Stucken, Frank van der

Preface

Stucken, Frank van der – Eight songs for a lower voice with pianoforte accompaniment Op. 17

(Fredericksburg, Texas, 15 October 1858 – Hamburg, 16 August 1929)

 

(1892)

Frank Van der Stucken was born in Fredericksburg, Texas, to a father from Antwerp and a German mother. After the Civil War, the family returned to Antwerp in 1865, where Van der Stucken studied at Peter Benoit’s (1834-1901) Music School. He then moved to Leipzig, where he had good contacts with Edvard Grieg, and to Weimar. There, with the support of Franz Liszt, he was able to organise a concert at the Hoftheater exclusively with his own works.

His name was made and, on Max Bruch’s recommendation, he returned to his homeland to succeed Leopold Damrosch in New York as the conductor of the oratorio choir Arion Society. This was the beginning of a major international conducting career on both sides of the ocean. He conducted US premieres of works by Benoit, Berlioz, Brahms, Dvorák and Tchaikovsky, among others, and made a strong commitment to new American music, which he also propagated to Europe. At the 1889 Exposition Universelle in Paris, for instance, he conducted an exclusive American concert featuring works by George Chadwick, Edward MacDowell, Arthur Foote and John K. Paine. At the turn of the century, Van der Stucken became a defining figure in Cincinnati’s musical life: from 1895 to 1907, he was the first principal conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and subsequently he also became director and dean of the Cincinnati College of Music (1897-1903) and music director of the Cincinnati Music Festival (from 1906 to 1912 and from 1923 to 1927). In addition, he continued to perform as a guest conductor in Europe.

As a conductor and a composer, Van der Stucken showed his fondness for Wagner. He himself composed orchestral works, piano music, choral works and a lyrical drama, but first and foremost he was a Lied composer. Between his first five opus numbers, four song cycles stand out, and throughout his career he would continue to publish several song cycles. In doing so, he always showed himself fastidious in his lyrics, whether in Dutch, German or English.

His Acht Lieder op. 17 immediately follow the Fünf Liebeslieder von Friedrich Rückert op. 16 and are based on poems by seven different poets, all in German and English. The translations, when necessary, were made by the American writer, librettist and translator Hellen D. Tretbar (1835-1902), who, in addition to English, was fluent in French, German and Italian, and specialised in song translations.

Unlike the compact songs of opus 16, the songs of opus 17 are more drawn out and harmonically complex. Some are also demanding for the voice with extended tessitura and large leaps, as for instance O Jugendlust, o Jugendglück. The piano parts are varied, from simple (Gedenken-Vergessen with a short rhythmic motif and Ein Schäferlied), over mainly broken chords (Einsame Thräne, Vorbei and Serenade, in which a guitar is imitated) to playing along parts of the vocal line (O Jugendlust, o Jugendglück and Seeligkeit).
O Jugendlust, o Jugendglück and Seeligkeit were the most popular songs in the cycle, but Gedenken-Vergessen, for all its simplicity, is one of the most beautiful songs in Van der Stucken’s rich song oeuvre.

Van der Stucken dedicated this cycle to the then young Swedish-American Olive Fremstadt (1871-1951), who would later make quite a splash as an opera singer with both soprano and alto roles.

Jan Dewilde

Reprint of a score from the library of the Royal Conservatoire of Antwerp and published with the cooperation of the Study Centre for Flemish Music (www.svm.be).

German and Flemish preface … > HERE