Langgaard's Lyre

[Symphonic Addict]

No. 9 might be the strangest symphony yet. Called "From Queen Dagmar's City", the first movement sounds like if Schumann orchestrated like Richard Strauss, the second movement reminds me of a Smetana polka, and the third movement, with plenty of church bells, reminds me of the slow, dramatic interlude before the finale of Schumann's Third. This symphony, written during Nazi occupation in 1942, is pointedly and deliberately out of fashion by 100 whole years. For the first time, especially in the low-powered finale, Langgaard turns from defiant to dull.

Over 1944-45, he wrote No. 10, "Yon Hall of Thunder." There is some drama here, with a minor key and occasionally weird orchestration (the constant repetitive falling violins at 1:10-1:50). Perhaps it reflects the trauma of war? Or it might just be another saga legend. The mood definitely reminds me of late romantic tone poems, as does the structure of a very big, loose sonata form. The development section fades to total silence at 15'. For the next two sections, the music tries to burst into thunderous storms, only to fade into one silence after another. It's almost like the Hall of Thunder keeps moving farther away, ever out of reach, just like the musical style Langgaard was copying. But we finally get a triumphant ending that restores the excitement.

Then we come to the two Really Short Symphonies. No. 11, "Ixion", is just six minutes long, with cymbals and tam-tam aplenty. The happy melody is repeated ad nauseam, each statement less persuasive and more dizzying than the one before it, like a dervish dancing until exhaustion. I understand this one is controversial because it's so bizarre. I like it. It sets out to do something very, very strange, and it succeeds marvelously. I wonder if the Ravel who wrote Bolero would have appreciated it.

No. 12, "Helsingborg" is a whole minute longer, and this is the one festooned with colorful, exclamation mark-filled directions like "Furiously! - Like trivial doomsday trumpets! - Hectically nervous! - Amok! A composer explodes." Unfortunately, I've always thought these were rather more interesting than the actual music. Unlike in No. 11, the musical style is once again super-reactionary here, not getting any more advanced than the Strauss of Zarathustra.

No. 13, "Belief in Wonders" is so very strange. It's basically a giant half-hour rondo based on an eccentric, memorable, ear-catching initial motif, an upward flourish. Part of the reason it's so memorable is that it is repeated 5+ times in the piece, every time the rondo returns home. The orchestration is almost Schumann or Brahms except for an added piano and organ. The first rondo episode is an 8-minute andante, with another memorable melody in which the springs express an almost Russian melancholy. Tchaikovsky looms. There's another slow episode and then the music begins to grow faster and moves into what might be a development section. The ending is rather sweet and sentimental in addition to repeating everything that came before. Very traditionally romantic in sound, but original in structure, deeply weird, and quite appealing.

No. 14, "Morning" is a suite of explicit tone pictures: Introductory Fanfare, Unnoticed Morning Stars, The Marble Church Rings, The Tired Get Up for Life, Radio-Caruso and Forced Energy, Dads Rush to the Office, Sun and Beech Forest. Unnoticed Morning Stars may be the single most traditional, and traditionally beautiful, thing Langgaard ever wrote, a pure adagio for strings of serene beauty. It seems descended from the adagios of Mahler's Third, Fourth, and Fifth. No weird hangups or structural tricks, no pompous cymbal crashes. Just a miniature that could stand alongside Grieg's "Last Spring" or Elgar's "Sospiri."

But first we have a two-minute fanfare intro with choral accompaniment. It reminds me of the manic sarcasm of his choral work in "honor" of Carl Nielsen, or Symphony No. 11, and it also sounds a little bit like...maybe Ode to Joy? Or a Brahms choral work? Once again the outsider expressing himself through pomposity.

The church bell movement (which does indeed have lots of ringing church bells in the percussion section) sounds almost like an opera prelude, so dramatic yet melodic is it. Next, the sleepyheads wake up, in an intermezzo-like movement that builds from a quiet opening to a triumphal end. (Breakfast?) The Radio-Caruso movement makes two in a row that sound like something from Goldmark, Raff, or Schumann - until the choir returns. The piece then ends with two very short little snippets, the choir singing a lullaby that leads to a surprising Grand Ending with cymbals and drum rolls.

Dramatically and structurally super weird, but unceasingly entertaining and some of the best Weird Langgaard.

Conversely, No. 15 "The Sea Storm" is the most modernist of Weird Langgaard. The first movement is the most expressionistic, atonal music I've ever heard from him, but a one-minute scherzo is more conventional and the finale is a rolling seascape straight out of the impressionist songbook, except with added chorus singing a poem.

I cannot include a description of No. 16 at this time because it triggers the "403: Forbidden" error.

Unlike you, I really like the 9th. It's so enchanting that I cannot help but love it. And the 15th does exhibit a more dissonant language, but it was too late before he embraced a more interesting turn in his career, alas.

[Brian]

The 22-minute No. 16 "Sun Deluge" is a truly valedictory symphony, summing up all of Langgaard's achievement in a short span. There are blazes of radiant music with great power. There are organ solos. There are abrupt endings. The orchestration takes much from Richard Strauss, returning to the world of Langgaard's first two symphonies. The scherzo is, for the second symphony in a row, just one minute long, and leads into the most unusual feature: a "Punishment Dance"!. I wish Dacapo had included the full booklet notes for each release, to explain why this is here. It's not in a danceable rhythm at all, and it's quite happy in mood, so both parts of the name are baffling.

Then we end with a calm, major-key "elegy" and a short, powerful, Straussian finale that brings the cycle to a close. Like many of the earlier symphonies - I should have counted! - this one also includes ringing church bells. This may belong near the top of the Langgaard List but I'd have to listen to the "Punishment Dance" once or twice more to understand why it was included at all.

[Brian]

I learned something interesting about the 403 Forbidden error there. I tried posting that review with the original posts, then cut out every sentence one by one until I discovered the offending sentence. It was the one that said "The scherzo is..."

Then I discovered the specific issue word by word. It was this: Dance"!. But without the period. When I added a period to make it !. instead of just ! , then the piece successfully published. That was all that was necessary. An added period.

When writing this post, I had the same error in the same situation. ", then !, then space in that order is the problem!!!