Segerstam: Rott's Symphony in E major

芬兰莱夫·希尔格斯坦指挥瑞典诺尔雪平交响乐团演绎
汉斯·罗特《第一交响曲》

A monumental orchestral work by Austrian composer Hans Rott (1858-1884). His music is little-known today, though he received high praise in his time from the likes of Gustav Mahler and Anton Bruckner.

Hans Rott: Symphony in E major (1880)
Norrköping Symphony Orchestra
Leif Segerstam, Conductor

1. Alla breve [0:00]
2. Adagio: Sehr langsam [10:46]
3. Scherzo: Frisch und lebhaft [24:57]
4. Sehr langsam - Belebt [39:07]

Hans Rott studied piano with L. Landskron and Josef Dachs, harmony with H. Graedener, counterpoint and composition—like Mahler—with Franz Krenn at the Conservatory in Vienna. He studied organ with Anton Bruckner and graduated with honors. While studying, he briefly roomed with Gustav Mahler.

His music was greatly influenced by Bruckner and Wagner - indeed, in 1876, Rott attended the first Bayreuth Festival. Two years later, in the final year of his studies, Rott submitted the first movement of his Symphony in E major to a composition competition, only to be met with derision from all the judges with the exception of Bruckner, who recognized its merits. Nevertheless, after Rott persevered and completed the symphony in 1880, he showed the work to Johannes Brahms and Hans Richter, hoping to gain the praise of these prominent musicians. Once again, the results were disastrous. Brahms, who resented the progressive influence Bruckner exerted in the Conservatory, called Rott talentless and told him that he should give up music. This proved to be too harsh a blow for the young composer to withstand, and later the same year, he experienced a mental breakdown.

It is unfortunate that Rott lacked Mahler's inner resolve: whereas Mahler was able to overcome many of the obstacles in his life, Rott was brought down by mental illness. While traveling on a train from Vienna to Mühlhausen in order to take up a post as choirmaster, he suddenly pulled out a revolver and threatened another passenger who was trying to light a cigar, shouting that Brahms had filled the train with explosives. In 1881, he was committed to a mental hospital, receiving a diagnosis of "hallucinatory insanity, persecution mania - recovery no longer expected". There, he destroyed a number of his compositions, reportedly using the score of his String Sextet as lavatory paper, saying, "That's all the works of men are worth." Rott died of tuberculosis in 1884, aged only 25. Many well-wishers, including Bruckner, attended Rott's funeral in Vienna.

Thanks to Rott's friends, some of his music manuscripts have survived in the music collection of Vienna's national library. This includes Rott's Symphony in E major, and sketches for a second Symphony that was never finished. The completed Symphony in E major is remarkable in the way it anticipates some of Mahler's musical characteristics. In particular the third movement is unnervingly close to Mahler. The Finale includes references to Brahms's First Symphony. Mahler also spoke well of Rott's Lieder, but regrettably, none of those survive. We also know of a Sextet, which Mahler never heard and has also been lost. In his last years, Rott wrote a lot of music, only to destroy what he wrote soon after writing it, saying it was worthless.

Bruckner and Mahler were the first to recognise Rott's talent. Mahler himself included references to Rott's work in his own music. However, in the 20th century, Rott's work was largely forgotten; and only in 1989 was Rott's Symphony in E major finally premiered by the Cincinnati Philharmonia Orchestra under Gerhard Samuel, in a performing edition prepared by Paul Banks. A CD recording followed (http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/r/Helios/CDH55140).
Other recordings of the symphony have since been issued, and other Rott works have been occasionally revived  (http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/c/Rott), including his Julius Caesar Overture, Pastoral Overture and Prelude for Orchestra.

In Mahler's own words, Rott was "a musician of genius ... who died unrecognized and in want on the very threshold of his career. ... What music has lost in him cannot be estimated. Such is the height to which his genius soars in ... [his] Symphony [in E major], which he wrote as 20-year-old youth and makes him ... the Founder of the New Symphony as I see it. To be sure, what he wanted is not quite what he achieved. … But I know where he aims. Indeed, he is so near to my inmost self that he and I seem to me like two fruits from the same tree which the same soil has produced and the same air nourished. He could have meant infinitely much to me and perhaps the two of us would have well-nigh exhausted the content of new time which was breaking out for music."

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所有跟帖： 

• 若Rott当年能够遇到一位心理成熟的老师（而不是Bruckner），不英年早逝，后浪漫主义将在他与马勒之间巅峰对决。好可惜哟！ -nWAY- ♂ (0 bytes) () 02/18/2013 postreply 18:37:59

• 谢谢分享 -yy888- ♀ (0 bytes) () 02/19/2013 postreply 14:15:10