The Nazism of Richard Strauss
List, Kurt
The Nazism of Richard Strauss By Kurt LUt THE eightieth birthday of hi.hard Straus* on Juno 11 poses an importaat question: la aa artist to bo denied public recognition aa a consequence of bis...
...Yet Hamsun and Celine, in their criticism of the decay of modern Uviag...
...Even Wagner, perennial boogy man ef all anti-Germans, has been left in peace...
...The philosophy is introspective and heroic, but not blatant and Teutonic...
...It was this factor which forced the seventy year-old man, stockholder in one of the biggest Germsn breweries and millionaire, into the arms of tbe Nazi bureaucracy...
...Till Eulenspiegel, who pays for his contempt of the drabness of every-day life with his head...
...There is no doubt that Strauss is a rather weak character, that he is money mad and desirous of popular acclaim with a vengeance...
...There is also no denying that he has hobnobbed with the Nazis to a greater extent than necessary...
...Yet are there valaes ether than political which are end*ring tad valid...
...Jacob Viner, famous Chicago economist, quoted Bess to characterize the Board...
...In the Isst ceatary Balzac predared enduring w*ra* through ate caastic aatiree ef the drab middle-class French living, end his weak* are appreciated although he was a royalist and reactionary...
...One must be grateful that thia war has fostered less cultural hysteria than the first world war...
...Many of these wrote under the influence of the Kaiser era, but Strauss, though impressed, chose mainly the love poetry and not the saber-rattling admonitions tha, Germany must wake up...
...It is difficult U> serve different masters at the same time...
...Straus* has done a great deal to direct contemporary music towards shallowness and supertcialMy . Hi* iaeieteare a pen a literary program ia conjunction with symphonic composition has shifted the center ef critical attentate frees the matica) iseinss to a literary evaluation ef music...
...Tat what can earn aay ef works ef art that reject humanistic value* and support a fascist dictatorship...
...An examination of the literary content of Strauss' works does not bear out the fact that the composer has been sporting Nasi ideologies...
...Since 1PI5 it has seen a permanent period of sterility...
...Thus he is the original prototype of the commercial artist who does not create because he ia driven toward creation, and earns his living as consequence of his creative activity...
...Only in Strauss' earlier songs, through his selection of poets, can some slight trace of nationalism be found...
...Tha nostalgia and charm of Rotenkavalitr and Ariadne are reminiscent of Mozart's ideas...
...Many of those who devour German babiee for breakfaet in order to have more strength to write bloodtbristy murder mysteries in the afternoon, may not consider it any proof that .Strauss' most prolific and only important period ended at a time when Hitler himself did not know what political turn to take...
...Kurt List, ia the accompanying article, aeee the German composer Richard Straaaa aa a peg for thia diacassioa...
...Nor are they ef a nature watch would warrant the suppression ef his work...
...Ia wartime, hew da we jadge tha Htorary and artistic werhs af ear enemtoe—and even ef our friends, whan that ally la tht totalitarian state of Raaeia...
...The treatment of human passion, as in Klektra and Salome, approaches the concept of the effective theatre comparable to the French and Puccini...
...This is the reason perhaps that bis works became repetitious after a while...
...Uat ia the author of "Seven Reason* for Shostakovich,*' ia The Sew Leader *f April 22, which areaeed wide debate, iadndiug comment by Olia Down** hi the New York Timet...
...Art and Propaganda WbKN a warn...
...Strauss' concept of the program Is German and national in the sense in which Beethoven's and Schubert's ideas were...
...aa the wrest aaal (h) a pat an Mm hash ¦ shunt > J etigaini ahe whale raw betas** ataaaa onv pert asad-paggewB aa *«t*am« hut a fewer* hi the internal "communication*" aystem of the univer-aity...
...Kara are ite main potato: 1. It tet.lly ignores the baa* af the patfisi ef the aaiversiiy...
...e e e ThERE are factors- which gave Strauss a pernicious color...
...When it comes to the question of musical style it ie much harder te decide whether there are any traces ef a Nasi ideology...
...Too often movi* scores are played in concert halls, as ballet accompaniments, at band matiness...
...He creates because he wants to earn a living, and a very lavish one...
...Too many of those, infected with the furor Americanus, have gone out on a limb to prove that even men like Kant were essentially Nazis, duc Strauss' program, and he is a composer who never wrote anything without aa extra-musical connotation, contains nothing which could* be construed as nationalistic...
...Even the contemplative Hans Sachs, who thundered so bitterly sgainst the foreign influences on German art in the Utitttrtingtr, is missing...
...His later songs sought lyrics of the romantic poets who were not concerned with any politics except that of winning a fair lady...
...The Nazism of Richard Strauss By Kurt LUt THE eightieth birthday of hi.hard Straus* on Juno 11 poses an importaat question: la aa artist to bo denied public recognition aa a consequence of bis political attitude...
...Art ia smeared arrorsuag te a Hue aadl takes ea aa eaVlal character...
...to be able to pursue this course he must cater to the taste of the authorities who pay for hie creation...
...gaaa tetaUtarton every aspsrt at aatteual Ufa Is forced to serve the Meter* State...
...When the trustees of the University of Chicago took a position on the controversy between President R. M. Hutchins and the Faculty Senate recently, it* answer was so equivocal that Prof...
...The controversy between Hutchins and the Senate boils down to one point: what shall the purpose of a university be...
...But unlike some of his rloeest friends of the nee-Thorn is t persuasion who admit that tbe value* they have in mind have been defined by the Pope of Rome, Hutchins evadea specifying hie values...
...Strauss's tore poems center around one theme: the hero who is in constant struggle with his mundan* surroundings which prevent him from arriving at his goal of spiritual salvation...
...Uat ia a composer and critic aad a cMtribetor to many magazine...
...But these actions do not shed any light upon the value of his music—which must be the sole measuring rod of the right to performance...
...But there is no hiding the fact that just ae Bess's equivocation was victory for Mary over Parliament, so the Board's was a victory for Hutchins over his Senate...
...Thia does not alter the fact that he has written e great deal of good and important music...
...He reaches further harmonically, at the same time simplifies the ticmendous apparatus of the dramatic orchestra...
...All his moves lead in that direction and now he can move faster than ever...
...One professor may differ from another even on the most profound questions...
...The figures are taken from the literature of many non-German lands and the theme ia the outcry of the artist who suffers under the indifference of his environment...
...Strauss musically represents an advance ae compared to Wagner...
...He ie the editor of Listen, a monthly magazine ef maaical criticism...
...Under such a purpose each p . eaeor may seek and teach the truth ss ha sees it (academic freedom...
...Macbeth, the man hopelessly entangled in his guilt...
...But Hutchins wants his university to abandon that aim and adopt another...
...The few national iconoclasts hare confined themselves to propaganda directed against Japanese cherry trees...
...simultaneously, they are also concert pieces and msy even be used in the ballroom...
...A short while ago Eriks Mann launched an acid attack upon Strauss and demanded that conductors discon-tinee any performance of his works in America...
...In order to make the most money from as little work as possible he has written music which can be used for one purpose in its original form and for other purposes when transcribed...
...Don Quixote, tortured in his sham battles, and Zarathuttre, the prophet who finds solace in solitude...
...Aa yet, nobody has discovered an Alfred Rosenberg chord, a Hjalmar Schacht scale or a Josef Goebbels counterpoint...
...These, however, are not connected with aay alleged Nasi ideologies...
...He gave up the heroic gesture and evolved a style which is rather conversational, than loud and heavy...
...People msy be found on the campus who feel, that unless Hutchins' head is chopped off by the Board, there are going to be big changes ia the university's faculty, one of the best in the country...
...There is Don Juan, the seeker...
...But one must differentiate between hit valuable works which were written in a period now belonging to history, and those which he wrote in tht immediate past and which are but pale images of erstwhile glory...
...What adds up to something is thia fact: that Hutchins is now free to ctn-tinua to agitate, maneuver and play politict toward hi* main goal—changing the aim of tht university...
...There, aa tha world knows, it a man who likes crusaders for moral values...
...Music written under this aspect, flirting with many possibilities at the same time, of necessity loses its strength...
...How anybody could crusade for a new set of moral values without having in mind a pa> ticnlar set of moral values for which he is going to crusade, is a mystery which nobody can penetrate...
...Because he catered to the official taste Strauss hai become the shining light of the academicians who oppose a modern development...
...have produced seme of the-meat notable aad original works ef this century...
...In mask there is a similar problem...
...Milton Hindu* raited thia iseae ia The Now Leader ef April If when ha dunasd ea "Liberalism la Geoae-stop" the efforts af certain anthologists af European writiags te exclade the writings ef Knnt Hamsaa aad Leak Ferdinand Celine hecaaae they despise rationalism and western civilisation...
...All this adds up to nothing...
...After years of grumbling, the faculty finally felt that it had te protest Hutchins' actions, particalarly as ha waa preparing a new sat of changes in the university ia Una With his ambition to redefine the institution's purpose, Be the Sonet* called ea Use Beard of Trustees to do Just ana thing: assure them that they would net permit tha pu rpose af the institution US be redefined aa Hutchins wanta...
...The Rotenkavalitr Waltzes are part of his operas...
...Hence a mood of depression among the faculty which causes a sober, responsible men lik* Viuer to talk about historical episodes which involved the chopping off of heads...
...Hullhins .I ml OI»s<ii rail, ism Will at Chicago By Daniel 0>Neill CHICAGO.—When Parliament asked Queen Bess to chop off the head of Mary Queen of Scots, Bess replied with a statement so equivocal that not even a Philadelphia lawyer can make it out to this day...
...He has never token the decisive stop towards modernism...
...riasjjiril tha far-ulty's brief, heard Hutchins and issued Ha deetoiea...
...Tht Board itself sppareatly did not take this diagnosis seriously for it decamped to summer playgrounds without offering a remedy or ordering anybody ahe te devise owe...
...In his operas Strauss ventured definitely beyond Wagner...
...Seme passionate democrat* claim that we to* have to reject work* ea political greands—if thane werhs are eati-demorratic...
...the only erne** wluch Halchto* aad •he Senate sejuarely eteahed...
...He has accepted honorary positions and has kowtowed before Goebbels add the lesser art dictators of the Third Reich...
...It remains only to be noted that one member of the Board which, by its meaningless statement, backed up Hutchins and let down the faculty, is Sewell Avery of Montgomery Ward...
...But it never betrays any sign of a nationalist superiority or arrogance...
...The purpose of the University of Chicago, as of all universities (except those conceived in strictly sectarian terms) is the advancement of knowledge by free research and teaching...
...There is present no raucous Siegfried who praises the national spirit...
...However, there is a type of German refugee who wants to be mora royalist than the king...
...Ia a democracy, art ia relatively free and Judgmeats af works are made aa grounds ether than polities...
...The Bear*) met...
...This attitude haa given vent to a development in which the composer writes a score for all around purposes...
Vol. 27 • January 1944 • No. 27
