Rabl, Walter

Walter Rabl – Symphony in D minor for large orchestra op. 8

(b. Vienna, 30 November 1873 – d. Klopein am Kärnter Klopeiner See, 11 July 1940)

Mässig bewegt p.4
Nicht zu langsam p.57
Rasch und sehr leicht p.79
Sehr langsam p.108

Preface
Almost nothing is now known about the life and work of the Vienna-born composer Walter Rabl. Just a single CD of chamber music offers an impression of Rabl’s work1, while the foreword to a reprint of his chamber works by John F. und Virginia F. Strauss2 provides some information on the composer. We learn little from contemporary sources either: Artur Eccarius-Sieber included him in his Monograph of Musicians: 20 Biographies of Contemporary Composers of 1907 while newspaper reports and surviving correspondence focus entirely on the two moments in Rabl’s life that bookended his period of creativity.

Most reports relate to Rabl’s op. 1, the Quartet for Clarinet, Violin, Cello and Piano, a work written for the fourth competition of the Vienna Composers’ Society [Wiener Tonkünstlerverein] in 1896. Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) had been honorary president of the Society since 1886, one year after its foundation. Formed as a counter current to the New German School associated with Wagner and Bruckner, the Composers’ Society had a conservative stance. The jury, consisting of Brahms, Eusebius Mandyczewski (1857-1929) and Richard von Perger (1854-1911), requested a work of chamber music featuring at least one wind instrument. Brahms reached his decision very quickly – as he wrote to the publisher Fritz Simrock (1837-1901) on 3 December 1896: “The best piece in any case is a piano quartet with clarinet – apparently by Rabl, a pupil of Nawratil. I know little of the young man or his work as I didn’t warm to him personally. Now of course I have my eye on him and his work.”3 Two weeks later, on 17 December, the interest had grown further: “I have ever more joyful news to report about our prize composer, Walter Rabl. I have a whole pile of his works. He will be attending the festivities in person and is about to undertake a doctoral thesis in Prague. The adjudication is on the 22nd; I believe that he will win first prize – but that’s of no importance. Your J.B. will look after everything.”4 “By the way, Mr Rabl did get the first prize”,5 Brahms wrote in his closing message to Simrock sent 23 December. Joseph Miroslav Weber (1854–1906) received the second prize, with the third prize going to Alexander Zemlinsky (1871–1942) for his Trio op. 3 for Clarinet, Cello and Piano in D minor, which remains in the chamber music repertoire today. While Weber, born in Prague, apparently left no lasting impression – his competition work is now lost – Brahms recommended the other two prize winners to Fritz Simrock, also reassessing Rabl’s character: “You have an incredible appetite for new work! The quartet by Rabl and trio by Zemlinsky are just the thing. In each case I can commend both man and talent. If Rabl hesitates in sending you the quartet, that is probably my fault. He feels he should wait either until he has another piece of equal quality or can produce one to soon follow.”6 Rabl’s success was quickly cemented: in 1897 Simrock published the Quartet as op. 1 as well as the Fantasiestücke for Trio (op. 2) and Song Cycles (op. 3 and 4). Two years later there followed Four Songs (op. 5), the Sonata for Piano and Violin (op. 6), Three Songs (op. 7) and the Symphony for large orchestra (op. 8). The quartet was published with a dedication to Brahms, to whom Rabl felt indebted not only on a personal level, but also as a source of musical inspiration. Brahms was never to see the dedication; he died on 3 April 1897.

There is little information on Rabl’s life before the competition. He was born in Vienna on 30 November 1873, the son of a civil servant, Dr. med. Johannes Rabl, and Rosine Bernard. Rabl completed his schooling at the Königliche Staatsgymnasium in Salzburg in 1892. He went on to read law, studying composition and music theory alongside with Joseph Friedrich Hummel (1841–1919), then director of the Mozarteum. In addition to further studies with Karel Navrátil (1867–1936) he wrote his doctoral thesis at the German University in Prague under Guido Adler (1855–1941), one of the most important German-speaking musicologists in the foundational years of the discipline. Rabl’s first musical guides were Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss – it was only later that he turned to the tradition of Brahms.

Spurred on by the success of his quartet following the competition, Rabl devoted himself entirely to music. He completed his doctorate and began work at the Prague Opera, soon transferring however to the Royal Opera Dresden where he worked as a répétiteur. During his time in Dresden, Rabl composed a series of songs and published them in six volumes with D. Rahter in Leipzig.

The songs in these volumes seem to have gained little or perhaps no mention in the press, and curiously, no press reviews of the earlier Symphony (op. 8) have survived either – there are not even reports of a premiere. The fate of what would be Rabl’s last work, his only opera, Liane (1903), was rather different. Apart from the quartet, it is the only work that enjoyed a more lasting success. Liane received its premiere in 1903 in Strasbourg, and was praised by the critics for its orchestration and Wagnerian modernity.

Why then did Rabl stop composing after the success of his opera? Perhaps he saw his vocation in teaching or as a conductor, rather than in composition. Yet it is also striking that almost all reviews of his final work allude to the guiding influence of Wagner, something which clearly troubled the composer. It was not only that he preferred to see himself in the mould of Brahms. More fundamentally, he did not want to be reduced to comparison with another composer, seeking instead to create work that was ‘his own’. Responding to the question of why his father’s career as a composer had ended, Rabl’s son wrote: “Following its premiere, his final work was described by critics as clearly echoing Wagner in style, a description he himself felt was justified. In (perhaps overly harsh) self-criticism, he drew the conclusion that he lacked the creative powers to compose and that it would therefore be the right thing to cease efforts in this area. Perhaps he also felt he had betrayed the Brahmsian tradition and joined the then endless legions of Wagner’s epigones.”7

From 1903 to 1906 Rabl worked as director of music in Düsseldorf and then toured as an opera conductor throughout Germany until the outbreak of the First World War. The period also saw his involvement in premiering German operas in Spain. Rabl became Magdeburg’s first town director of music in 1915 and remained there until 1924, when he was replaced due to his conservative stance. Thereafter he retreated from conducting, save for a few appearances in America and later a short period back in Magdeburg. Rabl remained in Magdeburg working as a piano and theory teacher until his death on 11 July 1940 in Klopein.

Translation: Paul Young

For performance material please contact Boosey & Hawkes (www.boosey.com), Berlin.