Schwer ist’s, das Schöne zu lassen
GERMAN–CZECH COMPOSER Viktor Ullmann wrote some of the best twentieth-century art songs you’ve never heard. Interred at Theresienstadt when Germany invaded Czechoslovakia, Ullmann was one of the great musical casualties of the Holocaust. The superb quality of songs included in this double-disc collection—all of his surviving works for voice and piano—makes the sense of tragedy surrounding his numerous lost works all the more acute.
Ullmann, who studied with Schönberg, wrote music that is poised right on the precipice of atonality without taking the plunge. The composer seems to have been somehow conscious of his place in history even amid uncertainty as to whether his work would survive at all. Even in the songs that are comfortably tonal, he gives the impression of someone who has glimpsed the great beyond and returned with dispatches.
Czech soprano Irena Troupová, who began her career as an early-music specialist, is a gratifyingly clear exponent of these challenging, grippingly individual songs. They demand complete musical and intonational assurance, which she provides in abundance. She’s comfortable with the angular intervallic leaps of “Aus dem Häuschen in den Garten,” another Steffen verse, and a song such as “Sonnenuntergang,” with its treacherously high middle section, could easily have sounded shrill in the hands of an artist with less vocal control. Troupová even sounds right at home with the Drei Jiddische Lieder, the standout of which is “A Mejdel in die Johren,” with its mix of tragedy, reproach and humor. Pianist Jan Dusek matches her colors and renders Ullmann’s crunchy harmonies with fullness and understanding. This is a major release.
Joshua Rosenblum
Písně Viktora Ullmanna na koncertních pódiích bohužel slýcháme velmi zřídka, přestože hudba "terezínských autorů" zařívá stále větší popularitu u nás i v zahraničí. V případě tvorby Viktora Ullmanna je pro to jeden hlavní důvod - jejich intonační obtížnost a hlasová náročnost, což ve svém důsledku rovněž vedlo k malému počtu nahrávek. O to více stojí v popředí jedinečný komplet Ullmanových písní pro soprán a klavír Schwer ist´s, das schöne zu lassen / Těžké je opustit krásu, který v letošním roce vydala společnost Arco Diva. Natočení Ullmannova kompletního díla pro sopránový hlas a klavír si vzala za svůj životní úkol sopranistka Irena Troupová, známá svou všestranností, čistou intonací i jasným barevným hlasem. Už při pohledu na komplet nás zaujme jeho objemnost. Booklet obsahuje detailnější popis Ullmanova života i díla, ale také texty všech písní - v českém, anglickém a německém jazyce. Velký dík za zpracování tu patří vlastě Reittererové, která texty písní rovněž z originálu přeložila. Komplet tak působí jako skutečný hold tomuto geniálnímu autorovi.
Písňová tvorba tvoří podstatnou část Ullmannova díla a je základem pro pochopení jeho hudební řeči. Ullmannovo mistrovství je ve vystižení sdělení textů. Pro dosažení konkrétní nálady hlas nešetří. Má mimořádné nároky na časté a velké změny polohy hlasu a jeho barvy, v popředí je výraz, dramatičnost i kontrasty v témbrech, které umocňují velké intervalové skoky... To vše Irena Troupová předvedla s lehkostí a naprostým porozuměním pro Ullmannovu hudební řeč i obsah samotných textů. Do Ullmannovy hudební duše se při poslechu doslova noříme každou další písní i díky citlivému a promyšlenému doprovodu Jana Duška.
Markéta Vejvodová
Časopis Harmonie
Exactly a week ago the Prague-based ArcoDiva label released a two-CD album of songs by Viktor Ullmann. Ullmann is probably best known today for having been imprisoned by the Nazis in the transit point concentration camp built in occupied Czechoslovakia in the town of Terezín, known as Theresienstadt in German. However, before Ullmann was deported to that camp on September 8, 1942, he had built up a significant portfolio of compositions that reflected the modernist influences of the first half of the twentieth century. After his military service during the First World War, Ullmann was accepted in Arnold Schoenberg’s composition seminar in Vienna at the beginning of 1918. However, he moved to Prague in May of 1919, where he was mentored by Alexander von Zemlinsky. It is therefore not surprising that his songs would show the influences of both of these composers, as well as those of at least one (if not both) of their eminent predecessors, Hugo Wolf and Gustav Mahler.
The title of the new album is Schwer ist’s, das Schöne zu lassen (it is difficult to leave the beautiful). All songs are sung by soprano Irena Troupová-Wilke, accompanied by pianist Jan Dušek. The Amazon.com page describes the album as “the complete lieder for soprano and piano of Viktor Ullmann.” This may not necessarily be the case. Most of the music that Ullmann wrote in Prague was self-published; and, according to his Wikipedia page, the manuscripts “presumably disappeared during the occupation.” Things were clearly not any better at the Theresienstadt camp, but that same Wikipedia page has a generous list of works that survived in holograph.
http://www.examiner.com/article/arcodiva-releases-a-two-cd-album-of-the-songs-of-viktor-ullmann
