Song-Symphony, Round 2

It's okay, you didn't miss something -- I didn't write about "Round 1".

The first round happened in 1908-09 when Gustav Mahler composed Das Lied von der Erde, a work which he categorized as a "symphony" but which is also and unmistakably a song cycle of symphonic style, weight and proportions.  And so the genre of the "song-symphony" was born. 

In a way, Arnold Schoenberg was an even earlier progenitor.  The first part of his Gurrelieder (originally composed 1901-03) also seems like a symphonic song cycle, although here the style veers a little closer to opera.

This post is about Alexander Zemlinsky's Lyrische-Symphonie, composed in 1922-23.  Zemlinsky publicly acknowledged his debt to Mahler, and like Mahler he adopted poems of an Asian poet (in this case, the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore).  Stylistically the music of Zemlinsky's work owes just as much to the wide-leaping intervals common in Schoenberg's vocal lines. 

Like both of these examples, Zemlinsky used two solo voices singing alternately -- never in duet.  But his choice of voice types was different from both of his predecessors: a dramatic soprano and a heroic baritone.  Their alternating songs clearly represent a dialogue between a man and a woman.

The seven songs form seven clear movements, but are played continuously, without pause.  The introduction and the first song (baritone) set the dark, enigmatic tone which is never far absent.  As Zemlinsky himself said, "All the other pieces...must take their bearings from the mood of the first."

Where Zemlinsky's work differs most strongly from both Mahler and Schoenberg is in a lack of long melodic lines.  Instead, there is a continous flow of music in which the tone colours may be consistent for long periods, but only small snippets of melody recur from time to time to anchor the structure.  This makes the Lyrische Symphonie a bit of a tough nut to crack for first-time listeners, but if you persevere and give it your close attention through two or three hearings then it will begin to gel as the single coherent work which it undoubtedly is.

In the late days of LP there was a wonderful performance from DGG featuring the husband-and-wife team of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Julia Varady, and conducted by Lorin Maazel.

A more recent, and equally commendable, DGG recording was issued on CD in 1996.  It preserves a live 1995 concert performance in the Musikverein in Vienna with Deborah Voigt and Bryn Terfel, and conducted by Giuseppe Sinopoli. 

Well worth your time to get acquainted with this unusual and beautiful song-symphony.