VOTD 2/20/2023

 Bernd Alois Zimmermann: Présence/Intercommunicazione (DG Avant Garde)

Purchased at Jerry's Records from the Duquesne University collection

I find myself back to Zimmermann again, wondering who this man was, what his intentions were. I was reading about Zimmermann's final major work, Ekklesiastiche Aktion, and I definitely have to track down a copy. I don't expect an uplifting experience though. He committed suicide before its premiere. I resist reading too much into subtext, what I think a composer's intentions might be. It would be difficult not to do so in that case.

Until then, here's an LP of two chamber works: Présence (1961), a five scene ballet for violin, cello, and piano; and Intercommunicazione (1967), a single movement piece for cello and piano.

The ballet is set for Don Quixote, Ubu Roi, and Molly Bloom. I'm not one to attend dance performances often, but I'd be very curious about such a production even without Zimmermann's music. The music darts between Darmstadt-style virtuosic atonalism, open spaces, bowing and harmonic effects on the strings, abrupt tone clusters, and his musical quoting. There's no question when you hear some of them pop up, often several simultaneously. The liner notes state there are quotes from R. Strauss, Prokofiev, Debussy, and Stockhausen. During much of the piece, only one or two of the instruments are playing; only the full trio is active a smaller percentage of the time.

That collagism definitely sets Zimmermann apart from most of his contemporaries. I suppose I could draw a comparison to Stockhausen's Hymnen, which uses national anthems as source material due to their general familiarity. Prior to that work, Stockhausen's musical language was an attempt to leave behind old musical techniques, to possibly achieve universality through erasing the past. It's very utopian in outlook. Zimmermann is definitely not utopian, and swings between a more kaleidoscopic approach to composition, and outright expressionism. Although maybe, the Requiem I've heard twice now does both. 

I admire some of the composers and works of this era, but I do sometimes question the degree to which they sound different from one another. My friend Nizan told me about attending a composer's forum when he was a student, and the advising teacher suggested that you can't really tell one serialist work from another. Nizan countered, the second movement of many 18th century symphonies are probably completely interchangeable. The teacher had to concede the point. 

Apart from his love of collage, I suspect there are subtle things that distinguish Zimmermann's works from those of other post-war avant-gardists. I'm just not sure what those things are yet. 

Alternately, Intercommunicazione does not seem to engage with any collage elements that I can hear, and seems to be a study in the differing sounds of the two instruments. The opening several minutes are a contrast between long cello tones combined with shorter, more percussive piano passages, sometimes repeating themselves in a sort of cellular manner. Whatever his methods, they don't sound stringently serialist to me.

I noticed the liner notes don't mention a date of death for the composer. I found this was released in 1969, so the composer himself more than likely heard the results. He may have coached the players directly, who premiered the works. It's tough stuff to play. Even when I follow the scores of works such as these, I wonder how accurately they're actually being played? Pianist Aloys Kontarsky is one of the go-to people of the time to play nearly impossibly difficult music, so I know he comes close.

I've know three people in the past several years who committed suicide. In all three cases, there were severe mental health issues. It's too easy to say that killing oneself is a selfish act; in the case of two of those people, they had sought doctors' help. It just became too much for them.

What of Bernd Alois Zimmermann though? I uncertain that he was in a similar situation. Did anyone see it coming? He was 52, and had already accomplished much as a composer. Despite that outlet of expression, I guess it wasn't enough. The world never got to see what he'd create next, and I feel robbed of that experience. I wish I could ask him why.