#reger

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German composer and pianist Max Reger on a vintage postcard

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This is a redo of the Caucasian Sketches Suite no. 1 vs Suites for Solo Viola poll because I accidentally set it to 1 day instead of 1 week, thank you to everyone who notified me. If you already voted in it, please vote again

Which do you prefer?

Caucasian Sketches Suite no. 1 (Ippolitov-Ivanov)

Suites for Solo Viola (Reger)

Voting ended onDec 12, 2023

Caucasian Sketches Suite no. 1 (Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov):

1 Submission

No propaganda

Suites for Solo Viola (Max Reger):

1 Submission

No propaganda

[classical-music-suites-bracket]

Which do you prefer?

Caucasian Sketches Suite no. 1 (Ippolitov-Ivanov)

Suites for Solo Viola (Reger)

Voting ended onDec 4, 2023

Caucasian Sketches Suite no. 1 (Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov):

1 Submission

No propaganda

Suites for Solo Viola (Max Reger):

1 Submission

No Propaganda

[tarianus]

Abgeschaut: Friedrich Hebbel (1813-1863) - »Requiem«

Seele, vergiß sie nicht, Seele, vergiß nicht die Todten! Sieh, sie umschweben dich, Schauernd, verlassen, Und in den heiligen Gluten, Die den Armen die Liebe schürt, Athmen sie auf und erwarmen, Und genießen zum letzten Mal Ihr verglimmendes Leben. Seele, vergiß sie nicht, Seele, vergiß nicht die Todten! Sieh, sie umschweben dich, Schauernd, verlassen, Und wenn du dich…

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[opera-ghosts]

OTD in Music History: Composer, conductor, pianist, organist, and pedagogue Max Reger (1873 - 1916) was born 150 years ago in Bavaria. As the central figure of the so-called "Back to Bach" movement that gained steam in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, Reger represents a rather strange case: Many modern day "classical" music fans -- if they are familiar with him at all -- deride him as something of an aesthetic monster; the prototypically tasteless late-Romantic composer of swollen orchestral scores filled with long and pointless fugues on stylistically unsuitable subjects (like his gargantuan "Mozart Variations"). But Reger was actually a remarkably prolific composer, and a good deal of his original music -- which includes beautiful chamber works, charming piano miniatures, profound solo organ music, artful lieder, and daring unaccompanied violin sonatas -- is entirely devoid of the heavy-handed counterpoint which has given him a bad reputation in certain circles. Arnold Schoenberg (1874 - 1951), for one, was extremely impressed by Reger the composer. Schoenberg summed up his thoughts in a 1922 letter that he sent to his friend and colleague, Alexander von Zemlinsky (1871 - 1942): "Reger must, in my view, be played often: 1. because he has written a lot, and 2. because he is already dead and yet people are still not clear about him (I consider him to be a genius)." One story about Reger has achieved a special scatological immortality within certain "classical" music circles: Reger had a very acrimonious relationship with Rudolf Louis, a German music critic who absolutely despised his work. After Louis published a particularly scathing review of Reger's "Sinfonietta in A Major" (Op. 90), Reger responded with a curt letter which read as follows: "Ich sitze in dem kleinsten Zimmer in meinem Hause. Ich habe Ihre Kritik vor mir. Im nächsten Augenblick wird sie hinter mir sein!" ("I am sitting in the smallest room of my house. I have your review before me. In a moment, it shall be behind me!"). What more is there to say? PICTURED: A lengthy six page autograph letter that Reger wrote to a friend in 1913, discussing various musical matters.

Although in his own day he was often viewed with suspicion as one of the "dissonant ultramodernists" (a fact which is almost hard to believe now), as former New York Times Chief Music Critic Harold C. Schonberg (no relation to Arnold) explained:

"Reger himself thought of his music as a continuation of the German tradition. He also claimed that his music was written in the spirit of Bach and Beethoven. 'I can say with good conscience,' he wrote in 1914, 'that of all living composers, I am probably the one who is closest in touch with the great masters of our rich past.' The music of his own day, composed by epigones of Wagner and Strauss, he called 'perverted rubbish'… [and yet at the same time,] Reger himself felt an affinity to [Arnold] Schoenberg. Indeed, he once told the violinist Adolf Busch that of all of the then-modern composers, he felt closest Schoenberg. Likewise, scattered throughout Schoenberg's writings are references to Reger that make it clear that Schoenberg put him on as high a plane as Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss…”

Perhaps it shouldn’t be surprising that a mutual fan club existed between Schoenberg and Reger -- after all, despite his own fearsome reputation as a "dissonant ultramodernist" (a reputation which, unlike Reger’s, persists to this day) Schoenberg also cut his compositional teeth working well within the lush Post-Romantic idiom (ex: "Verklarte Nachte")… and he too always proudly claimed an artistic lineage that extended straight back to Brahms, Beethoven, and Bach…

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