Mozart, Beethoven, Fiala: 18th Century Duets for Flute and Cello

Description

Today, the label of “classical music” covers an enormous timespan, and, within it, a variety of genres. In some cases, one could say that a particular work was a “Classic” since its premiere, or even since its conception. Arguably, Beethoven imagined his Ninth Symphony as aiming at the status of “Classic” well before it was ready for performance. His standing at the time, his unquestionable genius, and the efforts he put in its creation were just as many guarantees for the Symphony’s reception and for its lasting appreciation.
Such works were conceived from the outset for public performance; they may require a large ensemble of professionals in order to be played, and a large venue to be enjoyed. In a way, these are the “classics of classical music”.
However, today the umbrella of “classical music” covers also a great number of works which never aimed at such a status. They were works conceived for private performance, for “immediate consumption”, so to speak, and for the delight of their players more than of their listeners (if listeners were at all present).
In other words, works which were intended as the “light music” of the past have become now, by virtue of their age rather than of their intrinsic qualities, part of “classical music”. This includes also their displacement from the private home to the concert hall (or to the recording medium).
Works such as those recorded in this fascinating Da Vinci Classics album belong clearly in this second category. To be clear, this categorization is by no means to be intended as an a priori judgment of value: there are absolute masterpieces in this field, and many of them need to be rediscovered and appreciated. And these forgotten gems certainly include the works recorded here. What is at stake, therefore, is not artistic value per se, but rather the context and practices of musical creation and consumption. Works such as these Duets were conceived as ephemeral artworks; their very creators would have been surprised at their rediscovery, centuries after their publication. They were conceived, as previously stated, for private or semiprivate performance. They could be destined for skilled amateurs, who loved to play chamber music in their free time. (In the case of aristocrats, they had virtually no “non-free” time. They could therefore dedicate considerable time and effort to musical practice. Their musical level could be compared with that of professionals, the only difference being that aristocrats did not earn money by playing). Or they could be imagined as the background music for the nobility’s daily activities. In that case, these pieces were played by professionals of the court orchestra. Such works could be listened to attentively, but by a very restricted audience; or constitute the barely noticed musical backdrop to chatting, playing games, reading books, painting, or drinking chocolate or coffee. This form of musical enjoyment is perhaps the one closest to what is experienced by today’s listeners of musical CDs such as that you have presently in your hands. It is the private “luxury of beauty”, the possibility of savouring a moment of art in the midst of many other businesses, or perhaps to “beautify” the spare moment giving it a novel meaning.
Having thus sketched the intended context for the Duets recorded here, another point follows: the cogency (or lack thereof) of the composer’s indications about the performing forces. Of the pieces recorded here, only the two Duo concertante by Josef Fiala are original works for flute and cello; the others are transcriptions. Mozart’s Duo was originally scored for bassoon and cello, and Beethoven’s Duets were intended for clarinet and bassoon. How important is the original “sound” for the appreciation of this music?
Here again, I think that a line should be drawn dividing the “classics of classical music” and works like the duets recorded here. In Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (to remain in the example cited before), to replace the timpani’s solo at the Scherzo’s opening with, for example, a double-bass pizzicato would be unthinkable. On the one hand, its musical idea and gesture are strictly linked to the instrument employed to realize them. On the other, the classical music listeners’ knowledge of this Symphony is so deep that such a replacement would (rightly) be conceived as little short of blasphemy. In works such as these duets, instead, frequently the original instruments’ idiomatic features are not entirely put to use. What matters most is the melody’s beauty, the flow of music, the charming rhythms, the graceful pace, the spirited inventions. These traits (found in all works recorded here) lose very little, or perhaps nothing, when transferred from an instrumental medium to another. Moreover, this corresponds entirely to the practice of the time. In a certain, paradoxical fashion, one is faithful to the spirit of the eighteenth century by not being excessively faithful to the letter of the score. When a composer wrote and published Duets such as these, he or she fully expected these works to be adapted to the taste, availability, skill, creativity, and imagination of the final user. And this is frequently testified not only by anecdotal evidence, but also by the very history of the pieces under discussion, including those recorded here.
For instance, scholars debate as to the very intentions of the composer as regards the bassoon part in Mozart’s Duo. Surprisingly, in fact, and not in keeping with Mozart’s usual treatment of the bassoon, its part has a very limited range – practically a half of what the bassoon of Mozart’s time could play, and of what the composer habitually used. It has been argued, therefore, that the part could have been intended for the fagottino, a smaller-sized bassoon. This does not explain the matter fully, however. The fagottino, in fact, cannot reach its larger cousin’s low notes (and this could explain why very few low notes are found in its part); but the fagottino’s upper register is also not required by Mozart’s score, and this is harder to understand. Possibly Mozart wanted to write a piece which could be played on both instruments? This surmise cannot be proved, of course, but it does demonstrate the flexibility of the composers’ indications for works such as these and for their performance.
Mozart’s composition of this Duo has normally been related with his friendship with Baron Thaddäus von Dürniz (1756-1807), the dedicatee of Mozart’s Keyboard Sonata KV 284. Dürniz represented an instance of precisely the kind of aristocratic amateurs discussed earlier: he was a very good bassoon player. Mozart and Dürniz, who were the same age, had met in Munich in 1774-5, so, prima facie, the attribution makes sense. However, none of Mozart’s works for the bassoon had been (listed) in the Baron’s musical library, and this seems to disprove the attribution.
Another curious aspect regards the title, and what is implied by it. Properly speaking, a “duo” or “duet” should be a talk among equals, a musical encounter of peers. Here, evidently, the bassoon is the protagonist, and the bass part is practically a continuo part. When Mozart’s work (originally called Sonata by the composer, as was common practice for solo pieces with continuo accompaniment) was published, almost fifteen years after the composer’s death, the title was changed into Duo out of purely commercial reasons. Solo works with continuo were out of fashion in the early nineteenth century, whilst duets could be more easily sold. However, the work’s original concept should be borne in mind when listening to it, lest the refinement of its writing fails to appear.
Mozart probably appreciated the joy of making music together as few other people in history. He knew that chamber music could afford hours of pleasure to both geniuses as he was and mere amateurs. His attitude toward chamber music certainly had to do with both his love for music, and his appreciation of human relationships. And these he was able to establish with aristocrats and with simpler folk, but, especially, with fellow musicians. One of them was Josef Fiala, a Bohemian musician who was a few years his senior. Fiala and Mozart met, once more, in Munich (three years after Mozart’s acquaintance with Dürniz). By that time, Fiala had already established himself as a skilled oboe, cello and gamba player; he had been appointed as an oboe player at the prestigious Bavarian court chapel after other jobs in various European cities. Mozart befriended him and was impressed by his talent and accomplishment. Thus, the following year, Mozart obtained for him a place in Salzburg, in the Archbishop’s orchestra where, at the time, both Wolfgang and his father Leopold were still employed. In Salzburg, Fiala did not abandon his other instruments; he played the cello at the Salzburg premiere of Mozart’s Entführung aus dem Serail. Later, like Mozart, he moved to Vienna, and still later to Sankt Petersburg and to Donaueschingen. So appreciated was Fiala during his lifetime that he was granted the king’s coat of arms as a token of esteem. His two Duo Concertante display the unusual, first-hand, and professional knowledge Fiala had of both string and wind instruments. Both are treated in a truly “concertante” fashion (and here the different concept with Mozart’s “duo” comes to the fore). Fiala’s brilliant inventions punctuate all movements, demonstrating virtuoso and shining technical solutions in the quicker movements or in the elaborated variations closing the second Duo, and a noteworthy lyrical talent in the two Adagios.
The three Duets for clarinet and bassoon by Beethoven are of disputed authenticity, even though most scholars tend to attribute them to the composer. Certainly, they belong to his first compositional period, when he still was in Bonn, and they mirror the elegant and spirited fashion of the Classical era. They were published much later, however, and probably unbeknownst to the composer. Likely, Beethoven had left the manuscript behind when he moved from Bonn to Vienna in his youth, and the autograph (or a copy of it) mysteriously found its way to the hand of a French publisher, who was quick to exploit the (by now fully established) fame of the German composer. If here Beethoven does not question the “highest matters” of the spirit and of musical thought, nonetheless he demonstrates his precocious ability to combine a variety of compositional elements with inventiveness, freshness, and genius.
Together, these works seem to bring back a lost world of refinement, elegance, humour, irony, and beauty. By listening to their recording on this Da Vinci Classics CD, something of the eighteenth-century’s “luxury of beauty” of eighteenth-century aristocrats will be granted also to our busy and sometimes stressful lives.
Chiara Bertoglio © 2022