Joseph Marx: Nature Trilogy
Steven Sloan, Bochum Symphony Orchestra
ASV CD DCA 1137

5 stars

Absolutely First-Rate Austrian Romantic Impressionism

In the past few days I've been listening, quite by chance, to works by
two Austrian contemporaries--Alban Berg (b.  1885) and Joseph Marx (b.
1882)--whose approach to music couldn't be more different.  And I'm
loving it all.  I'll be writing a review of the other recording--Berg's
'Wozzeck' in English--shortly.  But this review is about what amounts
to a major discovery for me.  I'd vaguely heard the name 'Joseph Marx'
in the past but=

I don't think I'd ever heard a note of his music.  He was known primarily
in his day as a song-writer, most of which were written before he was
thirty, and as a hugely talented, kind, generous teacher in Vienna; it
is reported that he gave composition lessons for free to needy students.
Unlike some composers who are unknown in their lifetimes but discovered
only long after their deaths, Marx was well-known--at least in Germanic
countries--before his death in 1964.  He was privately supportive to
musicians threatened by the oppressive tactics of the Third Reich and
after the War made efforts to get their music performed again in Austria
and Germany.  After his death he and his music were quickly forgotten.

During his lifetime he was an intransigent critic of the Second Viennese
School (i.e.  Schonberg, Berg, Webern et al.) and probably made some
enemies as a result. His musical sound-world remained resolutely romantic
although it is clear from the music at hand that he was smitten with the
emerging impressionism coming from France.

The work recorded here never really had a full performance even in
Marx's lifetime; it was severely cut, or parts of the trilogy were
played separately.  This recording is reportedly the first time it has
been heard in its original form.  And what a piece it is; I listened to
it three times in row, so transfixed I was barely able to breathe

One hears echoes of a number of other composers in Marx's style, although
the totality is uniquely his own.  It's as if an English pastoralist
(Bax, Delius) with Mahlerian melodic ability had strengthened his backbone
with Germanic contrapuntal technique (Schmidt, Reger), and added a soupcon
of Italian pictorial orchestration (Respighi, Casella) resulting in
lushly romantic yet impressionistic sweep.

The 'Nature Trilogy' comprises 'Symphonic Night Music' (about 16 minutes
long), 'Idyll' (15 mins.), and 'Spring Music' (23 mins.).  It was composed
in the early 1920s, primarily during summers when Marx repaired to the
countryside near his hometown of Graz, and where he often met with his
buddies Franz Schmidt, Leopold Godowsky and Franz Schreker, along with
other less familiar composers like Wilhelm Kienzl [now there's a composer
who is due for thorough reinvestigation!] and Anton Wildgans.

The first movement is a nocturne, subtitled 'Mondnacht' ('Night of the
Moon') and depicts a moonlit garden in which two lovers spend a rapturous
night. They dance to a sensuous slow waltz in the middle part of the
movement before the movement ends in shimmering ecstasy.

The 'Idyll' is an homage to Debussy's 'Afternoon of a Faun.' It begins
with a medievalized deconstruction of the famous flute solo that begins
Debussy's piece, but this time with a solo clarinet.  It, like the first
movement, is mostly slow music but this time in the soft light of a misty
day.  A distant cuckoo is heard, almost as if in a dream.

'Spring Music' depicts the world's reawakening after the winter's freeze.
Rivulets form brooks, leaf- and flower-buds swell and unfold, the sun
shines brightly, birds sing.  The world exults.  Momentarily the moonlight
of the first movement and the idyll of the second are recalled.

The Bochum Symphony Orchestra is led by American-Israeli conductor
Steven Sloane.  (I had to look up the location of Bochum which, I blush
to admit, I'd never heard of, and find that it is a city of half a million
in the North Rhine Westphalian region that includes Essen, Dortmund,
Dusseldorf and Cologne.  On the evidence of this recording I'd warrant
that it is a major orchestra without a single weakness that I can detect.
Forty-five year old Sloane, a native of Los Angeles but long resident
in Israel, has been the orchestra's conductor for ten years and has
recently been named music director of the American Composer's Orchestra
in New York.  He is someone to watch.

I give this CD my highest recommendation.  On the strength of this music
I have ordered CDs of his first piano concerto (with Marc-Andre Hamelin)
and of his three string quartets.  I am gratefully beholden to the
exceptionally useful booklet notes written by Berkant Haydin and Martin
Rucker, included with this ASV release.

Scott Morrison