The 19th Century Salon Music

Description

The experience most of us have of the world is heavily conditioned by our sight. The term “paradigm of the visual” has been coined for indicating our reliance on sight above all other senses. Yet, we all know the power of a flavour or a scent to immediately evoke a specific time and place, frequently bringing back memories we thought we had completely lost. Memories bound to sound are even richer and more detailed, and their power to evoke feelings and emotions, along with narratives, is undeniable.
When we admire a museum or a palace where historical settings and furniture have been carefully reconstructed, we may feel we entered a time capsule, and imagine the movement of people, their chatter and their encounters; we enliven the buildings through our imagination. However, the impression would be much stronger and more accurate if we could add aural impressions to the visual ones, and hear the “soundscape” of time past. Those beautiful palaces of the nobility were permeated by sounds, and many of them were musical.
This Da Vinci Classics album is much more than an aural museum, since it does not merely aim at an artificial reconstruction, but rather at highlighting the artistic value of a forgotten repertoire. Still, even if considered merely as a document, this living memory of another century will not fail to impress its listeners.
The protagonist of this recording is the harmonium “d’art”. The specification is necessary, lest one mistakes the prince for the pauper, as we will shortly see. The setting evoked by this recording is unashamedly elitist; we are invited to admire the magnificent, princely palaces and manors of the wealthy nobility of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Although few of us would have belonged in that world, had we lived a century earlier, we are still entitled to gaze in awe and reverently to this refined, sparkling and cultivated society and to the places their inhabited.
The wealthy aristocracy of the era could afford to buy the most expensive musical instruments and to invite the most prominent composers and musicians of the era. One of the luxuries they prized was the possibility of listening to high-quality music within the comfort of their homes – a luxury we all have, today, thanks to digital audio reproduction.
Their soirées were frequently spent at operatic theatres or auditoriums, where the newest operas by Verdi could be performed, or the great symphonies by Schubert or others were heard. However, music is best enjoyed when it is already known, at least partially; moreover, even the greatest cities and their theatres could not perform the entire repertoire in one season. Thus, these rich amateurs wished both to prepare themselves prior to a theatrical performance, and to listen time and again to the tunes and scenes they had already heard.
The basic option was to play piano transcriptions (frequently for four-hand duet) of the most beloved airs and overtures. However, some of these transcriptions vastly exceeded the skill of amateur musicians; and, more importantly, the piano was only partially satisfactory as a replacement for a symphonic orchestra.
The piano, of course, has the possibility of recreating very thick musical textures, especially when the two pianists’ twenty fingers play together. It possesses dynamic variety, and can reproduce a feeble murmur as well as thunderous chords. However, one of its dramatic shortcomings is the impossibility to sustain, let alone modulate, a sound once the key has been pressed. The piano’s sound is doomed to decay, and this is a serious problem particularly when playing long and slow melodies. And if accurate pedalling can somewhat lengthen the piano’s sound, the possibility of increasing a note’s volume while it sounds is the forbidden dream of all pianists.
Unsurprisingly, chamber music ensembles where the piano is flanked by bowed string instruments were increasingly popular in the nineteenth century. The piano could provide the symphonic texture, whilst the most expressive nuances of the singing tone were entrusted to violins and cellos, which are fully capable of realizing the messa di voce.
However, the most refined palates would still miss something. Neither the piano nor the bowed string instruments could provide a satisfactory evocation of a wind band, with the expressive sounds of reed instruments, the mellow tones of the woodwinds, the powerful and brilliant sound of the brass.
Enter the harmonium. Nowadays, this instrument is deeply misunderstood. Typically, one imagines it in a dusty corner of a country church; it is played by an amateur pianist (perhaps the sexton), it has a rattling and asthmatic sound, and it supports a choir of elderly ladies with defective intonation. It is the organ’s poor relation, and it has no artistic ambition at all.
As previously hinted, this portrait does correspond to some harmoniums (disdainfully called harmonium ordinaire in French), but they are the paupers, not to be taken for the princes. The prince is the harmonium “d’art”, proudly claiming its dignity as not just an art instrument, but rather as one of the masterpieces of instrument manufacturing and building of the era.
The dream of uniting the piano’s extreme potential to play many notes together with the wind instruments’ expressivity had been cultivated for decades, and various attempts had been made- notably, by one Professor Kratzenstein who inspired the creation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Through a series of other instruments, one of which was the orgue expressif created by Gabriel Joseph Grenié, and another the Viennese Physharmonika, in 1840 the harmonium was created and patented by Alexandre Debain. Some of the most refined harmoniums could be as expensive as a luxury flat or a small house; they were played by musicians in the class of Camille Saint-Saëns or César Franck, the greatest organists of the era. These instruments were particularly prized not only for their capability to modulate sound, but also because they could reproduce the faintest whisper and the most powerful fortissimo: their dynamic range was perfectly suited for the aristocratic salon. Even though these salons could be very large and crowded, still they were utterly different from operatic theatres which could seat thousands. What could be heard and appreciated in a salon was much more refined than the minimum sound perceptible in a great theatre.
Ensembles such as those employed in this Da Vinci Classics recording were deemed as ideal for recreating the theatre’s magical atmosphere at home – or rather at palace. The bowed string instruments stood for the ranks of violins, violas, cellos and double basses; the harmonium replaced the whole wind section; the piano filled the harmonic texture and interacted with its partners.
The repertoire recorded in this album splendidly epitomizes the variety of works which could be adapted – at times by great musicians – for this or for a similar ensemble. In the CD we find the most august representatives of the Viennese tradition. Two works by Schubert embody the two souls of this great musician: his lyrical side, perfectly expressed in the masterly construction of the contrasted first movement of his Symphony in B minor (“Unfinished”), and his brilliant, genial aspect, epitomized in the serene Great Rondo. The sound of the Unfinished Symphony is really surprising, and it beautifully renders the complexity of this work.
The fairy and enchanted settings of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy’s Midsummer Night’s Dream is brought to light thanks to the variety of sounds this comparatively small ensemble is capable of producing. The haunted, mysterious and anguished forebodings of Mozart’s Don Giovanni Overture become almost unearthly and therefore powerfully expressive in the version recorded here. At the same time, the other side of this Mozartean masterpiece – the protagonist’s lightheartedness, his inexhaustible amatory powers, his seducing voice – are also evoked in the other two transcription.
Against the demonic atmospheres of the darkest Mozart, the lyrical Intermezzo from Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana provides for a moment of respite. The refinement of its melodic lines and the spiritual intensity of its texture are beautifully embodied in this noteworthy transcription.
Other representatives of the great tradition of Italian opera are also found in this fascinating itinerary through styles and eras; in particular, the full palette of Verdi’s genius is distilled, from the sparkling to the mystical, from the heroic to the exquisitely tender. The intensity of Rossini’s Mosè comes to light in the famous prayer, whose pleading lines intertwine transparently and profoundly with each other, whilst the enchanted levity of Čajkovskij’s fairy-tale is fascinatingly portrayed in the transcription for a curious hybrid instrument.
The sacredness of Sgambati’s Te Deum completes with its solemnity and spiritual imagery this varied and surprising itinerary. Throughout this compilation, the diverse tastes, the immense possibilities, and especially the omnivorous desire for music of the haute société have been recreated for us; and when the doors of this aural museum close behind us, we find ourselves enriched by new feelings and experiences, directly coming from the past.
Chiara Bertoglio © 2021