RUDOLF SCHOCK'S SOUND RECORDINGS AT ADVANCED AGE (1)

'The Clock/Die Uhr'  by Carl Loewe:

Naturely Rudolf Schock's voice changed over the years.

He himself said about it: "... my voice has remained deployable, aware of changed possibilities ...".
As is known, his great years were in the period 1946 - 1964.

'Tom the Rymer' by Carl Loewe:


Then - at the age of 48 - the voice quality slowly but surely regressed.
But his vocals continued to fascinate thanks to intuitively flawless approach to widely divergent genres of music and honest very intelligible presentation. Until his death.

On YouTube I covered that in the last part of the documentary 'Rudolf Schock: I sing that too!' and in a lot of separate audio videos.
I am therefore not surprised that some of them are listened to exceptionally much.
This also applies to the two (reworked) parts from Franz Schubert's 'Deutsche Messe ' in 1973, to 'Im Kahne' by Grieg also in 1973, to Kálmán's opera-like 'Komm Zigane' live from the Amsterdam Concert Hall in 1985 and to Norbert Schultze's 'Goodnightsong' in 1986.

Recordings of the singer at an advanced age:
> 'Gutenachtliedchen/Goodnightsong' (1948) by Norbert Schultze (1911-2002):

The lullaby is a reminder of the German soldiers ("Heimkehrer") returning from captivity in the years after the Second World War.
Rudolf Schock sang it in his year of death 1986 in a radio broadcast on the 75th anniversary of the composer Norbert Schultze.

Schultze, composer of the world famous soldier song 'Lily Marleen' (1938), turned into a not insignificant propagandistic cog in the war machine of the German Nazi regime.
After the war, judges classified him in the context of the "Entnazifizierung" as "Mitläufer/foot soldier".
A fact is, that he leaved by will all the money he received between 1933 and 1945 to the German Red Cross.
Schultze wrote his 'Gutenachtliedchen' as early as 1948, but did not publish it. Until 1986 and he accompanies Rudolf Schock at the piano in this late world premiere.

> 'Es neigt sich der Tag/The Day is coming to an End', aria by Cornelius Suythof from the opera 'Rembrandt van Rijn' (1937) by Paul von Klenau (1883-1946):

RUDOLF SCHOCK: "I got to know the aria through an old gramophone record by the tenor Marcel Wittrisch (1901-1955).
With this and with the help of a few surviving violin fragments - the orchestral material had been lost during the war - my friend Fried Walter (Schock's conductor) has carefully reconstructed the score, thereby saving from oblivion a particularly fine example of late romantic opera tradition".

From my blog text: 'RS SINGS ALBAN BERG': "The usual way of composing is based on the seven well-known tones, which together form a scale. The FIRST TONE of that scale is the CENTRAL TRIBE TONE. The six other tones are related to the tribe tone, as if moving towards that tribe tone. The listener has the experience that a piece of music "is right".
The 12-tone music has NO central tribe tone. The twelf tones are in equal relationship to each other. The listener experiences such a piece of music as "not right, not harmonious and inaccessible".

PAUL VON KLENAU: "My 12 tone theory is determined by keys. I make my 12 tone rows in such a way that I can easily extract harmony (!), disharmony and combinations of more independent melodic lines ... That explains that many critics have no idea that my music is 12-tone music".

About von Klenau:
Danish born conductor and composer Paul von Klenau was attracted to the late romantic German/Austrian music style.
He went to live in Vienna, met Arnold Schönberg & Alban Berg and was attracted by their 12-tone music. When the Nazis came to power, Schönberg left Austria and was naturalized as an American citizen. In Germany his music and that of Alban Berg were declared "entartet/degenerated" and forbidden.
The Dane Von Klenau felt safe, because his 12-tone music was hardly recognizable as such.
Capriccio Kulturforum 2020: "When he was then called to account by the national socialist culture authorities, he defended himself with the statement: "The 12-tone sequence is the musical equivalent of the principle of leadership (the "Führerprinzip"): Everything is subject to a single basic idea".

The authorities accepted Klenau's explanation and allowed the premiere of three new operas in the thirties, including the 1937 opera 'Rembrandt van Rijn'.


Premiere of 'Rembrandt van Rijn'
(Stuttgart 1937).
With Rembrandt, his wife Hendrickje,
Cornelia (left) and Cornelis (right)

About the recording:
Rudolf Schock recorded the aria of Cornelis* on April 3, 1978.
The love song is from the second scene of the second act of the opera.
In the video I mention and follow a set design from Paul von Klenau for this scene. He wanted to have the painting 'The Mill' by Rembrandt on the stage as a background.

Schock's voice is contained in a rather hefty sound frame. This makes the voice louder then normal. Occasionally he has to give an extra push to a higher note. But the total performance is nicely expressive. The more you hear the aria, the more beautiful it becomes. She sounds harmonious (!) and that fits in with what Von Klenau said about his 12 tone music.

* 'Cornelis' really existed: The painter Cornelis Suythof married in 1670 at the age of 24 the 16-year-old Cornelia van Rijn and thereby became Rembrandt's son-in-law.
Later he emigrated with his wife to the Dutch East Indies.
Cornelia and Cornelis died in Batavia - nowadays Jakarta - in 1684 and 1691 respectively.

>'The Clock/Die Uhr', opus 123-nr. 3, song (1852) by Carl Loewe (1796-1869), to a poem by Johann Gabriel Seidl (1804-1875)

"I would like to have such a watch too!"

is said to have proclaimed a boy from the audience, after tenor Carl Loewe recited his own "song of life" "Die Uhr".

A remarkable song, which Rudolf Schock recorded with orchestra in 1964 and in 1980 with piano accompaniment by Ivan Eröd.

The poem text is by Johann Gabriel Seidl, of whom Franz Schubert also set a number of poems to music (including 'Der Wanderer an den Mond' 'Sehnsucht' and 'Die Taubenpost').

"The clock" is about a human’s learning  journey through time, which is symbolized by a clock in the form of a vest pocket watch. A human who has once gratefully accepted life and, after living it, puts it back gratefully in the hands of his maker.

Hence I call this song a "song of life", which is utterly sincere in its simplicity. Of lasting value. Not sentimental, but honest.

Schock's performance in 1964 with orchestra under Werner Eisbrenner lasts almost a minute longer than that of 1980. Sung in a superior way. But is more drawn out and gives it a touch of sentimentality through a few falsetto moments.

The 1980 performance, superbly accompanied on the piano by Ivan Eröd (1936-2019), sounds different. It is simpler, more direct. Age and life experience sing along. The singer identifies with the mortal owner of the watch. The voice is certainly no longer what it was in 1964. However, the interpretation exceeds her.

>'Tom the Rhymer', opus 135a by Carl LOEWE with lyrics of Theodor FONTANE:       
    


Iván Eröd accompanied on the piano Rudolf Schock's last major record recording.

Krijn de Lege, 21.4.2020