The Virtuoso Conductors: The Central European Tradition from Wagner to Karajan

by Raymond Holden

An expert’s guide to the skills of the greatest conductors

While Weber, Spohr, Mendelssohn, and Berlioz were all conductors of repute, it was the thoughts and practices of Richard Wagner that laid the foundation for the modern virtuoso conductor. Though he was more celebrated for his dramatic operas, Wagner’s experience as a conductor brought a set of practices and principles that affected the interpretations of future generations, and conductors continue to pursue his example today.
This book examines Wagner’s conducting career and the principles of his musical performance. It then tracks the central European style through some of the greatest figures of modern music—Nikisch, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Weingartner, Furtwangler, Toscanini, Walter, Klemperer, Beecham, Boult, and others through to von Karajan, Bernstein, and George Szell. In each case Holden, himself a professional classical conductor, traces the rise from apprenticeship to international acclaim, comparing rehearsal technique, the baton, eye contact, repertoire, tempo, recordings, vision, style, and performance practice. The result is a deeply informative, intriguing, and highly readable portrait of the finest exponents of the conducting tradition.

Genres: Music

384 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2005

Reviews

[Lobstergirl · Rating 3 out of 5]

A barrage of tightly packed facts. There's some material about conducting styles, and much, much more on concert programs and programming (in numbing detail in the endnotes). Nearly gossipless. Anything even remotely scandalous is relegated to the notes (e.g. Otto Klemperer's "spectacular affair" with a singer whose husband then "attacked Klemperer with a riding crop during a performance of Wagner's Lohengrin."). I have one of Norman Lebrecht's books coming up soon and fully expect it to deliver all the smut I'm missing out on here.

It is interesting to find out which conductors loved and hated which works, and what they thought of each other's baton technique, tempi, or interpretations. I was gratified to find Richard Strauss writing to Mahler, "Your Fifth Symphony again gave me great pleasure in the full rehearsal, a pleasure only slightly dimmed by the little Adagietto. But as this was what pleased the audience most, you are getting what you deserve." (I loathe the Adagietto.) According to Wolfgang Sawallisch, Strauss would play continuo when conducting Mozart operas and sometimes insert little chunks of his own compositions into it, based on what was happening onstage (a touch of Till Eulenspiegel or Don Juan).

Errata: Holden writes that Igor Kipnis sang in a 1925 opera performance; he means Alexander Kipnis, his father (Igor was born in 1930 and was a harpsichordist). He gets the composer of Cavalleria rusticana right in all spots except once in the endnotes, where he attributes it to Leoncavallo (who wrote Pagliacci - they often appear on a double bill together).

[Amari · Rating 5 out of 5]

Packed with grammatical and typographical errors, this stunningly awkward piece of writing does contain a wealth of worthwhile information.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a passionate fan of virtually anything that falls under the umbrella of "Classical Music" (particularly opera, lieder, tone poems and symphonies), this book contained a lot of good information about nine of Central Europes greatest conductors. (The author selected these men from the larger group of ensemble musical directors of Austro-German heritage who worked between the mid-19th and -20th centuries.) Because of my very specific interests, the time spent reading this book was worthwhile. That time, however, required a conscious effort.

The writing is formulaic to a fault. While it might be said that this ensured that all musicians were given fair treatment relative to each other, it also led to narrative that was painfully unimaginative. I found the predictability of the template this writer used wearing. There were also more than a handful of redundant phrases and a fair number of points that were simply restated in slightly different form. This rephrasing sometimes occured in neighboring sentences. Seriously. Worst of all were the few times that a sentence appeared to exist only as a means toward making the book longer. (To whit: "The orchestral works he programmed in Los Angeles generally fell into one of two categories: those he had previously conducted and those that were new to him".) Most of us were disabused of this tendency in grade school.

Yet I read the entire book. And so we are back to square one and my deep interest in this material. (Yes, I am repeating an earlier point using a different sentence structure. It seems I *have* learned something from this book.) Only those with similar interests should even consider reading this book. All others - insomniacs included - are better off with a different tome.