Furtwängler

Wilhelm Furtwängler · German conductor and composer (1886–1954) · 1886–1954

Appears in 16 videos · 22 passages, 7 of them in depth.

What Dominique Pagani says

Dominique Pagani quotes Furtwängler mainly from his conversations on music. Because their title was already taken, he chose the name "Musicosophie"1. He takes several theses from them. Rhythm is never an independent element, a formula he attributes sometimes to Beethoven and sometimes to Bach2. In Beethoven, the themes clash like the characters in a drama3. Haydn, who embodies the joy of living, is the author of the break before Beethoven. Every masterpiece has one face turned toward its time and the other toward eternity. On interpretation, he stresses Furtwängler's element of spontaneity, which depends on the acoustics, the mood and the audience, and he contrasts him with Toscanini4. He presents him as a "demonic" conductor and as the greatest Wagnerian conductor, who stayed in Germany to carry on German humanism5. He mentions the 1951 Bayreuth Ninth and the Emperor Concerto with Edwin Fischer. He also reports Furtwängler's reading of Nietzsche's overman as a way of warding off the trauma of the new physics6.

Summary produced automatically from 22 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Who is this?

Gustav Heinrich Ernst Martin Wilhelm Furtwängler (UK: FOORT-veng-glər, US: -⁠lər; German: ; 25 January 1886 – 30 November 1954) was a German conductor and composer. He is regarded as one of the greatest symphonic and operatic conductors of the 20th century. He was a major influence for many later conductors, and his name is often mentioned when discussing their interpretative styles. […]

Read the article on Wikipedia

Text: Wikipédia, CC BY-SA 4.0, excerpt · Portrait: Emil Orlík, Public domain

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Series · 31 Mar 2021Wagner and his interpreters, Approaching Clouscard, Marx = Theseus? • Philosophical Q&A • Pagani

33:09The greatest Wagnerian conductor; stayed in Germany to preserve German humanism, defended by Jewish musicians, premiered Schoenberg under the Nazis.

Series · 25 Mar 2021Musicosophy 17. Interpretation

1:15:00Conversations on musicNever plays a work the same way twice, depending on acoustics, mood and audience: a share of unpremeditated spontaneity.
1:31:59Contrasted with Toscanini.

Series · 2 Feb 2021Musicosophy 13. Mozart restored

19:27Every masterpiece has two faces, one toward its era, the other toward eternity.
35:32Haydn is the joy of living; Wagner did not understand him.

Series · 15 Dec 2020Musicosophy 6. The Jazz Variation... by Beethoven

4:33Hearing a hotel orchestra, he sees it at ease in light music but embarrassed in Beethoven.
1:39:13Said that in Beethoven the themes are like the characters of a drama.

Series · 3 Dec 2020Musicosophy 2. From Lévi-Strauss to Nerval on music

43:14In his conversations with Abendroth, he sees Nietzsche's superman as an irrational warding off of the trauma of the new physics.
47:14His 1951 Ninth at Bayreuth creates a hallucinatory tension from the start.