Understanding Horn Notations in Later Works of WagnerNote: This article continues the topic begun in the previous article, "Unusual Notations in Works by J. R. Lewy." The below text is as presented in my 1995 dissertation, but with musical examples numbered as presented when this was published in 1997 as “Joseph Rudolphe Lewy and Valved Horn Technique in Germany, 1837-1851,” The Horn Call Annual 9, 23-35. John EricsonWhile the use of the
valves as crooking devices as requested in some of these works of J. R.
Lewy is very interesting, this technique would be of only minor
historical interest if it were not for Wagner applying this technique to
a major operatic work.
These works of J. R. Lewy bear a close
resemblance to the horn writing seen in the opera
Lohengrin
(1848).
Wagner composed this work in Dresden
while he was conductor and Lewy was principal horn.
Note the frequent changes of crook
required in the following example. This example can be
performed on the Ab crook, fingering the second valve in the G horn
sections, the second and third valves in the E horn sections, and all
three valves in the D horn sections, using some right-hand technique.
There are numerous sections in
Lohengrin which
call for a similar technical approach; it would be utterly impossible to
make the changes of crooks requested in this work in any other way than
with the valves. Why did Wagner change his
technical approach to the horn so drastically from that of
Der fliegende Holländer?
It would appear that he was not satisfied
with the valved horn at that time and turned to the technical ideas of J.
R. Lewy to reform the instrument.
Two sentences of the preface of the Lewy
etudes deserve to be highlighted again: ". . . the valves are to be
employed only when the natural horn is inadequate for the bright and
distinct emission of the sounds. . . .
In this way alone will the beauty of tone
of the natural horn be preserved, and the instrument acquire increased
capabilities."[1] These comments were in fact later mirrored by Wagner
himself. The most extensive
commentary by Wagner on the valved horn is found in the introductory note
to the published score of Tristan und
Isolde, which appeared in 1860.
His statement about the horn and on his
methods of writing for it sheds light on his underlying reasons for
attempting to use multiple transpositions in his horn parts in
Lohengrin. The composer feels called upon to recommend that special attention be given the treatment of the horns. The introduction of the valve has doubtless done so much for the instrument that it is difficult to ignore this improvement, although the horn has thereby suffered undeniable loss in the beauty of its tone, as well as in its powers of smooth legato. In view of this great loss, the composer, who is concerned with the preservation of the true character of the horn, would have to refrain from employing valve horns, had he not learned that excellent performers have been able to eliminate these drawbacks almost completely by especially careful execution, so that it was barely possible to tell the difference in tone and legato. In expectation of a hopefully inevitable improvement of the valve horn, it is urgently recommended that the horn players study their parts in the present score with great care in order to find the proper applications of the appropriate tunings and valves for all requirements of execution. The composer has already definitely called for the use of the E-crook (as well as the F-crook). The horn players themselves must decide whether the attachment of the respective crooks will permit the other changes of pitch that frequently occur in the score for easier notation of low tones or of the required timbre of higher tones; but the composer has generally assumed that the individual low tones, especially, can be produced by transposition. -- The individual notes marked with a + indicate stopped tones; and even if these occur in tunings in which they are open, it is still assumed that each time the player will change the pitch by means of a valve in such a way that the intended tone sounds like a stopped one.[2] An important point to first
consider is the loss in the beauty of the tone due to the valve and its
disruption of the horn's power of legato.
His comments parallel those of others in
this period [3]. Wagner recognized the superior tone and legato of the
natural horn compared to that of the valved horn.
He also recognized that artists on the
valved horn could overcome these deficiencies, and that further
improvements would come. It is clearly stated that
primarily the E and F crooks were to be used on the valved horn in
Tristan und Isolde.
Lower and higher crooks were also
requested in his horn parts, both for easier notation of lower tones and
for the tonal color of high notes.
He understood that transposition was
likely in the case of the low crooks (especially for the numerous,
isolated low range notes frequently encountered in his later works [4]),
but he did expect that the higher crooks would be used. Finally, in
Tristan Wagner
was not looking for any variations of tonal color, except for pitches
specifically requested to be performed stopped with the hand.
The notation "+" was used to make it
clear even if a note "looked" open from the standpoint of hand horn
technique, that the hornist was in fact to play it stopped in the same
manner that a stopped note would have been performed on the natural horn. That Wagner was willing to
listen to the technical preferences of hornists, as
Lohengrin seems
to evidence, is also shown in another later source.
Wagner was aided in the final preparation
of the score of Die Meistersinger
(1867) by hornist and conductor Hans Richter (1843-1916) [5].
Richter, who spent 1866-67 preparing the
fair copy of the score of this work, is quoted as saying that Wagner at
first did not understand the valved horn [6].
Richter, who became a famous
international conductor, especially of the works of Wagner, may have been
in a position to know.
Two examples given by Richter, verbally
reported by Friedrich Adolf Borsdorf (1854-1923, a leading German-born
hornist in England) and related by Blandford, are worthy of note. At one time Wagner conceived the idea of reforming the horn notation altogether, and propounded a scheme for writing in one of the C clefs, presumably treating the horns as non-transposing instruments--not in itself altogether a novelty. From this he was only dissuaded by Richter's earnest representations of the confusion that it would cause. Also, when in Die Meistersinger he gave to the first horn the subject of Beckmesser's serenade, he actually wrote it at its present pitch for the E crook, on which he expected it to be played. Again Richter, having procured his horn, demonstrated experimentally that it was utterly impracticable, and induced the composer to transfer it to the G crook, where it remains and on which it should obviously be performed [7]. While these sources focus
on Wagner's later works, they do reveal several points.
First, Wagner was entirely willing to
reform the notation of the horn.
But more importantly, Wagner's horn
writing style as seen in Lohengrin
undoubtedly has a lot to do with a general notion of maintaining the best
qualities of the natural horn on the valved horn.
This ideal is also consistent with the
type of valved horn playing he would have encountered in France, the
technique with which J. R. Lewy was also familiar.
Wagner had undoubtedly seen an early
version of the etudes of J. R. Lewy and applied his technical approach to
his operatic horn parts.
The pure theory behind this style of
writing for the horn must have fascinated Wagner for him to go to the
trouble of writing all of the required multiple transpositions. Perhaps if one were trained
for years in this method of using the valves, performing
Lohengrin
exactly as notated would be possible.
In practice, however, performers
attempting to use the notated method of playing these horn parts must have
found it terribly difficult to change tonal centers so frequently.
In spite of Wagner's grand design and the
great pains taken to write the horn parts in this way, transposition seems
to be the only reasonable method of actually performing this work. Another factor to consider
with the impracticability of the horn parts of this work as written is
that Wagner, while he may have consulted with performers, was not a
performer himself.
Wagner is quoted as saying to a harpist
who drew his attention to some of the impossible passages in his part, "I
am not a harpist.
I have given you my ideas.
It is for you to arrange them for your
instrument [8]."
His impression of what J. R. Lewy
recommended technically probably did not reflect the practical reality of
this approach to playing the valved horn. It is possible that J. R.
Lewy may have never been consulted either.
Wagner later recalled the "bugler" Lewy
with some hostility in connection with his involvement in the formation of
an orchestra union in this period in Dresden [9], regarding him as the
main spy of management [10], and Lewy also later received the following
mention in the diaries of Cosima Wagner: While we are talking about Josef Rubenstein's piano playing, R. says how curious it is that Jews seem neither to recognize nor to play any themes; he recalls that Levy in Dresden (not the Viennese one) played through the whole of the Holländer without recognizing the Dutchman's theme [11]. Whatever they may have
thought of each other [12], J. R. Lewy probably never performed any of the
music of Lohengrin.
Wagner, due to his involvement in the
failed 1849 revolution, fled the country and was then banned from
returning to Germany.
Thus, while originally intended for
performance in Dresden, Lohengrin
was not premiered until 1850 in Weimar under the direction of Franz Liszt. The unusual horn writing in
Lohengrin
seems not to have influenced other composers, and was never repeated by
Wagner.
Wagner carried Lewy's ideas too far in
Lohengrin
and quickly moderated his approach to writing for the valved horn.
In his later works it can be seen that
Wagner relied mainly on valved horns crooked in E and F, using the valves
as fingerings. The system of using valves
to make fast crook changes is quite cumbersome.
There is no evidence that J. R. Lewy used
this technique in the earlier part of his career in the Schubert and
Reissiger works written for him, which suggests that it was a later
development, perhaps influenced by the French use of the right hand on the
valved horn and the omnitonic horn.
Even at the end of his career it would
appear that Lewy thought both in terms of fast crook changes and
fingerings, with a stated ideal of maintaining the best qualities of the
natural horn in his valved horn playing. His innovative techniques
would appear to have had no influence on other players of the period.
If any one player might have been
influenced, his nephew Richard Lewy (1827-1883) would be a likely
candidate.
A
wunderkind on the valved horn (he
performed a "große Fantasie" for the "chromatische Waldhorn" with the
Hamburg Philharmonic in 1838 [13]), and in the same year appeared as a
soloist with the Gewandhaus Orchestra [14]), Richard Lewy became a
prominent performer in Vienna [15].
Richard Lewy was, however, passed over by
Johannes Brahms in an 1867 performance of his
Trio, Op. 40
(1865), as he was unwilling to perform on the natural horn [16].
This seems to indicate that Richard Lewy
also did not use right-hand technique on the valved horn, as his uncle
had; otherwise he could have easily performed the natural horn on this
work.
Richard Lewy's own undated Concertino
also shows no evidence to indicate that he used the valves to make crook
changes. Much experimentation was
being carried out by early valved horn players and composers.
The technique of using the valves to make
fast crook changes, as seen in some works of J. R. Lewy and Wagner, was a
dead end.
These unusual works illustrate the mutual
desire of Wagner and J. R. Lewy to maintain the best qualities of the
natural horn.
It is in this light that the unique
technical approach developed by J. R. Lewy makes its most significant
impact. This article is the conclusion of a three part series – Return to Part I NOTES: 1. Trans. in ibid, 694. 2. Richard Wagner, Tristan und Isolde (Leipzig: C. F. Peters,
[ca. 1911]; reprint with trans. New York: Dover, 1973), vii. 3. For example, consider the contemporary comments of
composer and author Ferdinand Gleich (1816-after 1866).
In his Handbuch der modernen Instrumentirung (Leipzig: C.
F. Kahnt, [1860]), he made the following commentary on the valved horn and
its use in the orchestra. It is used [by composers], but the beautiful, noble, and pleasant sound of the waldhorn has nearly disappeared with the insertion of valved horns into our orchestras; only a few hornists still go to the trouble of using it on older works written for the simple horn. The majority of the players take everything on the valved horn, and transpose each and every horn part on the valved horn in F, probably only to save themselves the bother of plugging in crooks! With compositions that were written specifically for the valved horn, which therefore are impractical on the natural horn, it is naturally in its place, but to use it [the valved horn] on works of Beethoven or Weber is a vandalism. (Gleich, 41). 4. Passages of this type are found in Eb, D, and C in
Tristan. Wagner appears to
have used this notational device to avoid requesting low notes not
possible on natural horn, but is not rigorous in its application.
In addition, as he hinted in the note to the score, writing the
lowest part in a lower crook does avoid writing excessive ledger lines. 5. Hans-Hubert Schönzeler, "Richter, Hans," New
Grove, vol. 15, 847.
Tarr, "Romantic," part 2, 200 also notes that Richter was a horn student
of Richard Lewy from 1860-1865. 6. Tom S. Wotton, "Notation of the Horn: Some Altered Meanings,"
The Musical Times 65 (September 1, 1924), 810, citing Paul Gilson in
Le Guide Musical, January 2, 1910. 7. Blandford, "Studies . . . Wagner . . .," part 2, 697. 8. Quoted in Wotton, 812; the original source is not known to the
author. 9. Richard Wagner, My Life, authorized trans. (New York:
Tudor, 1936), 463. 10. Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner (New York:
Alfred A. Knopf, 1937), vol. 2, 47. 11. Martin Gregor-Dellin and Dietrich Mack, eds.,
Cosima Wagner's Diaries, trans. Geoffrey Skelton (New York: Harcourt
Brace Javanovich, 1978), vol. 1, 523.
The entry is dated August 14, 1872. 12. There is one later quote of Wagner in reference
to an 1864 performance of the overture to Der Freischütz
sometimes cited in support of their close relationship as artists (for
example, Morley-Pegge, 2nd ed., 163).
Wagner stated "Under the sensitively artistic leadership of R.
Lewy, the horn players patiently changed their whole style of blowing . .
." (Richard Wagner, Über das Dirigieren, trans. in Brüchle and
Janetzky, Kulturgeschichte, 218).
Unfortunately, the quote actually refers to a performance in Vienna
by E. C. Lewy's son Richard Lewy (1827-1883).
The previously cited quotation of Cosima Wagner likely makes
reference to the Viennese Richard Lewy as well. 13. Kurt Stephenson, Hundert Jahre Philharmonische Gesellschaft in
Hamburg (Hamburg: Broschek, 1928), 117, cited in Seiffert, 46. 14. Pizka, 278. 15. Wagner's comments on R. Lewy have already been noted. 16. David G. Elliott, "The Brahms Trio and Hand Horn Idiom," The
Horn Call 10, no. 1 (October, 1979), 65. Copyright John Ericson. All rights reserved. This article posted online in 2016 |