Hermann Levi : from Brahms to Wagner / Frithjof Haas ; translated by Cynthia Klohr.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Haas, Frithjof.

Standardized Title:

Zwischen Brahms und Wagner. English

Language:

English

German

Subjects (All):

Levi, Hermann.

Conductors (Music)--Germany--Biography.

Conductors (Music).

Germany.

Music--Germany--19th century--History and criticism.

Music.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

xvi, 279 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Lanham, Md. : Scarecrow Press, [2012]

Summary:

Jewish conductor Hermann Levi (1839-1900) strove for excellence and recognition as a composer and conductor of classical music in nineteenth-century Germany. He unerringly devoted himself to the orchestral performance or works by the two major figures of the time: Johannes Brahms and Richard Wagner. In spite of the prevailing anti-Semitic atmosphere, Levi saw his conducting of Wagner's works as a major calling-one that pinnacled in the premier performance of Parsifal m Bayreuth.

In this biography, newly translated into English by Cynthia Klohr, opera scholar and conductor Frithjof Haas surveys the life and work of this remarkable individual. Born of a long line of rabbis and raised on the ideals surrounding the political emancipation of European Jews, Levi sought to break the social constraints and boundaries imposed on him by the power brokers of the classical music scene because of his religious heritage. Like so many German Jews of his generation, Levi struggled nearly all his life to dissolve the battle between personal lot and social prejudice.

Drawing on the wealth of material from the "Leviana" repository in Munich, Germany, Haas artfully weaves Levi's personal history with his musical milieu to paint a portrait of this ambitious and ambivalent figure in the world of nineteenth-century German music. Hermann Levi: From Brahms to Wagner will be of interest to musicologists, musicians, opera fans, classical music listeners, and historians and scholars of Judaic studies. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 Family, Studies, and First Positions 1

From Giessen to Mannheim 1

Studies in Leipzig and Paris 10

Years in Saarbrucken, Mannheim, and Rotterdam 26

First Intermezzo: The Composer Hermann Levi 43

2 Karlsruhe and Brahms 51

Chief Conductor at the Court Theater in Karlsruhe 51

Friendship with Johannes Brahms 60

From A German Requiem to The Mastersingers of Nuremberg 75

Farewell to Karlsruhe, Triumphlied 94

Second Intermezzo: The Conductor Hermann Levi 113

3 Bavarian Court Conductor Levi 119

An End to Friendship with Brahms 136

Society around Paul Heyse and Franz von Lenbach 147

The Spell of the Grail 158

Third Intermezzo: Editor Hermann Levi 185

4 The Struggle over the Bayreuth Legacy 193

From Perfall to Possart-And the Advent of Anton Bruckner 200

Cosima Wagner and Her "Major" 220

Literary Ambition: Mozart and Goethe 236.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780810884182

0810884186

9780810884199

0810884194

OCLC:

779607110