The Weimar Triangle by Eric Koch Page B

— only one of them, alas, made it to sainthood — provided a good defence for Mayor Landmann when they go after him for bankrupting the city. This is modern music at its best. The organizers wouldn’t have brought all these people all the way from Zagreb if the oratorio had not been successful and popular at home, and music of the highest quality. It has a clear purpose and is certainly not unintelligible self-indulgence for a few snobs. Nor is it forcing a few wrong notes into a perfectly innocent score to make it sound contemporary. It is genuine new wine in genuine old bottles — what good modern art should be — a reflection of the time we live in and at the same time making timeless things significant. Everything good has deep roots.”
    “Now you know what to write, Erwin,” Hanni teased me. “Hermann will defend you if you use that phrase of Herr Pachmann’s about the innocent score without permission.”
    “That is good to know.” I laughed.
    “I would be flattered if you do, Herr Doktor Herzberg. You have my permission.”
    From the Frankfurter Zeitung :
    When Richard Straus conducted Salome in Graz five months after its first performance in Dresden in 1906, Gustav Mahler was there. So were Giacomo Puccini and Arnold Schönberg, as well as the widow of Johann Strauss. On the train back to Vienna, Mahler was full of praise for his esteemed colleague’s work and called it a true masterpiece, a work of genius. He was also envious. He could not understand how a work of genius could also be popular.
    No one would have wondered about such a thing in the days of Beethoven or Wagner. The schools in Vienna were closed on the day of Beethoven’s funeral. He was a popular celebrity in his lifetime. Wagner, too, was a famous man. It has only been in our century, right from the beginning, that much of serious contemporary music has fallen out of favour.
    What is the reason? Why do we sometimes feel that composers deliberately put wrong notes into perfectly innocent scores? Or shift rhythms, like Stravinsky? Why is there a mass audience for popular music? Do modern composers intentionally put obstacles between themselves and the public because they believe if a lot of people like their work it cannot be any good?
    Something happened after the death of Wagner in 1881 that has made the twentieth century unsure of itself. Our confidence has been shaken. Old certainties have been put into question. New certainties and therefore big audiences for new works have not yet emerged. First there was the fin de siècle and the all-pervasive sensation of decadence and the feeling that something invaluable was coming to an end. At the same time there was a thirst for a new beginning.
    What happened after that? The shock and devastation of the war and the post-war horrors. Only now do we see the first glimmer of hope. If you listen carefully to some of the new music you can hear it. Frankfurt’s Summer of Music is a dress rehearsal. Perhaps soon large audiences, such as those who relished the oratorio The Life and Works of Saint Cyril and Methodius in Zagreb and in Frankfurt, will applaud Hindemith, Bartok, Stravinsky and Schönberg and dozens of others we do not yet know.
    Music always reflects the spirit of the times. We are still groping. When we are in a truly good mood again, upsetting dissonance will be as meaningful and welcome as soothing consonance.
    S EX IN K RONBERG
    A close friend of Teddy’s mother, Johanna Krieghoff, had a house and a lovely garden in Kronberg, the village north of Frankfurt in the foothills of the Taunus Mountains. For some reason she had to be in Berlin during the week after the festival of contemporary music, although it meant missing two important Beethoven concerts. I had met her a few times. She was a regular reader of my feuilletons and we got on well. Knowing that I occasionally enjoyed a few days out of town with a lady friend, she offered me her house for a few days while she was away. It