|
|
 |
|
 |
||
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
Contents:
Total Time = 51:21 - Recorded at Rosslyn hill Chapel, Hampstead, London - Digital Remastered 1997 Although Weber did not compose his Turandot music (J.75) until 1809, its origins belong to the same period 1804/05. It was at that time he discovered a Chinese melody in Rousseau's Dictionnaire de musique. This original melody fascionated him, and he composed an Overtura Chinesa based on that theme. Unfortunately the original concept is lost (and was already lost when Jähns compiled his catalogue on 1871), but Weber must still have possessed a score in 1809 when he wrote, on the MS of his Turandot: "The Overture is based on the Chinese theme which I found in Rousseau's Dictionnaire ... Originally in Breslau on 1 June 1806. Revised completely." This new music was composed for a performance of Schiller's Turandot, a tragico-dramatic fairy-tale after Gozzi. Weber himself described the Overture which is based solely on that one theme quite concisely: "First drums and fifes propound this strange, bizarre melody; it is then taken up by the orchestra, continued and developed in various forms, figurations and modulations. Without keeping count of the story in hand it cannot make a pleasing impression, but must be accepted as an honourable invented character piece." It is not Weber's mistake: it is ours if we expect to hear something which Weber has never envisaged. For the rest of it it is interesting from the literary point of view how closely Weber follows Schiller's drama - but not from the musical. There follow six short pieces: two marches, three musical interjections of 4 to 6 bars each, and a final funeral march of 30 bars. All these pieces are too short for performance in public or for inclusion on disc, only the first and longest of the marches (also based on the eternal Chinese theme) is given herewith. In recent times Weber's Turandot music has achieved a new importance. In 1943, when Hindemith composed his Symphonic Metamorphoses on Themes by Carl Maria von Weber, he borrowed themes from Weber's piano compositions for three of the four movements. The second movement, however, is entitled "Turandot, Scherzo" and it based solely on Weber's Turandot theme. Of course Hindemith goes his own ways harmonically and contrapuntally, and perhaps he has given a much more vital turn to the original melody. Nevertheless he thought it worthy of being incorporated in the central section of a work which, probably, is nowadays one of his most popular compositions and, as such, is known to thousands of music lovers. Page revised 30.06.03 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
