(++++) PLEASURES OF THE INCONSEQUENTIAL

Theodor Kirchner: Piano Music. Lowell Liebermann, piano. Blue Griffin Recordings. $24.99 (2 CDs).

Haydn: Baryton Trios, Volume 2—Hob. XI: Nos.6, 35, 67, 71, 93, and 113. Valencia Baryton Project (Matthew Baker, baryton; Estevan de Almeida Reis, viola; Alex Friedhoff, cello). Naxos. $13.99.

Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges: Sonatas for Violin and Fortepiano, Op. 1b, Nos. 1-3. Andrew McIntosh, baroque violin; Steven Vanhauwaert, fortepiano. Olde Focus Recordings. $16.99.

     The story of Fürchtegott Theodor Kirchner (1823-1903), to give him his full name, is one of those what-might-have-been musical tales that came to naught, or almost naught, but certainly did not need to. Kirchner was highly admired by precisely the musical intelligentsia that should have paved the way for his work to be widely accepted: Schumann praised him in Neue Zeitschrift für Musik; Mendelssohn’s recommendation got him the position of organist in Winterthur, Switzerland; Liszt, Wagner and others thought highly of him. Clara Schumann had an affair with him. Brahms, Gade, Grieg and others raised 30,000 marks on Kirchner’s behalf in 1884, so he could pay off his debts. But right there is part of the reason for Kirchner’s now-nearly-total obscurity: a dissolute lifestyle almost totally lacking in diligence or application to the work of composition or to his much-praised abilities not only as organist but also as pianist and arranger (he arranged a number of Brahms’ works). Lowell Liebermann, himself a gifted pianist/composer, has done Kirchner a major favor by rediscovering half a dozen of his piano groupings and making them available in finely honed, thoroughly sensitive readings on the Blue Griffin Recordings label. The first disc of the two-CD set includes the set of 15 Skizzen – Kleine Klavierstücke, Op. 11, and the nine Legenden – Dichtungen für das Klavier, Op. 18. The second disc has Nachtbilder – Zehn Charakterstücke, Op. 25; the four Notturnos, Op. 28; the five Ideale – Clavierstücke, Op. 33; and Vier Elegien für Pianoforte, Op. 37. The fact that these six works, all of which date to the 1870s, are made up of 47 separate pieces, points clearly to Kirchner as a miniaturist, and indeed that is a large (although not complete) element of his musical personality. He was quite adept at writing micro-miniatures lasting only a minute or so (he wrote a total of some 1,000 piano pieces), but he was also capable of expressing himself at greater length than the six collections played by Liebermann would indicate – although he never wrote for orchestra and created only two larger-scale chamber works (a string quartet and piano quartet). In any event, this excellent recording is as fine an introduction to Kirchner’s music as is likely to be encountered anywhere. Certainly many of the pieces here fall at least loosely under the somewhat less than complimentary designation of “salon music,” pleasantries of no great consequence. But some have greater emotional heft, and even the less-consequential ones show Kirchner’s considerable skill in all the Romantic-era short forms: for instance, the nicely contrasted seventh and eighth of the Skizzen, marked Im ruhigem Walzertempo and Ruhig, sanft, perfectly encapsulate aspects of the time period. The pieces in Legenden are no longer than those in Skizzen but are weightier, and as deeply Romantic as can be – they do not refer to specific circumstances, but invite listeners to conjure some for themselves. Likewise, the Charakterstücke are highly expressive, ranging from the intense and dramatic to the gentle and lyrical to the pathétique (the longest is labeled Mesto). It is easy in this set to hear the reasons Liszt and Brahms, so different pianistically in so many ways, could both find elements of Kirchner’s music to admire. The four Notturnos are for the most part gentle and pleasantly soporific, the third and fourth both possessing definite elements of lullabies. The Ideale are more rarefied, their sweetness tempered by thoughtfulness that, however, leaves their flow unimpeded. And the Elegien – more thoughtful than sad, more crepuscular than dark – are warmly expressive throughout. None of this is deeply meaningful music, most of it falling into the category of endearing trifles. But all of it lies very well on the piano, is tenderly cohesive, and reaches out emotionally to the 21^st century in ways that even the works of better-known Romantic-era composers often do not.

     Unlike Kirchner, Haydn is of course extremely well-known – but his extensive production for a long-obsolete instrument, the baryton, is almost never heard, given that almost no one plays the baryton anymore and playable instruments of Haydn’s time have not survived. The members of the Valencia Baryton Project are doing a real service to music and to Haydn by reviving the composer’s more than 120 trios for baryton, viola and cello – the large number resulting from the fact that Haydn was, after all, a composer employed by the Esterházy family to make music on command, and Prince Nikolaus was a strong advocate of the baryton and apparently a fine performer on it. Haydn not only created numerous works for his patron – many of them in the key of A, in which the baryton sounds particularly good – but also approached his assignments with his usual creativity. The baryton is essentially a bass viol with two sets of strings: gut strings played with a bow and wire strings that vibrate sympathetically with the bowed ones and can be plucked by the performer’s left thumb. Haydn had the sympathetic strings tuned a full octave higher than had previously been the case – allowing his employer’s baryton to stand out more clearly from the viola and cello when playing trios. This was a good 18^th-century example of managing one’s boss – and it also made for some elegant, poised and distinctive-sounding music. The new Naxos recording of a selection of Haydn’s baryton trios features three in A (Nos. 6, 35 and 71), one in G (No. 67), one in D (No. 113), and one in C (No. 93). All the works were created from the mid-1760s to the early 1770s, and all are in three movements – though here too Haydn was not formulaic, opening three of these six with slow movements and placing the minuets (which all the pieces contain) last rather than second in two cases. To the modern ear, the baryton – which was never especially popular even in its own time – has a somewhat strange sound, largely because of the difference between the gut and wire strings but also because the use of sympathetic strings throughout produces a different aural environment from that to which listeners are accustomed. Each trio on this fascinating disc has distinctive elements. For example, the longest, No. 113, starts with a very extended Adagio in which the metallic strings actually lead off the movement, producing a depth of feeling that Haydn is careful to balance with two much lighter movements and a genuinely perky conclusion. And No. 93 has a witty, syncopated first movement and a very short (90-second) finale built on an especially catchy tune. There is much to discover and much to enjoy here, including the finding that Haydn’s creativity shows itself as clearly in his lesser works as in his more-significant ones.

     A composer of Haydn’s time, working in Classical style, who is now nearly as obscure as Kirchner, is Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges (1745-1799). He is primarily remembered today because he was biracial and free – illegitimate, but acknowledged by his wealthy white father and given his father’s last name. Saint-Georges was appointed by King Louis XVI as a royal guardsman and joined the National Guard in Lille after the French Revolution – but was imprisoned for 11 months during the Reign of Terror because of his royal connections. He was so well thought of in musical circles that he was sometimes called the Black Mozart – yet his music is almost unknown today. A short but well-made Olde Focus Recordings offering of three of Saint-Georges’ sonatas for violin and fortepiano at least makes it possible to hear 43 minutes’ worth of his work and will likely whet listeners’ appetite for more. The release includes three two-movement sonatas published in 1781, and is greatly helped by being played in period style on the instruments for which the music was written – there is a very distinctive sound to the baroque violin that is missing in more-modern instruments, and (even more to the point) the fortepiano is so different from the modern piano, so much closer to the harpsichord in many ways, that the blending of string instrument and keyboard in these works is nothing like what it would be if a modern piano were to be used. All three of these sonatas have longer and faster first movements followed by briefer not-quite-as-quick second movements: nothing here is really slow and there is no attempt to delve into anything emotive, much less deep. The first sonata is in B-flat, the second in A, and the third, interestingly, in G minor – although it moves quickly to the relative major and spends most of its time there. The pieces are excellently balanced, written very idiomatically for both instruments, and clearly show Saint-Georges to have been adept with the musical forms of his time – albeit without doing anything to expand or transform them, as Haydn and Mozart did. Andrew McIntosh and Steven Vanhauwaert are truly excellent advocates for this music, playing it with assurance and conviction and bringing out the sonatas’ many charms. It would be stretching things to say that this is important music – neither are Kirchner’s miniatures or Haydn’s baryton trios – but certainly more works by Saint-Georges would be worth hearing, and in fact the biggest criticism of this CD is that it is over much too soon. Hopefully there will be more to come from McIntosh and Vanhauwaert, and more chances to explore and enjoy Saint-Georges’ obvious compositional skills.