Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt - Expressionismus (2020)

A most welcome collection of rarely heard works from the first three decades of the last century - a period that was characterized by the pluralism of musical expressions like hardly any other. The listener wins the stylistic alternations between Max von Schilling's late romantic tonal language and the miniatures by Eugene Goosens close to the French "Groupe des Six", gradually realizing what there is still to be discovered in this drawer of music history. And he quickly forgets to worry about the meaning of the term “expressionism” in music and what it actually means. Because neither the somewhat random selection of works nor the otherwise rather informative booklet text have anything to add to this question.

Expressionism as a "movement" never existed in music, and Arnold Schönberg, in connection with the free atonal phase of which the term is still used most often, is not represented at all in this compilation. But all of this in no way diminishes the joy of the more than two-hour distinctive potpourri (rather that does - with the exception of the Concerto Romano - dull, less transparent sound image). Works such as Alfredo Casella's magnificent organ concerto, his haunting elegia eroica for a soldier who died in the war or the pointed suite for violin and orchestra by Karol Rathaus speak for themselves and do not need to be legitimized by any "-isms".

Also worth mentioning is the Austrian Egon Wellesz, represented here with the early, early spring mood of Debussy, and the Swiss Russian descent Wladimir Vogel with his entertaining etudes for orchestra from 1930. All of these composers are, measured by their importance, on Sound recordings are far underrepresented. Perhaps to give the impetus for further publications here is the greatest merit of this edition. The orchestra from Frankfurt / Oder plays among the different conductors with changing fortune, but that Max von Schilling's Symphonic Prologue should have played it entirely without a conductor (as the cover believes) is not to be assumed.