German concert programme — Abt, Mendelssohn, Rubinstein & Reinecke

5 Duets

Franz Abt (1819-1885)

O, wie wunderschön ist die Frühlingszeit! Op.132 No.4 (c1851)

Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

Abschiedslied der Zugvögel Op.63 No.2 (1844)

Anton Rubinstein (1829-1894)

Volkslied: Sonne scheinet noch Op.48 No.12 (1852)

Carl Reinecke (1824-1910)

Abendlied Op.217 Book I (c1890)

Felix Mendelssohn

Maiglöckchen und die Blümlein Op.63 No.6 (1844)

It is unfortunate for Franz Abt’s posthumous reputation that the most memorable aspect of his career was his uneasy relationship with Richard Wagner who, when they were both working for the Allgemeine Musik-Gesellschaft in Zurich in the early 1850s, said he would like to “box that stupid young man’s ears.” As composers, Wagner and Abt had little in common. Abt had no consistent interest in writing opera - he preferred to work in smaller, though mainly vocal forms - and his stylistic allegiances were rather with Mendelssohn and Schumann, both of whom he had got to know in Leipzig in his student days.

Judging by its position among Abt’s 600 or so opus numbers, “O, wie wunderschön ist die Frühlingszeit!” was probably written at about the same time as his dispute with Wagner - but clearly not before 1851, when the poem on which it is based was first published in Friedrich von Bodenstedt’s enormously successful Lieder des Mirza Schaffy. Ignoring the poet’s claim to have translated his verse from the Persian (which was not true, although he was certainly influenced by oriental poetry) Abt sets “O, wie wunderschön” as though it were hearty German folksong. He does it, however, with irresistible outdoor zest, the piano introducing a lively dotted rhythm in the left hand while the voices, linked at first in third and sixths, proclaim their mutual joy in spring. A timely change from the basic vocal texture is made in the middle of each stanza with a brief exchange of solo lines and, as the piano adopts a triplet ostinato in the right hand, a resounding echo effect

Before Mendelssohn turned his attention to the medium, no great composer - not even convivial personalities like Mozart and Schubert - took much interest in writing songs for two voices. Perhaps they felt it was a domestic decorative art inappropriate for the interpretation of serious poetry. Even Mendelssohn himself seems to have had some such idea. Certainly, in his 6 Duets Op.63, which were written at various times between 1836 and 1844, he avoids anything that might be at all problematic for sociable consumption. “Abschiedslied der Zugvögel,” where the two voices are linked in parallel in the first and third stanzas but diverge in the second, admits a little melancholy but no more than that occasioned by the end of summer.

The colossus of Russian music in his day, Anton Rubinstein is remembered as a composer for little more than his Melody in F. So it is as well to be reminded of his duet setting of a text by the Russian folk poet Kolzof (in Viedert’s German translation) “Sonne scheinet noch,” which could almost be the inspiration of Tatyana and Olga’s folksong duet in the opening scene of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin. Beginning with one voice unaccompanied, the other joining in counterpoint a few bars later, the piano making its first entry as a third voice, it is one of the two most interestingly scored pieces in this group. Carl Reinecke’s “Abendlied” - based on a once popular poem by Matthias Claudius - is attractively written for the two voices and harmonically more seductive than the worthy sentiments of the text might suggest. But there are few duets of any period as captivatingly written for voices and piano than Mendelssohn’s “Maiglöckchen,” which so delightfully recaptures the elfin atmosphere of the Midsummer Night’s Dream music.