Looking for [Carl] Frühling

Looking for [Carl] Frühling

Looking for [Carl] Frühling

‘“Frühling? As in “Spring”? No, I’ve never heard of him.’ How many times, I wonder, have I heard that reply in answer to my eager question to virtually anyone I have met over the past few years who might know anything whatsoever about late 19th/ early 20th century Vienna? On the rare occasions on which someone has been able at least to point me in a hopeful direction, my gratitude has been enthusiastic to the point of embarrassment. So what is so special about Carl Frühling?

For me, the story started several years ago when an amateur clarinettist friend, Jim Breed, introduced me to Frühling’s clarinet trio. Having been somewhat underwhelmed by my introductions to the trios of Zemlinsky, d’Indy and others, I perked up immediately when we read through the Frühling– I loved it! I loved the unpretentious warmth, the humour, the gentle charm of his style. I wanted to know more about the composer, but Jim said that, apart from a very short entry in an American dictionary, he had been unable to find anything written about the man; poor Frühling wasn’t even in Grove’s Dictionary. I can’t say that this marked a turning-point in my life, but I was intrigued. I introduced the trio to some musician friends, who were mighty impressed; we even made a BBC recording of it. I then took the trio to a chamber music festival in Finland, and tried it through there, with a musician who played it so badly that it sounded boring, and then refused to perform it, because it was boring! (It is alarming how often wonderful lesser-known works are written off for that reason).

So I sulked for a bit until, some time later, I became friends with Michael Collins , and then Stephen Hough; I introduced the piece to them (separately) and both waxed lyrical over its charms. Eventually, the three of us performed it together, and then recorded it for BMG/ RCA. The rest is hysteria. Well, not exactly…’

This is the opening extract from an impressive and entertaining article, The Search for Carl Frühling, written by cellist Steven Isserlis in December 2018.

So, who was Carl Frühling? Let’s see what Wikki-thingy has to say:

‘Carl Frühling (28 November 1868 – 25 November 1937) was an Austrian composer and pianist.

Born in Lemberg (now Lviv, Ukraine), he attended from 1887 until 1889 the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde where he was taught the piano by Anton Door and music theory by Franz Krenn. He became a piano accompanist and teacher, working with Bronisław Huberman, Pablo de Sarasate, Egon Wellesz, and the Rosé Quartet. He died in Vienna in poverty’.

‘The catastrophic effects of the First World War on the economy in Austria left Frühling in extreme financial difficulties, and with the rise of Hitler’s National Socialist Party the fact that he was Jewish contributed greatly to him becoming neglected’ - Lesley Schatzberger (programme note).

This is chillingly confirmed in Isserlis’ article:

‘Another of the long-suffering unfortunates who had to endure my whining was Felicity Lott, who inadvertently stumbled across a major reason for his neglect. She dutifully enquired whether they might have any information at the Austrian Radio station where she was recording; they pulled out a file – and, to everybody’s embarrassment, discovered a large ‘J’ scrawled over it!

Clearly, Frühling’s music was suppressed and all but destroyed in those Nazi years both before and after he had died in obscurity, in 1937’.

The rehabilitation of Carl Frühling’s music and with it, the man, began for Isserlis after being ‘introduced to the Clarinet Trio, Op. 40 (by Jim Breed) - ‘and loved immediately!’ His enquiries resulted in finding ‘a list of about 100 works in a German dictionary of music dating from the 1950s. But where are these works? I still don’t know. I found [his] Piano Quintet, Op. 30 – which is wonderful – and now have [his] Piano Quartet in D major, Op. 35 (which I haven’t yet played); and then, in a music library in Vienna, I found a few songs, some operatic arrangements for piano [and his] Fantasie, Op. 55, for flute and piano.’

After listening to a few of his works, I find Steven Isserlis’ assessment of Carl Frühling right on the money:

‘He wasn’t a great composer, perhaps – well, pretty definitely; but he’s a thoroughly loveable one’.

Amabile - Lesley Schatzberger (clarinet), Nicola Tait Baxter (cello) and Paul Nicholson (piano) will perform Carl Frühling’s Clarinet Trio, Op. 40 at their York Late Music concert on Saturday 2 November. The concert will include Beethoven’s wonderful Piano Trio in Bb major, John Tavener’s Threnos for solo cello, music by Leonard Bernstein and a preconcert talk by Alan George.

For full details and ticket information: Amabile Clarinet Trio