OTHMAR SCHOECK'S SONGS

Abstract

FOR centuries Switzerland played a somewhat inconspicuous part in the history of music. At best something was known of the country's folk music, of yodling and male-voice choral singing. Apart from that it was a land without music . That this was not in fact true, that on the contrary an extraordinarily lively musical spirit was at work, may be gathered from a valuable book by A. E. Cherbuliez, ' Die Schweiz in der deutschen Musikgeschichte '.1 The prejudice may have arisen from the fact that Switzerland had never possessed a composer who exercised any decisive influence on European music, apart from Ludwig Senfl (c. I490-I550) of Zurich, who however was not of Swiss origin and spent his life abroad. It is only in recent years that this situation changed: Switzerland to-day possesses Arthur Honegger and Othmar Schoeck, two masters who stand in the forefront of European music while magnicently representing diametrically opposed tendencies: the former as a leader of the vanguard, the latter as an upholder of an organic development rooted in unshakable tradition. Schoeck, actuated by an impressive creative force, continues this tradition in a new way and builds up a life's work in which the Swiss people, particularly that of German-speaking Switzerland, finds the profoundest and most significant expression of its nature. On September Ist I946 Swiss music-lovers celebrated their master's sixtieth birthday (he was born on September Ist I886 at Brunnen, on Lake Lucerne), a master who could by that time look -back on a rich store of creative work. For Schoeck has published some 300 songs, including a series of extensive cycles, as well as eight stage works and a number of orchestral, choral and chamber works. As early as 1928 the University of Zurich conferred on the great lyrist and dramatist an honorary doctor's degree, thus paying tribute to an output of music one aspect of which, that of his song-writing, is about to receive attention in this study.2 Schoeck is a born lyrist throughout his work, even in his operas and music-dramas, his choral and chamber compositions. His 1 Huber & Co., Frauenfeld, 1932. 2 An essay on Schoeck's opera ' Massimilla Doni', by the present writer, appeared in 'Music & Letters', October I937. See also his monograph, ' Othmar Schoeck' (Huber & Co., Frauenfeld, 2nd ed., 1936), p. 335.