Page 83 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2024. Glasbena kritika – nekoč in danes ▪︎ Music Criticism – Yesterday and Today. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 7
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music of progress and the future. on the roots of a fierce press feud ...
ters.”35 The Schicksalslied in particular contains “like an echo of his admi-
rable ‘German Requiem’, the same Christian outlook, only in Greek form.”36
He cannot deny Beethoven’s Missa solemnis his recognition, but the work is
for him a “tone poem that is not both ecclesiastical and sacred in the highest
sense.”37 I already pointed out the reception of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis
and the absurdity (from a historical-critical perspective, not ‘reception-aes-
thetic’ interpretation against the author) of numerous attempts at interpre-
tation to deny the work a Christian dimension 25 years ago,38 without this
ever being deemed worthy of scholarly discussion.
The position that August Wilhelm Ambros (1816–1876)39 took towards
Hanslick is usually dismissed casually and somewhat contemptuously in
musicological literature.40 This overlooks the great esteem in which both
personalities held each other and which they always maintained despite all
factual differences. In 1856, two years after Hanslick’s first work, Ambros
published his Die Grenzen der Musik und Poesie. Already in the title, Am-
bros expresses that he does not refer to music alone, but considers it in con-
nection with other arts.
Ambros rebukes the “philosophers of form,” the “men of the sounding
arabesque,”41 and advises composers “not to resist” the spirit of the time,
insofar as it is compatible “with the immutable eternal laws of the true,
the good and the beautiful.”42 In a brief outline of the history of music, he
35 Ibid., 51.
36 Ibid., 54.
37 Ibid., 6.
38 Helmut Loos, “Zur Rezeption der Missa solemnis von Ludwig van Beethoven,”
Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch 82 (1998): 67–76.
39 He was a nephew of Raphael Georg Kiesewetter (1773–1850), a pioneer of the revi-
val and adequate performance of early music, see: Hartmut Krones, “Kiesewetter
und die Folgen. Zur Frühzeit der historischen Aufführungspraxis in Wien,” in Early
Music in Austria. Research and Practice since 1800. Symposium, Graz, 22–24 Mar-
ch 2007, Report, eds. Barbara Boisits and Ingeborg Harer (Vienna: Mille-Tre-Verl.
Schächter, 2009), 9–32, https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvdf0mj3.4. His view of history was
strictly progressive, empirically rational and determined by Enlightenment thought.
See: Raphael Georg Kiesewetter, Geschichte der europäisch-abendländischen oder
unserer heutigen Musik. Darstellung ihres Ursprunges, ihres Wachstumhumes und
ihrer stufenweisen Entwickelung von dem ersten Jahrhundert des Christenthums bis
auf unsre Zeit (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1834).
40 An exception is: Markéta Štědronská, August Wilhelm Ambros im musikästhetischen
Diskurs um 1850 [Münchner Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 75] (Munich:
Allitera, 2015). DNB
41 Ibid., 109.
42 Ibid., 114.
83
ters.”35 The Schicksalslied in particular contains “like an echo of his admi-
rable ‘German Requiem’, the same Christian outlook, only in Greek form.”36
He cannot deny Beethoven’s Missa solemnis his recognition, but the work is
for him a “tone poem that is not both ecclesiastical and sacred in the highest
sense.”37 I already pointed out the reception of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis
and the absurdity (from a historical-critical perspective, not ‘reception-aes-
thetic’ interpretation against the author) of numerous attempts at interpre-
tation to deny the work a Christian dimension 25 years ago,38 without this
ever being deemed worthy of scholarly discussion.
The position that August Wilhelm Ambros (1816–1876)39 took towards
Hanslick is usually dismissed casually and somewhat contemptuously in
musicological literature.40 This overlooks the great esteem in which both
personalities held each other and which they always maintained despite all
factual differences. In 1856, two years after Hanslick’s first work, Ambros
published his Die Grenzen der Musik und Poesie. Already in the title, Am-
bros expresses that he does not refer to music alone, but considers it in con-
nection with other arts.
Ambros rebukes the “philosophers of form,” the “men of the sounding
arabesque,”41 and advises composers “not to resist” the spirit of the time,
insofar as it is compatible “with the immutable eternal laws of the true,
the good and the beautiful.”42 In a brief outline of the history of music, he
35 Ibid., 51.
36 Ibid., 54.
37 Ibid., 6.
38 Helmut Loos, “Zur Rezeption der Missa solemnis von Ludwig van Beethoven,”
Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch 82 (1998): 67–76.
39 He was a nephew of Raphael Georg Kiesewetter (1773–1850), a pioneer of the revi-
val and adequate performance of early music, see: Hartmut Krones, “Kiesewetter
und die Folgen. Zur Frühzeit der historischen Aufführungspraxis in Wien,” in Early
Music in Austria. Research and Practice since 1800. Symposium, Graz, 22–24 Mar-
ch 2007, Report, eds. Barbara Boisits and Ingeborg Harer (Vienna: Mille-Tre-Verl.
Schächter, 2009), 9–32, https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvdf0mj3.4. His view of history was
strictly progressive, empirically rational and determined by Enlightenment thought.
See: Raphael Georg Kiesewetter, Geschichte der europäisch-abendländischen oder
unserer heutigen Musik. Darstellung ihres Ursprunges, ihres Wachstumhumes und
ihrer stufenweisen Entwickelung von dem ersten Jahrhundert des Christenthums bis
auf unsre Zeit (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1834).
40 An exception is: Markéta Štědronská, August Wilhelm Ambros im musikästhetischen
Diskurs um 1850 [Münchner Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 75] (Munich:
Allitera, 2015). DNB
41 Ibid., 109.
42 Ibid., 114.
83
