# Hindemith



## Guest

Sounds interesting. Unusual instrumentation in chamber works. What's the low-down then?


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## TurnaboutVox

As no-one really knowledgeable has replied yet, this mere enthusiast will start things off.

He _is_ an interesting composer. I can't claim universal knowledge of his music but I've been interested for a long time and know some chamber works (especially the excellent string quartets: he was a professional violist and founder of the original Amar quartet), piano sonatas, solo organ works, songs and some orchestral works.

He did write for some odd combinations of instruments (and voices). He had late-romantic, expressionist, and later neoclassical periods.

He's not everyone's cup of tea, his music is considered cold and uninvolving by some. For me, he's worth getting to know, I think.


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## PetrB

Hindemith was a virtuoso violist, and was one of those rare musicians who could pick up about any standard instrument of the orchestra and play it to a professional level -- woodwinds, brass, strings, piano. He was also in a time and place to take up the 'social cause' and an educator's one, of _Gebrauchsmusik,_ practical and accessible everyday music for players and 'the people.'

He wrote a sonata for just about every 'orchestral' instrument and piano, and this was partially due to that belief in Gebrauchsmusik, as well as practical (sales of copies.)

I most enjoy his early to middle period works, the youthful and freewheeling _Kammermusik_ series written over a number of years (six or seven of these, many of these a 'pocket' concerto for a soloist and smaller chamber ensemble or chamber orchestra.) Those are somewhat popular with a certain crowd.

The _Symphony, Mathis der Maler,_ suite, really, from his opera of the same name, and _Nobilissime Visione,_ again a concert suite extracted from another of his stage-works, that a 50 minute long ballet score -- are among his still most widely known and generally popular works -- because they are truly outstanding, as well as being generally accessible.
ADD: you might like his _Concert Music for Brass and Strings._

He was prolific, and could compose very quickly, which also often means there are 'well-written' works of little import or real interest, and their are certainly enough of those from him. It has been said of this composer, spinning out works following his own later codified music theory (all about how he handled harmony, of course) that he is a composer of "music by the yard." Just write and write, cut to length, rather like a manufacturer produces rolls of fabric.

Those operas I have only heard segments of, _Mathis der Mahler, Cardillac,_ sound well enough, but I've never heard them entire, nor read the full libretto, seen them staged. They seem to linger on the sidelines, in the ether, and are often mentioned as some of his greater musical achievements, while they are not often performed or recorded in full. Some swear by them, but I have a feeling there is some flaw about them, the story itself, the quality of the written libretto or the appropriateness of the material, possible bad pacing as written for active musical theater -- i.e. something which keeps them from being truly successful and well-received stage works in the theater.

Later, he did codify music theory (his version of it, natch) and that included a highly pedantic 'limit' on modern tonality (vs. atonality), and this was all set out in a textbook which became, for part of a generation, 'the current music theory book.' He also really began, imo, with others feeling the same about this, 'to compose using "the rules" of his own book,' i.e. theory being formulaic and the fundamental premise for composing a piece vs. something more intuitive and inspired, and I agree with many critics that those later works sound like parodies of the composer by the composer, and though 'well-written' sound dull and nearly interchangeable one to the next.

Of his entire output, I think those early _Kammermusik_ pieces -- his youthful 'bad boy' period, are still worth listening to and 'good fun,' -- they sound certainly 'dated' and from their time as well as also vital to this day -- and those middle period orchestral suites from the stage works are still very listenable (and his most widely popular, still, too.) The piano sonatas, really Bach-like with a new spin on harmony, sound more 'academic' than interesting to me, that last being, alas, the way I hear much of his music but for that handful I mentioned which I do like.

When Hindemith's music was new, for a decade or so many musicians and listeners thought 'this is the new way of all new music.' Later, after emigrating to America and holding an academic teaching post at Yale, and having then generated his music theory textbooks, he was hugely influential for some younger musicians of that generation. Some considered him the greatest living composer of his time. Later assessments on that shifted _in the composer's lifetime,_ and there are some writings that this had Hindemith's ego severely out of joint. He is now considered one of those strongly influential composers, but more within a brief time and space than 'universally changing the history of music.' This regard of being the great vanguard composer also fell similarly on Swiss composer Arthur Honegger; part of a generation, again for not so long, thinking his music was _the_ new direction of music... again, later, assessed as a fine composer of many a fine work, but no longer holds that position of the greatest mover or shaker of 20th century modern classical 

P.s. I would, out of very much liking the bits I've heard of the Operas _Mathis der Mahler, Cardillac,_ welcome a decent full length modern recording, and not consider it a wasted night out to attend a well performed and produced full-length production of either of these pieces. Who knows, it could be in later 'resurrections' of those pieces where we find these were Hindemith's more outstanding works.


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## Mandryka

There are two versions of Marienleben, an early one from the 1920s and a later one from the 1940s. I only know these through recordings - Janowitz / Gage for the later one and Roslak / Gould for the first version. Did anyone else record the first version? 

The early version sounds much more modern, a more distinctive voice, than the later one. The later one has me thinking of late 19th century music all the time, Brahms and Puccini even. 

Could this be the case: that Hindemith lost his balls? That he lost the courage to make a new music? And that the two versions of Marienleben show this?

When I think of Ludus Tonalis and Hindemith, which is the only other piece I feel I know, it's as if Hindemith was stuggling to find his own voice, and all his efforts were completely bested, put in the shade, by Schoenberg and Webern and Berg. Just listen to how tame, romantic even, the revised Marienleben sounds compared with Pierrot Lunaire, 10 years earlier.


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## PetrB

Mandryka said:


> There are two versions of Marienleben, an early one from the 1920s and a later one from the 1940s. I only know these through recordings - Janowitz / Gage for the later one and Roslak / Gould for the first version. Did anyone else record the first version?
> 
> The early version sounds much more modern, a more distinctive voice, than the later one. The later one has me thinking of late 19th century music all the time, Brahms and Puccini even.
> 
> Could this be the case: that Hindemith lost his balls? That he lost the courage to make a new music? And that the two versions of Marienleben show this?
> 
> When I think of Ludus Tonalis and Hindemith, which is the only other piece I feel I know, it's as if Hindemith was stuggling to find his own voice, and all his efforts were completely bested, put in the shade, by Schoenberg and Webern and Berg. Just listen to how tame, romantic even, the revised Marienleben sounds compared with Pierrot Lunaire, 10 years earlier.


The later revision, heavy revision, of _Das Marenlieben_ (*thanks* for the mention, reminding me of another truly fine earlier Hindemith work) is post the composer's having clarified and codified his take on music theory, and that -- imho -- almost always certain to be death to music approach of thinking 'theory is what writes music' is what 'ironed out,' Hindemith's revision. By then, he was a virtual slave to his pedant nature and ego re: theory, with a vengeance... and so that piece in revision, and his later music 'died.'

Thanks, what he did in revising _Das Marienleben_ is the perfect manifestation of a more spontaneous composer getting blinded by his own later self-created and believed in "theory."

A kind of mentally lazy _Petty Pedantry_ vs. a more difficult to work and achieve _Intuitive Artistry_. Sadly, the petty pedantry won.


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## joen_cph

The Kepler-inspired symphony "_Harmonie der Welt_", one of his most ambitious works, should be known by everyone dealing with 20th Century orchestral music.

Mravinsky recording recommended, sound initially a bit too compressed in this link, but only at the beginning: 



http://www.allmusic.com/composition...lt-quot-the-music-of-the-spheres-mc0002389064

The opera which formed the basis for the symphony seems largely forgotten.
http://www.hindemith.info/en/life-work/biography/1945-1953/werk/die-harmonie-der-welt/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_Harmonie_der_Welt

The _cello works_, such as the sonata op.11,3 are among his other fine pieces


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## joen_cph

Listened to the lesser known _Piano Concerto _(1945), an old Celibidache recording. A lighter and more lyrical work, at times even a bit French-sounding in the first two movements, the third being more rhapsodic.


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## Guest

Thank you for all the replies. Plenty to go at here, I shall go away and start rummaging!


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## starthrower

Are you looking for solo and chamber works? Everyone seems to be recommending orchestral pieces. The MD&G label has an excellent series of complete sonata recordings. I have volume 4 which features many fine pieces including his beautiful harp sonata. I also have the Glenn Gould 4 disc set. Don't worry about comments like cold and uninvolved. That's just not true, imo.


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## dgee

I thought the Symphonic Metamorphosen on Themes by Weber would be the most performaed Hindemith orchestral work. It's super fun (one of the best times I've had playing) - here's a decent recording:






The symphony in Bb for band is also outstanding.

The chamber music I know is all cery well crafted - try the Wind Quintet as a good example. The Trombone and Bassoon Sonatas are also very good


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## Mahlerian

Having just compared the first two songs of Marienleben in their original and revised versions, I must say that the later version seems quite anemic by comparison. Expressionist Hindemith and the Neoclassical Hindemith of the Kammermusik and the String Quartets I've heard appeals to me quite a bit, while later Hindemith just strikes me as oddly detached.


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## PetrB

*Re: Hindemith's ability to compose swiftly:*

Re: Hindemith's ability to compose swiftly:

"On 19 January 1936, Paul Hindemith travelled to London, intending to play his viola concerto Der Schwanendreher, with Adrian Boult and the BBC Symphony Orchestra in Queen's Hall, on 22 January. This was to be the British premiere of the work.

However, just before midnight on 20 January, King George V died. The concert was cancelled, but Boult and the BBC music producer Edward Clark still wanted Hindemith's involvement in any music that was broadcast in its place. They debated for hours what might be a suitable piece, but nothing could be found, so it was decided that Hindemith should write something new. The following day, from 11 am to 5 pm, Hindemith sat in an office made available to him by the BBC and wrote Trauermusik in homage to the late king. It was written for viola and string orchestra (Der Schwanendreher employs a larger complement that includes woodwinds). Trauermusik was performed that evening in a live broadcast from a BBC radio studio, with Boult conducting and the composer as soloist." ~ Wikipedia.

Trauermusik:
A 1939 registration with Hindemith as viola soloist




A current recording,


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## Guest

starthrower said:


> Are you looking for solo and chamber works? Everyone seems to be recommending orchestral pieces. The MD&G label has an excellent series of complete sonata recordings. I have volume 4 which features many fine pieces including his beautiful harp sonata. I also have the Glenn Gould 4 disc set. Don't worry about comments like cold and uninvolved. That's just not true, imo.


I shall listen broadly, but was thinking primarily of chamber/solo works. The intimacy of smaller settings seems to appeal to me (currently)...


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## Guest

As an aside, what got me interested was the solo violin encore on the Proms the other night. Blew me away, as they say.


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## Guest

joen_cph said:


> The _cello works_, such as the sonata op.11,3 are among his other fine pieces


Oooh, this cello sonata is right up my street. Mmmmmmmm....


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## elgar's ghost

gog said:


> Oooh, this cello sonata is right up my street. Mmmmmmmm....


In that case, you might want to check out the recording on the Dabringhaus & Grim label entitled Chamber Works for Solo Instruments and Piano Vol. 1 (Ensemble Villa Musica) which contains the first four of the five extant opus 11 works:

11.1 - Sonata for Violin and Piano
11.2 - Sonata for Violin and Piano
11.3 - Sonata for Cello and Piano
11.4 - Sonata for Viola and Piano

Dabringhaus & Grimm have served Hindemith's chamber output especially well - although some in the series are not cheap, my advice is to keep an eye on them and snap any up that come within whatever price you consider reasonable.

The other work in the opus 11 group is a sonata for solo Viola, op 11.5, one of four he wrote between 1919 and 1937. This, with the other three solo sonatas, is available on ASV under the title The Complete Works for Viola 2 (Paul Cortese). Hindemith wrote prolifically for chamber forces featuring strings, especially during the late 1910's and mid-1920s, and all of them are worth investigating - as are the numerous chamber works featuring wind instruments, most of which were composed once he left Germany in 1938.

I wholeheartedly agree with the previous endorsements of the string quartet cycle and Kammermusik series - my 'go to' in these cases are cpo (Danish Quartet) for the complete string quartets, and Decca (Chailly/Concergebouw) for the Kammermusik, as that recording includes the Kleine Kammermusik for wind quintet op. 24.2, a work not usually included in the series.

More than enough for you to chew over, and this is only the chamber stuff! :lol:

Anyway, hope this helps and enjoy your voyage of discovery, should you decide to have a real go at it.


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## Guest

Muchly appreciated; I do intend indeed to part with some readies. And there seems quite enough recommendations to assist me in that offloading! Thanks again everyone.


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## Vaneyes

I feel a merge coming on.


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## Guest

Sorry, have I created a duplicate thread?


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## TurnaboutVox

I have several versions of all of the string quartets, though no complete cycle yet. But - may I recommend to you the incomplete Amar Quartet cycle on Naxos as the best modern performances I've heard yet? Excellent recordings, of course.


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## Guest

Merci beaucoup!


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## elgar's ghost

Actually, gog, I got something wrong in my original post. With reference to the group of Hindemith chamber works under opus 11, there is in fact a sixth work (his first sonata for solo violin) which was assumed lost for many years but has, in fact, been rediscovered and subsequently performed and recorded. Just to compound the error, I've actually got it... 

It is included with Hindemith's other two sonatas for solo violin, op. 31.1 and 31.2, on this:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51fKZROzhEL._SY300_.jpg

My humble and embarrassed apologies.


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## Guest

Well having cogitated, I got the Violin Sonatas performed by Eliot and Jill Lawson. Thanks for all the suggestions, I'm sure I'll be revisiting Hindemith; I'm really enjoying this music.


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## elgar's ghost

gog said:


> Well having cogitated, I got the Violin Sonatas performed by Eliot and Jill Lawson. Thanks for all the suggestions, I'm sure I'll be revisiting Hindemith; I'm really enjoying this music.


Good for you, my friend - I hope to see further bulletins in due course.


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## Hassid

On YT you've the original Licco Amar SQ, with brothers Hindemith on viola and cello, playing N°3. Not very modern!!


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## teej

On a Hindemith "kick" these days...recently made several purchases, including string quartets and piano sonatas. Now listening to "Paul Hindemith Piano Works Vol. 3" Pianist is Hans Petermandl (Marco Polo label). As a starter I highly recommend the Sonata No. 2. I plan to spend a considerable amount of time in the coming months listening to a lot of Hindemith.


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## Mandryka

teej said:


> On a Hindemith "kick" these days...recently made several purchases, including string quartets and piano sonatas. Now listening to "Paul Hindemith Piano Works Vol. 3" Pianist is Hans Petermandl (Marco Polo label). As a starter I highly recommend the Sonata No. 2. I plan to spend a considerable amount of time in the coming months listening to a lot of Hindemith.
> View attachment 52647


I know Petermandl's Ludus Tonalis and I think it really is very special. He's a pianist I collect - he's outstanding in big difficult music, Art of Fugue and Diabelli Variations.


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## hpowders

Check out the Hindemith Violin Concerto with Stern/Bernstein. Highly underrated and a fine work!


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## Blake

PetrB said:


> Re: Hindemith's ability to compose swiftly:
> 
> "On 19 January 1936, Paul Hindemith travelled to London, intending to play his viola concerto Der Schwanendreher, with Adrian Boult and the BBC Symphony Orchestra in Queen's Hall, on 22 January. This was to be the British premiere of the work.
> 
> However, just before midnight on 20 January, King George V died. The concert was cancelled, but Boult and the BBC music producer Edward Clark still wanted Hindemith's involvement in any music that was broadcast in its place. They debated for hours what might be a suitable piece, but nothing could be found, so it was decided that Hindemith should write something new. The following day, from 11 am to 5 pm, Hindemith sat in an office made available to him by the BBC and wrote Trauermusik in homage to the late king. It was written for viola and string orchestra (Der Schwanendreher employs a larger complement that includes woodwinds). Trauermusik was performed that evening in a live broadcast from a BBC radio studio, with Boult conducting and the composer as soloist." ~ Wikipedia.
> 
> Trauermusik:
> A 1939 registration with Hindemith as viola soloist
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A current recording,


That's pretty darn impressive. I get so much more out of Hindemith than cold academia. He is exacting and efficient, but there's something else that has always kept me interested... and I can't quite put my finger on it. I almost get a similar feeling as I do with Stravinsky. Cool precision, but there's something magical there.


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