ed to clarify their professional relationship. “How do you picture the married life of a husband and wife who are both composers?” His correspondence continued: “The role of ‘composer,’ the ‘bread-winner,’ is mine; yours is that of the loving partner, the sympathetic comrade.” Immediately taken aback by her fiancé’s condition, Alma nonetheless grew to accept the arrangement, writing in her diary on December 24, “I would give everything for him—my music— everything —so powerful is my longing!” Alma’s 14 surviving songs clearly reveal a composer of enormous talent and potential. Her earliest collection, the Fünf Lieder , dates from around 1900–1901. The text selections demonstrated Alma’s familiarity with the pre- eminent lyrical poets of the day: Richard Dehmel, Otto Erich Hartleben, Gustav Falke, and Rainer Maria Rilke, along with one poem by the Romanic author Heinrich Heine. These finely crafted essays in late-Romantic vocal writing show the greater influence of her teacher/lover Zemlinsky than of her hus- band. The four songs performed on this occa- sion originate within this collection. Despite their mutual devotion, the marriage between Gustav and Alma suffered long emotionless stretches, in large part a result of Gustav’s neglect and obsessive devotion to conducting and composition. Feeling deep abandonment and despondency, Alma be- gan an affair with the young architect Walter Gropius in 1910. She finally felt free to express her inner anguish to Gustav: “I told him I had longed for his love year-after-year and that he, in his fanatical concentration on his own life, had simply overlooked me. As I spoke, he felt for the first time that something is owed to the person with whom one’s life has once been linked. He suddenly felt a sense of guilt.” Gustav’s guilt translated into a secret proj- ect to restore the one gift he had taken from Alma—her compositions—which he began editing for publication. While walking home one day in August 1910, Alma stumbled upon his scheme, which produced a different re- sponse than anticipated: “I heard my songs being played and sung. I stopped—I was petrified. My poor forgotten songs. I had dragged them to and fro to the country and back again for 10 years, a weary load I could never get rid of. I was overwhelmed with shame, and also I was angry.” The Fünf Lieder first appeared in print in 1910. Alma almost Alma Schindler Mahler (1897) immediately began assembling another song collection, the Vier Lieder , from two earlier pieces (1901, “Licht in der Nach” and “Ernte- lied”—originally titled “Gesang am Morgen”) and two newly composed songs (1911, “Wald- seligkeit” and “Ansturm”). For his part, Gustav heaped praise on Alma and encouraged her to revise the music. She had not felt this degree of acceptance from her husband for years. “To be honest —I knew that my pieces were good,” Alma confessed. This long-awaited attention and approval did not last long. While in the US conducting performances by the New York Philharmon- ic, Mahler fell ill with bacterial endocardi- tis—a bacterial infection of the heart valves— on February 20, 1911. The ailing musician was rushed back to Vienna for treatment but hope quickly disappeared. He cried out “My Almschi!” (his term of endearment for Alma) repeatedly in his final hallucinatory state. At the stroke of midnight on May 18, 1911, Gus- tav Mahler died. Siblings David (b. 1943) and Colin (b. 1946) Matthews grew up in the East London area of Leytonstone (the birthplace of Alfred Hitch- cock), where a shared interest in composition was ignited during their teens. David remem- bered: “Colin had also started composing, and, as there was no music master at our school, we were each other’s only teachers for a number of years. People often ask me what it is like to have a brother who is a composer, and the obvious reply is that I can’t imagine what it’s like not to have one.” David studied classics at Nottingham Univer- sity, which he augmented with composition lessons under Anthony Milner and consulta- tions with composer Nicholas Maw. Similarly, Colin entered Nottingham University for un- dergraduate studies in classics and continued as a master’s student in composition under the tutelage of Arnold Whittall and Maw. Eventually he earned a doctorate from the University of Sussex with a dissertation on Gustav Mahler. Both brothers collaborated with Deryck Cooke on his performing ver- sion of Mahler’s Symphony No. 10. The music of the Mahlers—Gustav and Alma—has wo- ven like a unifying thread through the Mat- thews’ careers. Their orchestrations of Alma’s Lieder und Gesänge are the products of almost four decades of work (1964–2002). Universal Edition has published a collection of seven song arrangements for medium voice and orchestra. RAVINIA.ORG • RAVINIA MAGAZINE 25