Hindemith in Washington

To German Nazis he is merely a "noise maker" and his U. S. patroness is almost stone deaf. Nevertheless, Paul Hindemith is a god to many a musical modern and his U. S. debut in Washington. D. C. last week--at Patroness Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge's eighth festival of Chamber music in the hall of the Library of Con-gress--was an event of first importance.

The festival lasted three days, of which one whole morning was devoted to Hindemith's less complicated works, with the composer on the viola. People were impressed by the assurance with which the flabby, sad-eyed man played his Sonata for Viola Alone, his curious indifference to tonal qualities. Later they had a chance to hear Hindemith's Der Schwanendreher (The Organgrinder) which had never been played in the U. S. before. Der Schwanendreher is a concerto for viola and small orchestra, based on traditional German folk tunes. In it Hindemith expanded a song called Among Hills and Valleys into a whole astonishing movement. Bassoon, clarinet, oboe, horn and solo viola made an intricate, lovely fugue out of The Little Bird on the Fence. Critics considered the concerto "work-manlike," "resourceful," "poetic," "often amusing," looked forward to hearing it again in New York this week.

Throughout Paul Hindemith's arduous career few have ever doubted that he was workmanlike. Born to a poor family outside Frankfort in 1895, he was only four when his father began to give him music lessons. At 13, he was helping support the family by playing at theatres and dances. At 15, he was concert-touring with his sister, a talented pianist. In 1915 Hindemith became concertmaster of the Frankfort Opera, but was conscripted for the army shortly afterward. There he served as a drummer because he had no training in brasses. After the Armistice Hindemith returned to Frankfort to compose. He concentrated on chamber music, also wrote settings for poems by Walt Whitman, ballad cycles, strange discordant operas with such names as Murderer, Women's Hope, The Nusch-Nuschi (for marionettes), Sancta Susanna.

Hindemith's Das Unaufhoerliche (The Unending) scoffed at the "mines, oil wells, rubber plantations, graves of the mythless white race." Though conservatives complain about his shocking dissonances, Hindemith has always shown a strong sense of form. He can handle counterpoint as well as any man alive. The German Republic, which liked moderns, gave him a medieval tower to live in. The Hochschule in Berlin made him professor of composition. When the Nazis removed Hindemith and tabooed his works because his wife is Jewish, Wilhelm Furtwangler temporarily resigned his posts with the Reich Chamber of Music, the Berlin State Opera and the Berlin Philharmonic out of indignation. Though Paul Hindemith's duties are now lighter, he spends months of every year in Turkey as its musical adviser.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.