The
Nazis killed
Expressionism.
Expressionism is a term that was first used to describe paintings, and is in some ways antithetical to
impressionism. The goal is not to create passive interpretations, but to emphatically express intense feelings and emotions. Expressionism is similar to romanticism in that the point is to convey
emotions, but in
expressionism the composer ususally does not obey common musical 'rules', but allows the emotion to take over the piece, often resulting an a jarring and powerful
sound.
Neue Sachlichkeit is a
German term similar to expressionism, but more often pertaining to
literature during the 1920s in Germany. Many of these writers were thought of as
mad. Neue Sachlichkeit covers Marxist authors, embracing the ideas of Einstein and Freud.
This ethos of
Expressionism and Neue Sachlichkeit was suppressed by the Nazis for extolling ideas that were not
compatible with their
regime. After the Nazis were deposed, this music became regarded as old fashioned and was swept away by the burgeoning wave of the
Darmstadt School, centered on the city of Darmstadt, featured mostly piano compositions tending toward the
avant-garde.
Some composers of the
expressionist style were then almost forgotten, swallowed up by the march of the
third reich. The two
most underappreciated, in my opinion, are
Heinz Tiessen and
Kurt Hessenberg.
Tiessen was the director of a socialist workers' chorus which put him in a precarious position with the
Nazi regime. He was allowed to keep on teaching but was barred from
performance and
publishing his work. My favorite is his second symphony, only half an hour long. It seems to me like a composition
feeling like a tortured and
momentous life unto itself-- full of
struggles and
passions ending with a
climax and quickly yet
gradually winding down at the
finish. Recorded by the Berlin Philharmonic under Sergiu Celibidache.
Kurt Hessenberg was not a
Nazi, but he did not
oppose them either, as he accepted the
National Composition Prize in 1940. Coincedentally, his most famous work is also his Symphony No. 2, which is rather influenced by the neo-classical. It has undertones of Baroque, but with an individual tonal harmonic style, with a very smooth melodic line. Hessenberg's inaugeral recording was recorded by the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, under
Leland Sun, also produced by Leland Sun. (Who is also my cousin-- You can get it at
Tower Records or
Amazon.com)
The
implications of this
phenomenon of
politics influencing music and vice versa are mind-boggling. Music and attitudes towards it say
everything about a certain
attitude or
sentiment at any given time. It's just so
interwoven it's hard to make a distinction. For example,
Nietzsche would not have had the thoughts that he had if not for the composer
Wagner, and
Wagner wouldn't have written what he
wrote (Die Gotterdammerung, for example) without the
frendship, association, and influence of Nietzsche.
But we'll save that for another node.