FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

Music As mentioned Nietzsche was also quite productive as a composer. The program of the Nietzsche remembrance celebration on August 25^th 2000 in Bayreuth included the performance of some of his compositions, supplemented by some material from Brahms opus 116. I did not attend, and based on the program concluded, that evidently the Nietzsche compositions needed a stronger brother to make an attractive program. In December 2000 I did attend a meeting at the Goethe-Institut in Amsterdam, Safranski attending for commenting on his recent Nietzsche biography and the beautiful wife of Raymond Benders singing three of Nietzsche’s compositions, of which I remember Verwelkt. This performance put some doubt to the earlier opinion, and therefore I was quite content to find those two CD’s in the shop of Weimar-Klassik in Weimar one year later: FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, Volume I, Compositions of his youth [1857-1863] Performing: Lauretta Altman, piano; Wolfgang Bottenberg, piano [in fourhanded works];Valerie Kinslow, soprano; Eric Oland, baritone; The Orpheus Singers, Peter Schubert, directing. DDD, TROY 178, © 1995 Albany Records, made in the USA. 25 compositions, total playing time 52’48”. FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, Volume II, Compositions of his mature years [1864-1882] Performing: see Volume I, and Sven Meier, violin. DDD, TROY 181, © 1996 Albany Records, made in the USA. 18 compositions, total playing time 50’36”. The compositions sometimes remind of Liszt, Schumann or Chopin. Of course they are not as brilliant as works created by those masters, and also Nietzsches compositions are later, and thus less original. Professional musicians therefore are less interested. The young French pianoforte performer Jonas Vitaud tells me that he feels Nietsche’s compositions lack the complexity that interest him. However this communication followed his brilliant performance on my own Baby Rippen of the indeed complex piano pieces opus 119 of Brahms. On the other hand, those compositions have their own Nietzsche flavor, and quite well let us hear his ultimate preference for the sentiment in the music of Bizet over the intellectualisation thereof in that of Wagner. As such, to Nietzsche readers, they are an important sung and played amendment to his writings, whatever professional performers say. Nietzsche’s music survived in manuscript and was finally printed in 1976, Curt Paul Janz editing. Benders reproduces the numbers 239, 244 and 246 from GSA folder 71, the first bar of 246 being: The numbering of folder 71 suggests there are much more compositions than the 43 ultimately recorded. The recording is the audible result of research undertaken at Concordia University [Montreal] in 1992-93 under the prime inspiration of Wolfgang Bottenberg. He is not optimistic about the possibilities of performing the remaining material. Another selection was recorded in Berlin in 2000. Under musicians this early chamber music thus meets more appreciation than Hymnus an das Leben [Schaberg 52], the only music printed during Nietzsches lifetime, of which no recording is known to date. The importance of the Hymnus is further played down by the correct remark of Schaberg, that it actually is an arrangement for orchestra by Peter Gast of a song earlier composed by Nietzsche. This song is actually the last composition on the second CD mentioned above. Personally I am most impressed by some early compositions for piano [like Phantasie and Aus der Czarda], especially when taking into account that they were composed at the age of 15 and 18, without any formal training or professional supervision. Directly from the heart of a passionate youngster. For Hymnus an das Leben further see Schaberg pp. 140-149, my only additional suggestion being, that the first performance on 19 October 1893 possibly was under the direction of Thalesmann [see Krummel p. 283].

1871