CLEFNI

On Saturday 10 September 2022, the University of Bern is pleased to invite you to another “Nacht der Forschung”. This event provides an insight into the research at the University of Bern – explained clearly and presented entertainingly. More than 700 researchers will present their work through interactive presentations and lectures.

CLEFNI could not stay out of this event and will participate in the “Nacht der Forschung” with two presentations:

• 5 p.m.: “Singing Cities: Choirs in Bern and Fribourg in the 19th Century” (in German). Main building, 2nd floor, room 206.

• 8 p.m.: “Knowledge from around the world: Speed dating with tomorrow’s top researchers” (in German). UniS, Underground, corridor with glass floor.

The “Nacht der Forschung” will take place between 4 p.m. and midnight on the Grosse Schanze, in the main building (Hauptgebäude), in ExWi and in UniS. 

Visiting the “Nacht der Forschung” is free of charge.

The 21st Quinquennial Congress of the International Musicological Society started yesterday in Athens and lasts until Friday.

On Thursday, Dr. Caiti Hauck will present partial results of CLEFNI in the paper “Male choral societies and multiculturalism in Switzerland in the long 19th century: the cities of Bern and Fribourg as case studies”.

The registration deadline for the conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” has been extended to 15 September 2021!

Check out the full programme below.

Registration for the conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” is open until Sunday!

17-18 September 2021, Universität Bern, Aula Muesmatt (Gertrud-Wokerstrasse 5, 3012 Bern)

The third keynote lecture of the conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” will be given by Professor Beat Föllmi (Université de Strasbourg, France).

Below you can read the English summary of his talk (the lecture will be given in German).

The choral works of Othmar Schoeck: from post-Romanticism to avant-garde and beyond

Othmar Schoeck (1886-1957) is first and foremost known as the “master of the Lied”, and more recently his operas have attracted attention. His choral work, however, has often been considered to be dictated by the straitened circumstances of the young composer and his need to earn a living. However, the publication of the volume containing the choral works (published in 2002) as part of the Complete Works has brought to light a varied and sometimes surprising body of work in the form of some 350 pages of scores. In addition to these compositions, written especially for a chorus (male or mixed), there are choruses inserted in the operas.

On his return from Leipzig in 1908, where he had studied with Max Reger, Schoeck took over the direction of several men’s choirs in Zurich, first the “Harmonie” choir and then those of the Aussersihl and the school teachers (Lehrergesangverein). He left these positions in 1918 after receiving an annual grant from the patron Werner Reinhart and after his election as conductor of the St. Gall Symphony Orchestra. It was during this period that Schoeck wrote some of his most important choral compositions: Postillon, op. 18 (Nikolaus Lenau), Dithyramben, op. 22 (Goethe), Wegelied, op. 24 (Gottfried Keller), and Trommelschläge, op. 26 (Walt Whitman).

Confronted with the avant-garde of the Vienna School at the Salzburg Festival in 1923, Schoeck completely changed his writing. The opera in one act Penthesilea(written between 1923-1925) testifies to this radical new approach; it includes bold passages for mixed chorus. But the reluctant reception he received from the public brought him back to reality. Once again the composer modified his writing, moving closer to neoclassical and neo-romantic styles. Two choral works from the beginning of the 1930s reflect this transformation: Die Drei, s. op. n°39 (Lenau), and Kantate, op. 49 (Eichendorff). Finally, the composer’s late style, from the 1940s onwards, is expressed in a number of accomplished choral works which mark a return Schoeck’s early work in this field, notably Für ein Gesangfest im Frühling, op. 54 (Keller), Vision, op. 63 (Keller), and Maschinenschlacht, op. 67a (Hermann Hesse).

It is no longer possible to claim that these choral compositions are the work of the young, post-Romantic Schoeck, followed by some late, imitative works. If we take opera choruses into account, it is clear that Schoeck wrote for choruses throughout his whole life – from the simplest a capellaforms to the most monumental ensembles, from almost “folk” writing to the use of vocal techniques borrowed from the avant-garde.

The second keynote lecture of the conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” will be given by PD Dre Delphine Vincent (Université de Fribourg, Switzerland).

Below you can read the English summary of her talk (the lecture will be given in French).

People’s choir and popular theatre at the Théâtre du Jorat

The Théâtre du Jorat was opened in Mézières in 1908. Up until 1947, the works performed there were exclusively plays written by its founder, writer René Morax, who was trying to develop popular Swiss-French dramatic art. Music played an important role in his plays. For both aesthetic and financial reasons, this music was often performed by amateur choirs.

Between 1908 and 1947, thirteen plays by Morax were created. The music for these plays was written by four composers: Gustave Doret (Henriette, Aliénor, La Nuit des Quatre-Temps, Tell, Davel, La Terre et l’Eau, La Servante d’Evolène), Arthur Honegger (Le Roi David, Judith, La Belle de Moudon, Charles le Téméraire), Frank Martin (Roméo et Juliette) and André-François Marescotti (La Lampe d’argile).

With the exception of the Honegger oratorios and a few choruses by Doret, this music is not well known today. At most, we remember the divergent points of view between Doret and Honegger and the factions that developed as a consequence. However, the constraints imposed by writing for amateurs and the stage music genre imply more shared stylistic points than one might be led to believe from the controversies between Doret and Honegger, who moreover were both campaigning for an art that addressed everybody directly.

We wish to identify the long-term elements of the choruses written for the Théâtre du Jorat in terms of the types of subjects (regional, religious, historical, everyday), the functions of the choruses (intradiegetic or commentary to the audience) and the compositional strategies. Balanced against the dissimilarities, it will thus be possible to establish the ways in which the choirs sung at the Théâtre du Jorat contributed to spreading a certain image of French-speaking Switzerland and to shaping the notion of popular music in Romandy.

The first keynote lecture of the conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” will be given by Professor Friedhelm Brusniak (Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, Germany).

Below you can read the English summary of his talk (the lecture will be given in German).

On the transition from the Liedertafel style to choral polyphony in the 19th and 20th centuries

On 6 June, 1903, Kaiser Wilhelm II gave a memorable speech on “The German Folk Song” following the second “Kaiserpreissingen” singing competition for the trophy he had donated for the contest between Germanmen’s choirs. He criticized what he believed to be the wrong choice of repertoire for amateur choirs and inadequate performance standards forsingers in virtuoso choral works. As a consequence, he announced that a collection of “all folk songs” that were “written, sung, and known in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland” would be compiled. A working committee and an advisory committee were immediately formed, with Friedrich Hegar (1841–1927) from Zurich also being appointed to the latter. The two large volumes of the “Folk song book for male choirs” (Volksliederbuch für Männerchor), which included 611 pieces and became known as the “Kaiser’s song book” (Kaiserliederbuch), were published as early as 1906, at the instigation of the German emperor. In 1915, the counterpart “Folk song book for mixed choirs” (Volksliederbuch für gemischten Chor) with 604 numbers was published, again with the contribution of Friedrich Hegar as a representative of Switzerland. The unique publishing project did not come to an end until 1930, with the multi-volume “Folk song book for young people” (Volksliederbuch für die Jugend), in which experts from Germany, Austria, Holland, and Switzerland were also involved.

But neither the “Kaiser’s song book” anthologies nor the forward-looking “Folk song book foryoung people” collection, now published by the State Commission, prevented a bitter debate breaking out in the 1920s. This debate was over a 19th-century style for male choirs, rightly or wrongly negatively described as the “Liedertafelstil”, and a new type of vocal polyphony, which was enthusiastically welcomed and accepted or disparagingly criticized as “polyphonitis”. 

For some time, academic study had been intensifying onthe transition from the increasingly openly criticized, usually four-part homophonic “folk choir song” in the “Liedertafel” style by composers such as Franz Abt (1819–1885) and Ignaz Heim (1818–1880) to vocal works for “polyphonic male choirs” by Erwin Lendvai (1882–1949), who worked in Switzerland from 1935 to 1938 before emigrating. This work had already led to new discoveries and rediscoveries of unjustly forgotten choral music from an exciting period of upheaval in choral culture in the early 20th century.

The conference “Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century” takes place on 17 and 18 September 2021 in the Aula Muesmatt of the University of Bern.

Keynote Lectures

• Professor Friedhelm Brusniak (Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, Germany): Zum Wandel vom Liedertafelstil zur Chorpolyphonie im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert
• PD Dr Delphine Vincent (Université de Fribourg, Switzerland): Chœur du peuple et théâtre populaire au Théâtre du Jorat
• Professor Beat Föllmi (Université de Strasbourg, France): Das Chorwerk von Othmar Schoeck: von der Postromantik zur Avantgarde und darüberhinaus

Round Table

• Composers: Leopold Dick and Jean-François Michel
• Moderation: Dr Irène Minder-Jeanneret, Dictionary of Music in Switzerland

Participation is free of charge. Register now, the number of places is limited!

Choral Life in Switzerland, 19th-21st Century 

International Conference

Institute of Musicology, University of Bern

17–18 September 2021

The Call for Papers is open!

Extended deadline for proposals: 31 January 2021

Keynote speakers

• Professor Friedhelm Brusniak, Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, Germany
• Professor Beat Föllmi, Université de Strasbourg, France
• PD Dr Delphine Vincent, Université de Fribourg, Switzerland

Conference Committee

Dr Caiti Hauck, CLEFNI, University of Bern

Dr María Cáceres Piñuel, University of Bern

Professor Cristina Urchueguía, University of Bern

Warning: these lectures have been cancelled due to the coronavirus. They will be organised in autumn/winter 2021 if the situation allows it.

From November 2020 to January 2021 the Historical Society of the Canton of Fribourg organises the public lectures Singing in the Canton of Fribourg (16th-20th century). Five meetings with a total of 12 speakers and one illustrative concert will present aspects and highlights of the singing tradition in the Fribourg region.

CLEFNI will contribute to this event with a lecture given by Dr Caiti Hauck on the theme Repertoire and choirs in the second half of the 19th century in the city of Fribourg.

Registration is open.

Read the article published in the newspaper “La Liberté” on the subject:

Preliminary results of CLEFNI will be presented at the 1. Study Day of the Swiss Musicological Society (SMG).

Dr Caiti Hauck will talk about the choral life in the city of Bern in the long 19th century, with a special focus on the activities and the repertoire of selected choirs.

The event takes place on 17 September 2020 at the Kuppelraum of the University of Bern.