Today is the birthday of one of my favorite composers, Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957). I don’t know, maybe it has something to do with watching those Errol Flynn movies on television as a kid – you know, the ones that inspire you to take down the curtain rods and start dueling around the house.
Korngold was one of music’s great child prodigies. His ballet-pantomime “Der Schneemann” (“The Snowman”), composed at the age of 11, was performed at the Vienna Court Opera before Emperor Franz Josef. His early piano and chamber works were picked up by Artur Schnabel. His “Sinfonietta” (a full-scale symphony in all but name) was performed by Felix Weingartner and the Vienna Philharmonic when he was 15. At one performance, Korngold shared a box with Richard Strauss.
Several of his operas are knock-outs. The double premiere in Hamburg and Cologne of “Die tote Stadt” (“The Dead City”) in 1920 made Korngold, at the age of 23, one of the leading opera composers of his time.
Several factors contributed to an enormous shake-up in Korngold’s reputation. One was the fact that his musical language never really developed. His earliest works are as finely crafted and as fully realized as those written at the end of his life – most impressive, except that what seemed strikingly modern when he was a teen later seemed hopelessly romantic and passé.
Another was that Korngold followed theatrical impresario Max Reinhardt to Hollywood for a big screen adaptation of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” This led to further offers from Warner Brothers, under terms he couldn’t refuse. In the meantime, the Nazis rolled into Austria, effectively sealing off his return home.
For decades, Korngold’s reputation among “serious” music aficionados suffered. His Violin Concerto was famously derided by one critic as “more Korn than Gold.” But that all began to change in the 1970s, with the issue of an album on the RCA label, featuring music from Flynn’s “The Sea Hawk,” “Captain Blood” and “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” that proved there was indeed a market for classic film music. Ironically, the very projects that had dragged him down in the eyes of some served to jumpstart his posthumous revival.
With the advent of compact disc, with labels searching for worthwhile though underexposed repertoire to lure consumers who had already replaced their entire record collections, Korngold’s reputation again began to soar. While he will never be regarded as the next Mahler or even Richard Strauss, it’s fairly obvious at this point that his place in “serious music” is secure.
Still it is with affection that many remember his film scores, which he regarded as operas without words. It was Korngold who brought Old World opulence to New World popular culture. His efforts earned him two Academy Awards.
This week on “Picture Perfect,” we’ll have two scores by Korngold as part of our second installment celebrating the films of 1939, which film historians frequently refer to as “Hollywood’s greatest year.” The first installment aired in February, and featured music from “The Wizard of Oz,” (Harold Arlen & Herbert Stothart) “Of Mice and Men” (Aaron Copland), “Gunga Din” (Alfred Newman) and “Goodbye, Mr. Chips” (Richard Addinsell).
This week’s episode will include Korngold’s “Juarez,” an historical drama about Mexican resistance against the French army of Napoleon III, which starred Paul Muni, Bette Davis and Claude Rains, and “The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex,” with Davis and Errol Flynn, as Elizabeth I and Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, respectively. The latter features plenty of Korngold’s signature pageantry.
The show will also include two scores by Alfred Newman, for “Wuthering Heights” and “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”
A third installment, focusing on the indefatigable Max Steiner – who worked on 13 films in 1939 – will air in the fall. So no more brickbats from you “Gone With the Wind” fans, please!
Join us on the second leg of our journey to celebrate the 75th anniversary of “Hollywood’s greatest year,” on “Picture Perfect,” Friday evening at 6, or enjoy it later as a webcast at http://www.wwfm.org.
PHOTO: Erich Wolfgang Korngold (right) works with a score mixer laying down the tracks for “Juarez.” That’s Paul Muni onscreen.
