Klarinet Archive - Posting 000052.txt from 2007/05
From: "dnleeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] SV: Orff, Wagner and Nazi's
Date: Mon, 07 May 2007 12:51:43 -0400
I had no argument with the Orff question. I only addressed
Paolo's statement that Wanger never preached violence. So you are
preaching to the converted when you defend Orff. I think only
that his music is shallow.
Your reference to Bruno Walter leaving Germany rather than deal
with the Nazis is way off base. Walter was Jewish and he was
lucky to have escaped with his life.
Dan Leeson
DNLeeson@-----.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Fred Jacobowitz [mailto:fbjacobo@-----.net]
Sent: Monday, May 07, 2007 6:35 AM
To: klarinet@-----.org
Subject: Re: [kl] SV: Orff, Wagner and Nazi's
Dan,
As I remember reading, Orff was an opportunist with a very
minimal set
of morals. He joined the Nazi party for the same reason many
Russians
joined the Communist party: to get ahead. While other artists
such as
Bruno Walter and Paul Hindemith left rather than deal with the
Nazis,
he stayed and prospered. I have not heard that he had anything to
do
with murders and deportations, etc. or that he was an ardent flag
waver, but he was willing to benefit from the artistic vacuum
created
by the departure of the leading artistic lights. This in itself
earned
him the scorn and derision of the musical world. After the war,
he was
spurned by the musical community. By contrast, Strauss was an old
man
and by some accounts, not all there mentally. Even he finally
broke
with the Nazis when they banned Mozart's music.
Fred Jacobowitz
Kol Haruach Klezmer Band
Ebony and Ivory Duo
On May 7, 2007, at 10:19 AM, Curtis Bennett wrote:
> Dan - this thread started with regard to Orff. Is there
anything on
> the background of Orff as it pertains to the Nazis?
>
> On 5/7/07, dnleeson <dnleeson@-----.net> wrote:
>> It is an exercize in futility to argue if Wagner would have
>> behaved similiarly during the Nazi regime. There is no way to
>> conclude on that attempt at a historical contrast.
>>
>> But, Paolo Leva is incorrect when he wrote: "[Wagner] never
>> preached violence in a way even close to what Nazi did." That
is
>> not the case.
>>
>> Wagner explcitly offered a proposal that all Jews should be
>> forced to commit suicide during a performance of "Isaac the
>> Wise." That was a play that had become popular during that
period
>> in which the character of the Jew, Isaac, was shown in a
>> non-demonizing way.
>>
>> That attitude can be seen in no other light thatn preaching
>> violence.
>>
>> And while antisemitism was a plague then (and is to, perhaps,
an
>> ever greater degree of a plague today in the Muslim world),
>> Wagner was the only composer who incorporated his hatred as
part
>> and parcel of his music dramas. He disguised his bigotry
because
>> he did not want his operas to be seen as political pamphlets,
but
>> his greatest masterpieces, "Meistersinger," three of the four
>> operas in "The Ring," and others, are rife with his toxic
>> thinking.
>>
>> Dan Leeson
>> DNLeeson@-----.net
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Paolo Leva [mailto:paolo.leva@-----.se]
>> Sent: Monday, May 07, 2007 2:34 AM
>> To: klarinet@-----.org
>> Subject: [kl] SV: Orff, Wagner and Nazi's
>>
>>
>> I feel the need to enter this debate and underline the
>> crucial difference between composers who consciously
>> served the abominous Nazi regime, and composers who
>> have been (ab)used by that regime.
>>
>> No secret that Wagner was antisemite and generally
>> behaving chaotically in his private and political
>> life, but we cannot assume that if he'd known Hitler
>> and the Nazi he would have supported them. After all
>> he deeply was a humanist and, as long as I know, he
>> never preached violence in a way even close to what
>> Nazi did. We should also remember that he fought with
>> the left activists in Dresden against the regime, in
>> protest to the fact that the parlament had been
>> dismissed by the king. For what we know, Wagner might
>> as well turned out to be a fierce opponent of Nazism.
>>
>> We'll never have answer to this question, this is what
>> makes Wagner so very very different from Orff. We are
>> all entitled of disliking Wagner, his music and his
>> ideas, but considering him a supporter of Nazism and
>> associating him with people like Orff is false from an
>> historical point of view.
>>
>> Once Wagner wrote that he could not think as clear in
>> his private and political life as he could do in his
>> artistic work. This seems to me to be a very good
>> picture of this man.
>>
>> //Paolo
>>
>>
>> > Date: Mon, 7 May 2007 00:37:11 +0200
>> > To: "klarinetlijst" <klarinet@-----.org>
>> > From: "Rien Stein" <rstein@-----.nl>
>> > Subject: Orff, Wagner and Nazi's
>> > Message-ID:
>> > <001901c7902f$16c83270$6402a8c0@rien94hk64swup>
>> >
>> > My father was a great admirer of Carl Orff's music,
>> > especially the Carmina
>> > Burana. He was half Jewish, and did not know mauch
>> > about Orff. My
>> > grandfather was an (amateur) expert on Wagner: after
>> > three notes he
>> > recognized him, which opera, in which scene, and as
>> > far as I know was always
>> > correct, even if it concerned such an (at least in
>> > the first half of the
>> > previous century) unknown work as say Rienzi. My
>> > grandfather possessed the
>> > complete writngs of Richard Wagner, and that
>> > includes not only his opera
>> > texts, but also what he wrote else on theoretical
>> > issues and so on. Writings
>> > I felt troubled of. Thanks to Dan Leeson I now
>> > understand it was the
>> > antisemitical background of this man. To me that was
>> > a good enough reason to
>> > become interested in the attitude of many German and
>> > Austrian composers
>> > towards Hitler and his bent.
>> >
>> > I decided not to listen to, nor to play, music
>> > composed by some composers:
>> > Wagner and the in my opinion much lesser composer
>> > Orff. Strauss indeed was a
>> > stupid fellow, not really understanding what was
>> > going on, but Orff was
>> > aware off it all! He was not the composer of such
>> > really badly intended
>> > trash as Horst Wessel wrote, but he should have
>> > known better! Actually he
>> > knew better, but was indifferent to it, as far as I
>> > know.
>> >
>> > I assume Dan Leeson refused to play music written by
>> > Wagner and Orff, and
>> > some other composers as well?
>> >
>> > Rien
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> kalender. Dessutom 250 MB gratis, virusscanning och antispam.
Få
>> den på: http://se.mail.yahoo.com
>>
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>
>
> --
> Curtis Bennett
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------
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