Elisabeth, Andreas & Wilhelm, 1954
Salzburg
Daniel Barenboim, the famous Israeli pianist and conductor is a champion of Furtwängler as a conductor and as a composer. He gives his views about Furtwängler in the war time: "Furtwängler is a very complex personality... He's a specific type of German intellectual around the first world war and right after, at a time of cultural nationalism. The problem was that this cultural nationalism led to fascism. But Furtwängler claims he decided to stay in Germany in order to defend German culture. The barbaric aspects of the Nazi regime were foreign to him. I think he was sincere about that. That's really how it was. He was in no way a Nazi. I think he helped many Jewish members of the Berlin Philharmonic. He didn't leave. I don't think it's right to accuse him. He wasn't just someone who played music wonderfully but was unique in that he had a great sense of the philosophy of music. He understood what sound was about. He understood the nature of music, as something that through sound integrates everything - the intellect, the sentiment, the sensuality."
"Europe has to take the initiative now", an interview in The Guardian, 30th November 2004
Valery Gergiev, the Russian conductor pays his tribute to Furtwängler :
Kaplan: The Third Movement from Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony. The Vienna Philharmonic led by Valery Gergiev, my guest on today's edition of "Mad About Music". Now you said that today's conductors are always looking over their shoulders at the giants of the past. Who are the conductors of the past you most admire?
Gergiev: There are a few names, which I cannot ignore, even if I wished. Furtwängler - great German conductor. Not only conducting but also his artistic statement. In a very, very complicated times, of Second World War. Hitler being there, in power. (...).
Kaplan: You know you're not the first to cite Furtwängler for his amazing abilities, but I wonder if you can be a little more specific for our audience. What for example are his musical ideas, or his interpretive ideas that you think makes him such a star?
Gergiev The most difficult thing in conducting is not to slip into mechanical beating. So this restless search for a real tempo, a real pulse, of practically each bar of music, rather than just one tempo for one movement, is something what very few conductors could ever master. Not many conductors will confess, maybe, that it will be something difficult for them to do, but then they will go and compete with Furtwängler, and most probably lose. Because it's kind of God-given gift,a genius quality, which one conductor contributes to the playing of the orchestra - I describe it in the following. You can't possibly imagine this same orchestra play the way they play with Furtwängler if you just remove him from the podium. It is just not possible to imagine they will do the same thing. They will be even maybe more organized, they'll be very focused in a certain ensemble, but they will never deliver this kind of incredible expression which he is able to bring to life once being in front of an orchestra. No matter if it was Berlin Philharmonic or Hamburg Radio Orchestra or Vienna Philharmonic, so that was his incredible quality.
Kaplan: (...) I think it's time we heard some Furtwängler. What did you bring today?
Gergiev: The "Great" symphony of Franz Schubert. We call it No. 9, sometimes we call it No. 7, but number doesn't matter; the quality of symphony and the quality of interpretation. Amazing. I believe in every movement there are so many changes of tempo. First, fantastic theme with horns are playing, and then, in the Second Movement, also it's very, very, it seems to be very settled but then it becomes so desperately dramatic. And again, the Third Movement, it's not just going like a clock, you know, da-da-da-da-DA-da-da-da-DA, it has the, you know, it has a bite, it has a freedom, it has a fire, and it has a style, so it's very Austrian. Schubert was really a shy man, but hear how this shy man sounds in the hands of Furtwängler.
Mad about Music. Valery Gergiev. Excerpts from an interview published on New York Public Radio, 1st June 2003
Paavo Järvi: "I grew up with Furtwängler's et Bruno Walter's recordings. (...) My father, the conductor Neeme Järvi, was bringing these records back from his tours in the West. The search for authenticity by the barocco orchestras brought a lot to me, and I take that into account, but when I think of the beginning of Schubert's 9th Symphony (...), I think more and more that Furtwängler was right."
Paavo Järvi "L'autorité ne m'intéresse pas", Le Figaro, 28 novembre 2006
The composer | The man | The conductor
