Erwin Schulhoff: Shapeshifter
Delos

James Conlon has held many distinguished posts—guest conductor at the Metropolitan Opera since 1976, Music Director of the Los Angeles Opera since 2006, Principal Conductor of the Paris Opera from 1995 to 2004, and Artistic Advisor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra since 2021, to name four—but as admirable is the part he played in establishing the Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices at the Los Angeles-based Colburn School in 2013. Aided by the support of Los Angeles philanthropist Marilyn Ziering and through the efforts of the Recovered Voices at Colburn (RVC) Ensemble, the organization is dedicated to keeping alive the work of composers silenced by the Nazi regime. In Conlon's view, in programming works by Erwin Schulhoff and others like him “we deny the Nazi regime a posthumous victory, a victory that must not be allowed to stand.”

Spanning the years between 1923 and 1937, five works by the Czech composer were recorded at the Colburn School for this seventy-seven-minute release, with Conlon leading the RVC Ensemble and pianist Dominic Cheli in a performance of Schulhoff's Concerto for Piano and Small Orchestra, Op. 43. Cheli appears on three other pieces, by himself for the Suite for Piano, Left Hand and the album-closing “Susi” and with Adam Millstein for the Sonata No. 2 for Violin and Piano. Rounding out the programme is Five Pieces for String Quartet, Millstein joined by three other players from the Colburn School.

Born to a German-speaking Jewish family in Prague in 1894, Schulhoff studied piano before being conscripted into the Austrian army in 1914, an experience that included a stint as a prisoner of war and left a profound mark on his artistic sensibilities. In place of the neo-romantic material he'd written earlier, his post-war compositions were bolder and even revolutionary in spirit. The discovery of jazz and Dada also proved influential, with one compositional result, Infuturum, comprised entirely of rests and therefore predating Cage's notorious 4'33” by decades. Schulhoff's exposure to many different forms influenced the compositions he created during this period, hence the album title chosen for the release. Living in Prague brought with it myriad professional successes and failures, but his life took a particular turn for the worse following Hitler's rise to power in 1933. After obtaining Soviet citizenship in 1941 and acquiring visas for his family, Schulhoff and his son were interned, and the composer perished of tuberculosis a year later at the Wülzburg Detention Camp in Bavaria.

The single-movement Concerto for Piano and Small Orchestra towers over the other pieces for sheer length. Not surprisingly, the twenty-one-minute work ventures down multiple stylistic avenues during its journey, with the piano soloist and two chromatic motifs operating as key unifiers. While a somewhat foreboding intro makes for a dramatic and tension-filled start, one can't help but be impressed by the conviction with which Cheli and the RVC Ensemble execute their parts. Their impassioned rendering of Schulhoff's material is compelling, regardless of whether the music's blustery, becalmed, or mysterious. Cheli distinguishes himself throughout, never more so than during the sostenuto section that arises midway through and the poise he demonstrates in his solo. The ensemble rejoins him for a jazzy, high-energy episode sprinkled with cowbell, anvil, car horn, sleigh bells, castanets, and torpedo siren, after which another shift sees the music become a plaintive violin-and-piano duet before a robust full-ensemble finale.

The animation of the opening work carries over into the Five Pieces for String Quartet in an irreverent take on the dance suite that in moments invites comparison to Bartók. Playfulness is evident in the opening “Alla valse Viennese” but also audible in the macabre devilry of the “Alla serenata” and searing polka rhythms of the “Alla czeca.” The tempo slows for the enrapturing “Alla tango milonga” before shifting into high gear for the light-speed “Alla tarantella.” Cheli returns for The Suite for Piano, Left Hand, his commanding realization of its five parts spread across nineteen engrossing minutes. Whereas the graceful “Preludio” and euphonious “Air” sparkle, “Zingara” dances mischievously and the “Finale” raucously. Following that bravura solo display, the pianist partners with Millstein for Sonata No. 2 for Violin and Piano, the work on the release that most closely adheres to standard classical form. In the sixteen-minute performance, the breezy dance moves of “Allegro impetuoso” give way to a ponderous, almost eerie “Andante” and percussively thrusting “Burlesca: Allegretto” before resolving with a medley-like “Allegro risoluto.” One final album twist arrives in the form of “Susi,” a nostalgic, jazz-tinged reverie delivered by Cheli alone.

January 2023