Even if they don't know his music, most people are familiar with Reger's famous letter to music theorist and critic Rudolf Louis following a negative review:
"I am sitting in the smallest room of my house. I have your review before me. In a moment it will be behind me."
But no one seems to talk about the actual review. This got me curious, and it didn't take too long to find out that it was published on February 7, 1906 in the newspaper
Münchner neueste Nachrichten following a performance of Reger's
Sinfonietta, Op. 90. Finding the full review was trickier, but thankfully German libraries seem to love scanning their historical journals/newspaper and uploading them online... great! Since I don't speak German, I had to translate the whole damn thing with Google and a bit of "filling in the blanks." Anyways, here it is. Run-on sentences and references to obscure fin de siècle stuff incoming!
"After the lesser event, that was undoubtedly signified by the performance of Debussy's String Quartet, followed on the next day the great event, the first Munich performance of Sinfonietta by Max Reger, who has this — but only this — in common with Debussy: that he has been nominated by the verbal leaders of the anti-Wagnerian reaction to carry the banner as the proper Man of the Future. The Sinfonietta, the composer's first major orchestral work, achieved a brilliant success at its premiere in Essen, was then more or less harshly rejected in Berlin and Vienna, and finally found a reception in Stuttgart that was somewhere in the middle of these two extremes. Therefore, one had to be all the more curious to get to know this controversial, as well as highly praised and abysmally damned creation for oneself. If you had not heard or read anything about the work before its performance, you would have been in for a surprise. For the designation "Sinfonietta" suggests something small and delicate, a diminutive or miniature symphony, perhaps something like the two Trios, Op. 70 [sic.]. What we instead have in front of us in Reger's Op. 90 is a dense score of 244 pages (Bruckner's most extensive symphonic score, that of the VIII., is — albeit in a slightly larger format — not much more than half as long), and in this voluminous vessel "a lavish wealth of musical and thematic design, as hardly any other modern score should have." (Dr. Eugen Schmitz, Max Reger's Sinfonietta, Munich and Leipzig with Georg Müller.) Under these circumstances, a modesty seems to come to light in this "shameful" title, the authenticity of which is somewhat discredited precisely because it is so completely out of place. For what the aforementioned Dr. Schmitz, in justifying the name Sinfonietta, teaches — "Sinfonietta" relates to “symphony” like “comedy” to “tragedy" (!!) and the designation chosen by Reger indicates the "essentially harmless and light thought-content of his work” — is probably too logically and etymologically abominable to be taken seriously. Yes, even the “restriction in the use of orchestral means” for which the Sinfonietta is acclaimed by those who, understandably, find it quite difficult to make a musician like Reger the champion of the longed-for return to simplicity and simpleness, is not too great. That Reger writes only two woodwind parts each, in contrast to the modern triple woodwind, is amply compensated by the fact that he (according to the score) may wish to double the instrumentation of these instruments, and from the normal modern orchestra he lacks only the third trumpet and a bass tuba. No, this Sinfonietta is certainly not simple, and it can be compared, even if only "from the broadest possible point of view," with Wolf-Ferrari's [1903 comic opera] Le donne curiose, just like that Dr. Schmitz does with enviable confidence in the lack of judgment of those to whom he speaks. Of course, one thing cannot be misunderstood: Reger has manifestly wished it to be simple. But it remained just wishing; he has been unable to carry out his intention. The intent for simplicity is revealed above all in the themes of the Sinfonietta, whose motivic material leaves nothing to be desired in terms of "spiritual harmlessness." But the fact that this thought-material, which weighs so lightly in itself, is exaggerated by means of hypertrophic counterpoint, as it is characteristic of Reger, to a large musical pomp and circumstance, brings an insoluble conflict into the work, and it is almost amusing when you see that Reger has made the same mistake which his admirers — and certainly not wrongly — accuse the representatives of modern program music: namely that he serves us a dish in which the broth is more expensive than the chunks [German idiom meaning that the additional costs are higher than the thing itself; the benefit is small when one considers the disadvantages; despite the great effort, the result is unsatisfactory], a product in which the "presentation" is the main thing. From a general impression that the Sinfonietta, even compared to other compositions by Reger, is not inherently a significant work, that its tonal language essentially depends on conjuring up the illusion of significance by a thousand contrapuntal, harmonic, and modulatory tricks, the sole exception from this general impression is the Larghetto. The short two-part motif on which it is based is, however, only a harmonic, not a melodic one, and is also very reminiscent of Brahms; but it has a peculiar charm, its implementation structures the movement in a clear manner, and we have here much less of the unpleasant sensation that someone, placing full faith in the psychological phenomenon of suggestive power, as so delightfully illustrated in the well known fairy tale "Talisman" dramatized by [Ludwig] Fulda, is taking us for fools. Incidentally, there is no lack of bright spots, especially in the Scherzo (Trio), even in the last movement, which is otherwise the greatest of all. It goes without saying with Reger that the work is interesting, that it reveals an abundance of spirit, wit, and astonishing combinations, as well as with regard to the compositional ability demands the highest respect, even admiration. On the other hand, the orchestration is rather less pleasing because it is completely devoid of tonal stimuli, in that it very often denigrates, even blurs, the melodic lines rather than working them out in a sharp and sculptural way.
"The reception by the audience was divided: a strong one? A minority clapped enthusiastically and persistently, the majority behaved neutrally, a few hissed, and occasionally someone, by going crazy, tried to prove his good musical taste, or his lack of lifestyle. Felix Mottl, who had already conducted the work at the premiere in Essen, placed all his eminent conducting skill at the service of the novelty, which, meticulously rehearsed, was perfectly rendered. Only the tempo of the Larghetto should have been a little livelier in the sense of the composer's instruction ("but not dragging"), even at the risk that details would have lost their clarity. Like the conductor, honor and fame also belong to the orchestra itself, which fulfilled its difficult and strenuous task with devotional zeal. The beautiful execution of violin solos in the slow movement by Herr Concertmaster [Bruno] Ahner deserves special mention."
... and there it is. Hopefully someone found that interesting. The
Sinfonietta is not one of my favorite Reger works, so I tend to agree with most of Louis' points. The idea that "light" themes are incompatible with rigorous development has obviously been thrown out the window by Schnittke, Ligeti, and others, but I doubt that Reger was going for something quite so polystylistic/sardonic! A noble failure, then.
As a side note, I suppose Louis wasn't the most progressive of thinkers: he didn't like Mahler's music for its "Jewishness" (*sigh*) and was appalled by
Pierrot lunaire. Oh, well.
