Someone who inspires

We know that, after his death, Alexander Zemlinsky was largely unknown in the music world for a long time. It wasn’t until the 1970s that people gradually began to rediscover him. That was a sad oversight, and even today he is still far from being as well-known as his music deserves to be.

In that sense, I would say: Unfortunately, many are still not familiar enough with him to be able to say “Alexander.” With Bartók, it’s different. He is much more firmly established in the musical canon, especially for pianists, who come into contact with his works at a very early age and often grow up with them.

Questions like these are always difficult to answer because they’re often a combination of several factors. Take Johann Sebastian Bach, for example. He had long been forgotten until Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy rediscovered him. Sometimes, then, it takes such people and eras to bring someone back into the spotlight. Unfortunately, this has not yet happened to a sufficient extent in Zemlinsky’s case.

I have another possible reason: During his lifetime, he was exceptionally well-known and in demand as a conductor —perhaps his fame as a conductor overshadowed that of the composer a little? Critics of his music—and of course I am not one of them —agree that it’s not easy to quickly outline his personal style.

It’s clear: When you listen to Bartók, Mozart, Mendelssohn, or Mahler, you recognize their music immediately. But perhaps we only recognize it because we’ve heard it so often and it’s so familiar to us? Perhaps someone who doesn’t recognize Zemlinsky hasn’t listened to enough of his music? Because once you delve into his musical world and his works, he becomes just as instantly recognizable as Mahler or Mozart within seconds.

Exactly, and that’s precisely the problem—people say he “has something of” this or that, instead of addressing what’s specific to Zemlinsky. For example: There’s almost always a duality in his work, a sense of standing between two worlds. Light and shadow, chaos and harmony. Or his harmonic peculiarities: sometimes very tonal, then again oriented toward the whole-tone scale. He builds on small cells, rhythmically as well. He uses leitmotifs. And so on. All of this results in a very personal musical fabric that makes Zemlinsky unmistakable.

But one must also note that there were three phases in his creative work: Initially rather traditional, coming from the Brahms school; then—I would say, starting with the Lyrical Symphony— he became more extreme in his use of tonality; in addition, he encountered Leoš Janáček in Prague, and that made an impression on him. And finally, he expanded his tonal range even further … If you’re familiar with his late works and then go back to The Dwarf, for example, you’ll notice his tremendous development.

Of course, in Bartók’s early works, one can sense, among other things, the influence of Brahms, as well as that of Richard Strauss; but then he discovered Claude Debussy and a few others. It wasn’t until Bartók finally developed his own personal style—in which his collaboration with Zoltán Kodály also played a major role —just think of their joint research into folk music! This, too, found its way into his work. Bartók was not only a collector of original folk music; it also left its mark on his compositional work.

But often—as in the case of Bluebeard’s Castle —not in its original form, but transformed through composition. I am Armenian, and in my homeland there was the well-known and very important composer Komitas, who also collected folk music —but in his works, it remained folk music. Bartók, however, created something entirely new out of it. For him, it was an opportunity to break new ground musically.

The question on everyone’s mind was: How do you deal with tonality? There were many answers. Arnold Schoenberg developed his twelve-tone technique, while others remained close to it, such as Richard Strauss and Erich Wolfgang Korngold. What an incredibly exciting time!

I played Bartók’s works on the piano even in my early years. But later, when I worked with Hungarian conductors and coaches, I realized how wrongly I had interpreted this music up to that point. Because there are fundamental things that one simply must know and by which one must orient oneself accordingly. For example: that Bartók’s music, from a certain point in his career onward, is very closely interwoven with the Hungarian language.

This has far-reaching consequences, not least in terms of stress. In Hungarian, the first syllable is stressed, that is: TA-ta, TA-ta. This must also be taken into account musically. Often, coming from the Western European tradition, one would musically pronounce it this way: Ta-TA, Ta-TA. But that is simply wrong. Incidentally, you can verify this by listening to recordings in which Bartók himself can be heard playing the piano. Of course, you absolutely have to know these things when you play his works.

It’s like Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande. When the work was first performed, many people asked themselves: What is this? An opera? Where are the familiar forms? It’s much the same with Bluebeard. But there’s no doubt that Bartók wanted to write an opera, and that’s exactly what it turned out to be. One that, in part, breaks new ground, that is symbolic rather than realistic, that works metaphorically, raises questions and presents images that can have many meanings.

The tears, the torture chamber, the jewelry—all of this covers many levels. And we have an ending that is not clearly conclusive, but rather open-ended. It seems as if Bartók had left three dots. Who knows what’s coming?

Well, that was simply a very personal assessment by Julius Korngold. But we mustn’t forget that he was the father of the composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold, who studied with Zemlinsky. So there was a great deal of confidence in Zemlinsky’s ability. I generally see the challenge in this opera less in the many details than—and this is, after all, the case with many works of that time —in the balance.

Many people think that operas from this period—including Salome and Elektra—simply need to be performed according to the score. You play what the composer wrote down, and that’s it. But that’s not how it works. Because if you simply play these works—with their massive brass sections—exactly as written, the orchestra is far too loud, and you can’t hear the singers.

There’s an anecdote about this: The very young Georg Solti was conducting a stage orchestra rehearsal of Elektra in the presence of the elderly Richard Strauss. Exhausted and proud, Solti asked the composer at the end: “Maestro, what do you think?” And Strauss re­plied: “Oh, that was absolutely wun­der­ful! Except I didn’t hear a single singer …” So what to do?

You have to do the job of a good conductor and lower the volume. Where it says “fortissimo,” you have to play “piano”; where it says “forte,” almost “pianissimo.” But with the emotional intensity of “forte.” Zemlinsky, who was a great conductor, recognized this himself after he had conducted his opera, and made numerous adjustments to the dynamics in his Florentine Tragedy. One must not forget that there is a great deal of dialogue in this opera, and this is particularly delicate when it comes to being drowned out.

Quite precise, in fact. At times he would specify: “This passage must be played at a tempo of one, not three.” Or he would write: “Calmly, without any change in tempo.” He had —probably also because of poor conductors who had frustrated him—very precise ideas about how he wanted things done.

The first challenge is quite obvious: You have to find the right—but very different—colors for each composer. We’ve already mentioned this: Although the works were composed very close together in time, they belong to entirely different worlds. Zemlinsky’s music must have a certain Viennese quality, and the State Opera Orchestra is a great help here: For it possesses shades and nuances that you simply can’t hear anywhere else.

With Zemlinsky—even in this opera—there’s a hint of a waltz that you’re supposed to feel. With Bartók, however, it has to sound completely different. The interpretation requires a sharpness, directness, and rawness that is often neglected. We’ve already discussed the second major challenge—dynamic range and the balance between the stage and the orchestra pit —we have already discussed. This applies to both, with Bartók working with undulating movements, while Zemlinsky, on the other hand, conveys the feeling of an eternal climax. Even more, even higher! But of course that’s not possible, so one must find a meaningful system of crescendos and releases.

In The Florentine Tragedy, specific motifs are very clearly assigned to the characters. Right at the very beginning, you hear Guido Bardi’s motif, immediately followed by Bianca’s. It has a bit of the feel of a musical caricature, because we can—as in Der Rosenkavalier —can imagine what’s happening behind the closed curtain as a backstory. Oscar Wilde, on whose text the opera is based, had originally written a corresponding first scene, which has since been lost. Then Simone enters, a character portrayed in very dark musical terms. In any case, we hear these three character motifs again and again throughout the entire opera.

In the end, however, something truly astonishing happens: We hear Bianca and Simone’s famous last words— “Why didn’t you tell me you were so strong?” / “Why didn’t you tell me you were so beautiful!”—an atmospheric shift. It’s like an illumination, a radiance. The two look at each other as if in a sudden revelation.

Super-lyrical. As I said, like a light that suddenly breaks through. Bartók, too, works with motifs, the blood motif is central—an ornament featuring a downward-pointing minor second that we hear again and again. There is also one for Judith and one for Bluebeard, though hers is clearly brighter and lighter in tone. But at the end of the opera, something very special happens in a short duet: The two begin to move toward each other musically. The work may be somber, but one can hear something unifying in this movement toward one another.