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Post by julesd68 on Mar 13, 2022 17:21:28 GMT
In light of the events in Ukraine and subsequent efforts to blacklist a number of high profile Classical Music artists, it is interesting to review the position of Furtwängler in this excellent, highly informative and balanced article on his association with National Socialism.
In his own words, he protested -
"Music and politics have nothing to do with each other.”
But the author of this article makes a very timely summation -
"His principle of keeping art separate from politics may be a good one under democratic regimes and in peacetime, but it cannot function in a reign of terror, brutality and war."
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Post by Slinger on Mar 13, 2022 18:02:56 GMT
TORONTO – The Toronto Symphony Orchestra says Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 will not be performed tonight and Thursday after it cancelled performances by a Ukrainian-born pianist. The TSO had said Toronto pianist Stewart Goodyear would play the Rachmaninoff piece after Valentina Lisitsa was told her appearance was cancelled due to “ offensive, intolerant comments” she made on social media. However, in a statement apparently posted by Goodyear on his Facebook fan page late Tuesday, he said he has been “ bullied into declining this engagement.” He said he found himself “ in the middle of a social media frenzy” and what was one of the happiest moments of his life turned into a “ shattering display of mob hysteria.” The symphony says ticketholders who attend the concerts to hear Mahler’s Fifth Symphony will get a free ticket to an upcoming concert, while those who don’t wish to attend can request a refund. Toronto resident and Lisitsa fan Adir Krafman has already received his refund and says he’s disappointed that the TSO dismissed her for her political comments. Krafman says he hopes Lisitsa will play a promised free concert in Toronto, but she tweeted Tuesday night that she has so far been unable to secure a venue. SOURCE |
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Post by MartinT on Mar 13, 2022 19:04:31 GMT
I'm sure there have been offensive posts made by performers in the past. What has it got to do with music and do we need nannying on who we can see and not see?
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Post by John on Mar 13, 2022 19:10:24 GMT
It's part of the cancel culture, which I want nothing to do with.
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 13, 2022 19:23:33 GMT
Valentina Lisitsa is a nearly unique case in that her staunchly pro Kremlin views have been freely expressed and well documented over the years and as such it is difficult to imagine many concert halls where she would be welcome right now; her card had been marked long before now which had certainly limited both her performing and recording career.
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 13, 2022 19:55:08 GMT
The link between music and politics is as important now as it was with Furtwangler - do we really want those who have enjoyed the express patronage of the Kremlin to keep schtum and carry on regardless? Difficult to see how someone like Gergiev was not going to face any consequences for being so close to Putin.
What's proving more divisive now is the 'silence is complicity' mantra that many are adopting with regard to previously apolitical artists. Some people are adopting this with an almost McCarthy-ist hysterical zeal.
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Post by John on Mar 13, 2022 20:41:23 GMT
The trouble is there quite a few famous musicians that were and still are xxxxxx
Eric Clapton can be a embarrassment with his Political stance I do not like his music but see him banned?
The child abuse by a lot of famous rock stars back in the 70s Much as I like Jimmy Page music I do not agree with him sleeping with 15 year olds. The same could be said with many musicians.
By all accounts Miles Davis was a nasty person but he probably recorded one of the greatest Jazz albums ever.
Of course they are positives Paul mentioned rock against racism and just hearing Strange Fruit says more about what happened to Black people than I could ever say and still can bring tears to my eyes.
The link between Politics and music has always been there and can be a force for bad or good.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 13, 2022 20:45:21 GMT
The same could be said for actors. Tom Cruise is an idiot Scientologist. Am I going to avoid his films because of that?
Surely it's about the Art.
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Post by Slinger on Mar 13, 2022 20:48:20 GMT
Of course, it's not only classical/operatic artists and composers that should be considered. There was the whole "Protest Movement" among what was initially the folk scene, in the late fifties, and throughout the sixties and early seventies. It still continues today, but has spread its wings to encompass anything from a young bloke with a guitar to a bunch of heavy-looking tattooed Finns growling and beating guitars to within an inch of their lives at the volume level of a Jumbo Jet.
The first time I heard this it absolutely blew me away and led to me "discovering," Phil Ochs. The lyrics are right on the money, and what a great voice he had too. Vietnam, obviously, is the subject matter, and as far as I know this was written in 1964/5.
The pilots playing poker in the cockpit of the plane
The casualties arriving like the dropping of the rain
And a mountain of machinery will fall before a man
When you're white boots marching in a yellow land
It's written in the ashes of the village towns we burn
It's written in the empty bed of the fathers unreturned
And the chocolate in the children's eyes will never understand
When you're white boots marching in a yellow land
Red blow the bugles of the dawn
The morning has arrived you must be gone
And the lost patrol chase their chartered souls
Like old whores following tired armies
Train them well, the men who will be fighting by your side
And never turn your back if the battle turns the tide
For the colours of a civil war are louder than commands
When you're white boots marching in a yellow land
Blow them from the forest and burn them from your sight
Tie their hands behind their back and question through the night
But when the firing squad is ready they'll be spitting where they stand
At the white boots marching in a yellow land
Red blow the bugles of the dawn
The morning has arrived you must be gone
And the lost patrol chase their chartered souls
Like cold whores following tired armies
The comic and the beauty queen are dancing on the stage
Raw recruits are lining up like coffins in a cage
We're fighting in a war we lost before the war began
We're the white boots marching in a yellow land
And the lost patrol chase their chartered souls
Like cold whores following tired armies
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 13, 2022 21:03:35 GMT
The same could be said for actors. Tom Cruise is an idiot Scientologist. Am I going to avoid his films because of that? Surely it's about the Art. Art at any cost? Not for me, there is a point where I draw the line.
Tom Cruise obviously has some very strange beliefs which do not stop me from very occasionally watching his mediocre films.
Gergiev on the other hand has been close to Putin and his inner circle for many years, being directly enabled by them. I don't think you would find people queuing up to go to his concerts now and rightly so. He has always been openly supportive of Putin's ambitions in Ukraine. Anyway he's busy trying to offload his $150 million property portfolio in Italy right now. Amazing how profitable conducting can be if you know the right people! 
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 14, 2022 14:44:41 GMT
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Post by MartinT on Mar 14, 2022 18:50:50 GMT
Interesting to see that Russian composers are also being "cancelled" in many concert halls at present. Sorry, but that's just completely ignorant. These composers didn't live in modern times and many of them suffered from persecution in their own country. |
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 14, 2022 19:06:45 GMT
If the composers aren't fit to be played now then surely they weren't fit to be played previously? It doesn't quite add up.
I'm pretty hopeful that it's just a temporary 'ban' due to sensitivities right now. I'm sure Tchai and Rach will be back on the menu.
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 17, 2022 17:12:11 GMT
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Post by MartinT on Mar 17, 2022 20:37:58 GMT
Cancelling idiot performers expressing such views I can understand.
I still don't understand doing it to long dead composers.
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 20, 2022 12:40:12 GMT
You couldn't make this up.
I went to see a lovely production of Rimsky Korsakov's opera The Golden Cockerel, which is a comedic fantasy satire on his native Russia. A timely expression of music and politics ...
It features a hapless and vein Tsar Dodon who rules by absolute decree, sacrificing his troops in battle and who demands the total loyalty of his poor and downtrodden subjects, who ply him with feint praise even though they know he's a half wit and no good for their country.
Sound familiar Tsar Putin??
Dodon, like many of his ilk, meets a sticky end.
To be continued ...
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Post by jandl100 on Mar 20, 2022 15:35:36 GMT
Interesting article about Furtwangler and the Nazis. Seemed he did a fair bit to help Jewish musicians by staying in Nazi Germany, as well as other acts of defiance. Possibly a weak man, but nonetheless a brave one in the context of the times. "Only here could I struggle for the soul of the German people. Outside, people can only protest; anyone can do that." holocaustmusic.ort.org/politics-and-propaganda/third-reich/furtwangler-wilhelm/ |
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 21, 2022 12:36:44 GMT
As I discovered with the article in my opening post, Furtwängler is certainly an interesting case and there is nothing 'black and white' about him at all - a man full of contradictions and neither a saint or a criminal collaborator. He was obviously passionate about being German and seems to have seen his role as preserving the 'high art' and 'superiority' of German music and certainly tried to fight the system from within, but his main interest seems to have been trying to wrest control of cultural policy from the Nazis. Who knows whether he tried to save numbers of Jewish musicians out of some kind of duty and empathy, or whether it was simply pragmatic, as they were useful to him and his musical quest.
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Post by julesd68 on Mar 26, 2022 13:08:40 GMT
It's fascinating to see history repeat itself.
With all that we know about Furtwängler, the Third Reich were constantly trying to assert their authority over the arts so that the 'correct' political message always got through.
Fast forward to 2022. Vlad Putin tells his chum Valery Gergiev that he should merge the Mariinsky with the Bolshoi and take sole charge of them. Two birds with one stone here - he gives his mate more power and prestige, and would remove the Bolshoi's Vladimir Urin who isn't such a Putin fanboy - job done.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 26, 2022 13:24:55 GMT
Merge those two great houses? What a tragedy.
Mirrors the terrible bullying Stalin meted out to the Russian composers and performers of the time. The same composers who are being 'cancelled' by uneducated idiots now.
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