John Smyth replies to me: >>I find Schrecker's music pretty but uninteresting - a lesser Korngold, who >>works the same idiom. > >Hang on here, though I find Korngold to be a great technician, I don't >ever feel that he really takes off, (you know, that "sum of the parts..." >sort of thing), in the way that Schreker routinely does. Please find me a >melody in Korngold that equals the one found at the end of Schreker's "Der >Geburstag der Infantin." (On the solo cello, BTW, for those convinced that >he's a blowbag.) I'm glad he's got a champion, but it just isn't me. I grant that Schrecker writes pretty melodies, but I just don't find the works as a whole as interesting as, say, the Korngold Symphony or the Violin Concerto. I have liked what I've heard by Schrecker (not Der ferne Klang, but you make it sound like a good bet), but it never strikes me as more than pretty. Steve Schwartz