Alfred Schnittke (1934-1998)

[Mandryka]

Kevin Karnes' recent books on Arvo Pärt rather highlight how that composer got lucky from a marketing perspective: Pärt's association with ECM meant that in the public imagination today, he seems to have come out of 1980s West Germany. . .  Consequently, as large-scale public interest in Soviet dissident art waned, he wasn't affected.

@CRCulver Why do you think Shostakovich is so popular?

[CRCulver]

@CRCulver Why do you think Shostakovich is so popular?

I'd argue it is because he got canonical status long ago. Indeed, he is often called one of the last composers to do so. The relationship between him and the Soviet state has become just one biographical detail, and he gets programmed just because he has always been programmed.

[Mandryka]

I'd argue it is because he got canonical status long ago. Indeed, he is often called one of the last composers to do so. The relationship between him and the Soviet state has become just one biographical detail, and he gets programmed just because he has always been programmed.

This is maybe of interest if you don't already know it

https://www.some.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/2.-Weber-1999-The-history-of-musical-canon.pdf

[DavidW]

The answer is, in fact, no. You know this is something that can be easily checked, right? Have a look at the Discogs entry for Schnittke and filter by releases where he is the composer. You'll see that the majors recorded Schnittke frequently in the 1990s, but then that dropped off; later releases are almost solely reissues of those 1990s recordings.

Okay I looked. Harmonia Mundi, DG, Pentatone all have releases in the past several years that are not just reissues. My favorite is the Jurowski recording of the third. But I have a feeling that you're stuck in the past with what you consider a major label. So here is a DG recording from 2021 as an example:

https://www.discogs.com/release/17309128-Schnittke-Daniel-Hope-Alexey-Botvinov-Works-For-Violin-And-Piano

[SurprisedByBeauty]

Greetings, fellow Schnittke-heads: I've been part of a little YouTube podcast (#ClassicalDiscoveries) where we explore, well, music worth discovering... and I was wondering if I could show it here, to get some feedback and especially criticism (maybe a bit beyond "you guys suck", although I can see that, too) from people well into that sort of thing. And perhaps take cues as to what we should be doing and covering.

This is about his Film Music for the tripartite TV-movie by Mikhail Schweitzer on Pushkin's "Little Tragedies" with a Faust prologue. I ended up reading the Pushkin for this and watched the first and second part of the film (they're available on YouTube, all), which was great fun and edifying. I hope you don't find this too annoying. (Though we try!)

(I don't quite know where to post this, without being obnoxious, but I thought this might be the right thread. I will also post our video of Braunfels' "Jeanne d'Arc", Mahler (his Beethoven "Retuschen") and Miklos Rozsa ("Beyond Ben Hur") in those composers' threads.)

Classical Discoveries - #002 Alfred Schnittke: The FILM MUSIC EDITION

[Mandryka]

I have just discovered the glorious Concerto for Choir!

[relm1]

I have just discovered the glorious Concerto for Choir!

I haven't.  What makes it glorious?

[Mandryka]

I haven't.  What makes it glorious?

Same thing which makes the Rach Vigil and Sviridov's Garland glorious. Strange music, which never seems to lose its strangeness, but nonetheless is always agreeable.

[brewski]

Same thing which makes the Rach Vigil and Sviridov's Garland glorious. Strange music, which never seems to lose its strangeness, but nonetheless is always agreeable.

PS, spurred by your post, earlier today I found a version I'd never heard before, recorded in August 2023 and uploaded last year.

[Mandryka]

At the moment the choir concerto is possibly my favourite Schnittke piece, the Polyansky recording.

[relm1]

Lately, I've spent a lot of time traversing symphonic cycles of many 20th century composers that I haven't explored deeply before.  I might have listened to them in passing but wasn't focused on hearing it.  They included the symphony cycles of Roger Sessions, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Aaron Copeland, Hans Werner Henze, Per Norgard, Malcolm Arnold, Aaron Copeland, Leonard Bernstein, and a few more.  I think traversing a cycle in order is an enlightening process because you really do hear their output contextually.  I found Norgard and Maxwell Davies to be more traditional when I listened to their cycle straight through. 

As a simple example, I feel Shostakovich's Symphony No. 15 has greater depth and meaning when heard in context of his symphonic output.  He references early material and places it within the experience of a life lived fully recalling early material such as William Tell and such within the Symphony No. 4 which might have been his most personal.  It becomes a testament of life and meaning.  I think the same for Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 10 regardless of its completion state.  He finished it, just didn't fully finish the performing version of it but it was clear what he was meaning.

I think Alfred Schnittke was a great symphonist and I didn't fully understand that when he was alive.  No two of his symphonies sound alike while clearly having his fingerprints.  His output is characterized with polystylism (classical, neoclassical, romantic, jazzy, baroque, etc., within the same work...sometimes at the same time), tone clusters, lamenting, sometimes lyrical, sometimes chaotic, but it always feels very personal and honest.  Music that refuses consolation if it feels unearned. 

Today I learned that my uncle died as a result of his fourth stroke.  I know Schnittke suffered multiple strokes and I'm not exactly sure of the dates but think they impacted his output and mindset.  According to Wiki, he had a stroke on July 21, 1985, but was it his first?  It says he was clinically dead but recovered and ultimately suffered several more strokes before dying in 1998 at the age of 63.  I presume the strokes contributes to the grim sparseness of his later works but think it's also important to mention the beauty inherent.  More on this later.

Symphony No. 0 (1957) feels like a historical footnote.  It is impressive, competent, and stylistically cautious and reminds me somewhat of Shostakovich's No. 1 (a very impressive debut). I don't find it really close to his real voice but an accomplished work worth hearing.

Symphony No. 1 (1969-72) is the explosion point: chaotic, grotesque, exhausting, and often hilarious in a bitter way. It feels like Schnittke throwing the entire symphonic tradition into a blender just to see what survives.

Symphony No. 2 ("St. Florian") (1979) pulls sharply away from that chaos into something ritualistic and severe. It's not particularly expressive but rather ceremonial.  It feels like time slows down, and the music starts to behave like a religious object rather than a narrative.  The cathedral is an imposing edifice to ritual feeling like a slow procession through time and sacred space.  Sometimes personal, sometimes imposing, sometimes monumental. 

Symphony No. 3 (1981) is dense and heavy in a different way.  Almost oppressive in its engagement with German symphonic tradition. It doesn't joke or provoke so much as it endures, like architecture you're forced to walk through.

Symphony No. 4 (1983) turns inwardly and quiet, restrained, and strangely intimate. The vocal writing and modal atmosphere make it feel suspended outside normal symphonic drama, more about spiritual coexistence than conflict.

Symphony No. 5 (Concerto Grosso No. 4) (1988) is probably my favorite overall because it finally feels like a complete emotional journey from start to end. The polystylism no longer collides but seems to recall past memories. The Mahler quotation doesn't shock; it feels mourned, and the whole piece seems to sum up Schnittke's identity up to that point: irony, grief, history, and sincerity all coexisting without tearing the music apart.  Schnittke wrote six Concerto Grossi.  To him, these clearly blended in with his conception of a symphony.  Does that mean that he wrote 14 or so symphonies? 

I sort of think of the Concerto Grossi as a concerto for orchestra.  Not quite a symphony but very much symphonic.  He's blending genres.  Sort of like how a Sinfonia Concertante is somewhere between symphony and concerto.  One can imply it's not fully either as well.  Sort of like how Sibelius's Kullervo Symphony isn't really a symphony but is more of a symphonic poem.  To me, this shows Schnittke is following in the symphonic tradition by bending the definition of what makes it a symphony...just like how all the great symphonists did. 

Symphony No. 6 (1992) feels like a clear departure after that. It's much starker, more rigid, and emotionally clenched, as if the expressive flexibility of No. 5 has been deliberately shut down. The music feels constrained rather than haunted.

Symphony No. 7 (1993) pushes that reduction even further but retains structural meaning.  It is bleak, sparse, and almost frozen in time and place.  Gestures are minimal, and the sense of motion feels fragile, like the music might stop if pushed too hard.

Symphony No. 8 (1994) is devastating in its stillness.  I thought it was in a single movement spanning over 35 minutes but it seems there are clearly multiple movements.  I find it very beautiful in a Mahlerian way (the beauty isn't overt) and filled with longing more like listening to sound retreat from the world. Is this a good bye to life or longing to better times?  There's no drama here, just introspection, resignation and calm acceptance of the inevitable with a radiant rising end. 

It reminds me in places of Mahler's Symphony No. 10 last movement.  This is a very deep, meaningful, sublime work.  It also reminds me somewhat of Malcolm Arnold's Symphony No. 9.  This is along with No. 5, my favorite of his symphonies and one I feel needs repeated listening to fully grasp its depth.  It's magnificent.  Does anyone know what was happening personally during the composition?  Did he have another stroke and feel this was his end?  It's solemnly radiant.  I believe this work alone (well, the 5th too) marks Schnittke as a great composer. 

Symphony No. 9 (1997, completed posthumously) is unsettling in a different way: fragmentary, weakened, and incomplete not as an aesthetic choice but as a reality. It feels like the idea of a symphony struggling to continue when the body can't fully support it anymore.

Analytically, the arc makes sense: early excess → historical weight → spiritual withdrawal → late erasure. What makes the cycle powerful isn't consistency, but the honesty of that progression. And that's why No. 5 stands out.  It's the last moment where everything he was up to that point still feels fully alive before the music hardens into something colder and more minimal.

Epilogue:

Schnittke doesn't stand beside Beethoven or Mahler as a builder of grand cathedrals.  He is one of the great symphonists because like them, he treats the symphony as a personal, moral, historical, philosophical exploration and not just a form.  Even a journey where perhaps he doesn't have the answer but explores the question.  He stands beside them as someone who asks, "What purpose does a cathedral have if faith and belief have collapsed?"  I don't know the role of faith in Schnittke's life but don't think it matters that much.  One can still find beauty in the grand cathedrals an myths of the past regardless of how much of it they believe.  I adore ancient myths even though I don't believe in Zeus, Amon-Ra, Jupiter, or Yahweh. 

As far as interpreters, I adore Gennady Rozhdestvensky who is just one of my favorite Soviet/post Soviet conductors but the older recordings have harsh sonics.  Secondly, I think very highly of the BIS set which has a long list of orchestras and conductors (Segerstam, Klas, Otaka, Kamu, Jarvi, Jia, Arwel Hughes).  I also very much liked No. 3 by Jurowski.

[brewski]

Today I learned that my uncle died as a result of his fourth stroke.  I know Schnittke suffered multiple strokes and I'm not exactly sure of the dates but think they impacted his output and mindset.  According to Wiki, he had a stroke on July 21, 1985, but was it his first?  It says he was clinically dead but recovered and ultimately suffered several more strokes before dying in 1998 at the age of 63.  I presume the strokes contributes to the grim sparseness of his later works but think it's also important to mention the beauty inherent.  More on this later.

So sorry to hear of your uncle's death. Thank you for using the moment to comment on Schnittke's symphonies, which makes me want to explore all of them myself. Despite being a huge fan of the composer, I'm more familiar with his chamber music, and have only heard symphonies 1, 5, and 8, the latter live. Your comments are prompting me to get cracking on the others.

[DavidW]

Nice survey. The 8th is my favorite.