Bruckner Journal book review
OUT OF TIME - The Vexed Life of Georg Tintner
By Tanya Buchdahl Tintner
448 pp University of Western Australia Publishing (UWA Publishing) ISBN 9781742582566
[Available on-line at £25.49. Or $32,08. Readers wishing to use Amazon (.com or .co.uk)
are invited to use the Shop for Anton Bruckner at Amazon link in the Web Store at
www.abruckner.com]
“TINTNER? Tintner? Who is he? Where does he live? What does he know?” The rhetorical
questions referred originally to Bruckner in Hugo Wolf’s castigation of the Viennese
for their failure to acknowledge the genius in their midst in 1884(1). They are equally
appropriate to the general ignorance of the composer (2) and conductor Georg Tintner
when the first Naxos recording in the Tintner cycle of Bruckner symphonies was published
in 1997. Most Brucknerians, and indeed most of the classical music audience, knew
nothing of him and faced with the outstanding performance of the Fifth Symphony by
the Royal Scottish National Orchestra wondered where on earth - or what celestial
other-world - he had sprung from. And when we discovered from the CD insert notes
that he was already 80 years old, had been a member of the Vienna Boys Choir, sung
Bruckner under Franz Schalk, had been assistant conductor for the Vienna Volksoper
- but had to flee the Nazis and pursue a career in New Zealand, Australia, South
Africa, England and Canada, the questions why we knew virtually nothing of him and
had heard little or nothing of his work previously, and how come he was such a great
Bruckner conductor, demanded answers. Tanya Buchdahl Tintner’s excellent book, Out
of Time - The Vexed Life of Georg Tintner provides many of the missing clues.
It is an extraordinary life story that is told here. At times it leaves you seething
with anger that such a talent should be wilfully ignored by bureaucrats and mediocrities,
pompous little people with prejudices, who had the power to deny opportunities to
an artist of such integrity and stature as Tintner; and at times exasperated with
Tintner himself whose unbending commitment to often somewhat outlandish eccentricities
and principles made him an unattractive candidate for inclusion in the conservative
circles of the musical establishment of the post-war antipodean British Commonwealth.
The sheer incongruities that arise from these juxtapositions lead to repeated moments
of hilarious absurdity, such as when the answer to the question ‘Tintner? What does
he know?” is officially recorded in his New Zealand naturalisation certificate: ‘Composer,
conductor, poultry farmer’; and moments that bring sentimental tears to the eyes
at the passionate, though often ineffective, advocacy of his supporters, such as
that of the New Zealand composer Alfred Hill who, a day or two after one of the rare
Tintner orchestral concerts, addressed an Auckland luncheon audience as follows:
“I want to tell you that my wife says the silliest thing on two legs is poultry.
I think there are some people that are sillier. They are the people of this city
that would let a man keep a poultry farm instead of conducting an orchestra.”
That he became such a great Bruckner conductor finds its origins in those early days
in Vienna. When he was twelve, 1929, he was in a rehearsal of the Bruckner Mass in
F minor conducted by Franz Schalk, who “was a truly nasty piece of work. We were
absolutely terrified of that man. […] When it came to the Benedictus […] we suddenly
noticed […] that his beat, which was a very good and very clear beat, got less and
less clear and less and less good, and suddenly he stopped altogether and he went
to the window and started to cry. Just to cry. He was terribly ashamed of it, of
course. I would say these tears were the most important tears in my life. It may
be that they made me into a musician. I felt… what music can do to this dreadful
man, […] This sentimental, perhaps slightly ridiculous, story was terribly important
to me. But it would have meant nothing had I not loved [Bruckner’s] music as intensely
as I did.” Also from that time in Vienna he reports that the superlative art of
Lotte Lehmann “and the three Bruckner masses, made me into that bit of a musician
I became.” The plan was for Naxos also to record the masses with Tintner - but in
the event it was never to happen: what a terrible loss it is that we shall never
receive the benediction of those performances.
There is much in this book that will be rewarding for lovers of Bruckner’s music
to read. Bruckner was very special for Tintner, and contrasted to Mahler “It was
important for Georg to perform Mahler because he understood it so well; he could
recognise himself […] He preferred what Bruckner gave him, what he called his ‘assurance’,
‘that sort of cosmic feeling that, in spite of every horrible thing, the world can
be a good place’, (a sort of non-theistic parallel to Bruno Walter’s famous statement
to the effect that Mahler was always searching for God; Bruckner had found God.)
Tintner’s views on versions and editions were firmly allied to the work of Robert
Haas, regarding his post-war dismissal as purely political, and Nowak as an unworthy
successor. It was intended that the 8th Symphony be recorded in both the 1887 and
Haas editions. He refused to conduct the 1890 (Nowak) edition, and wasn’t entirely
satisfied with the Haas: he hoped that if he had time he would make an edition of
his own. As it happened he had time for neither the recorded performance nor the
edition, but it is indicative of the strange persistence of the ‘Bruckner problem’
that even the most devoted Brucknerians feel there is a need for editions and versions
beyond those supplied by the scholarly scores of the International Bruckner Gesellschaft.
The book includes intriguing exchanges between Tintner and Prof. William Carragan
about the scores of the 1st and the 8th symphonies.
“One of Georg’s burning ambitions was to promote Bruckner wherever he went,” writes
Tanya Tintner, and the persistence with which he performed Bruckner and gave lectures
on Bruckner is attested by the record of many such events in this book. He did much
work with the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, and other youth orchestras, many
of whose players report life-changing experiences, and Paul Hawkshaw’s lifelong devotion
to Bruckner stems in part from his experience of playing the Fifth Symphony under
Tintner in 1974. Some idea of Tintner’s lectures can probably be gained from the
enthusiastic and characteristically opinionated insert notes he provided himself
(at Tanya’s suggestion) for the Naxos recordings: they constitute clear and often
evocative analyses of the works, together with enough biographical information to
provide the reader with the context in which the work arose. But one’s appreciation
of those recordings is deepened immensely by becoming acquainted through this book
with the circumstances of their production. Georg was already afflicted by a cancerous
growth in his mouth when the project began; it was removed, but by the time of the
last recording an aggressive melanoma was diagnosed. The first recording with the
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, of the Sixth Symphony, was conducted under strained
circumstances and if you sense in that recording a coolness not apparent in the recordings
that followed, it doesn’t surprise you to learn that the recording was made during
one of the coldest winters ever to afflict Wellington, and that the recording was
frequently interrupted when the musicians’ union declared it too cold to continue.
The description of how these recordings came about, and the varying circumstances
under which they were made, provides an essential adjunct to the performances themselves,
adding a dimension that increases their power and profundity. And when you add to
this the life-history that led up to them, the greatness of this Bruckner conductor
that shines through every performance acquires a back-story that helps to account
for and magnify its stature.
There is much in this book that is not about Bruckner. There are many valuable observations
on the art of conducting - and many extraordinary stories of what following that
profession can demand. Tintner’s repertoire was extensive, and he conducted a wide
range of operas, often in far-out places where interruptions might include an unscripted
screaming mezzo in Madame Butterfly, who had just sat on a toad in the dark lavatory
back-stage. The Australian opera tours were in every respect hair-raising, Tintner
playing the piano and giving the cues for a hundred or so performances in as many
days and in almost as many locations. Besides Bruckner, Tintner also promoted the
compositions of New Zealand composer Douglas Lilburn, Pfitzner, Franz Schmidt, Hans
Gal. He gave stunning performances of Beethoven symphonies and Fidelio, Mozart and
Schubert (3) – nearly always conducting without a score, even for the full length
operas. His efforts to forge a career in the UK, against odds unfairly stacked against
him, were oh so nearly crowned with success when Peter Heyworth wrote a highly laudatory
review in The Observer of Tintner’s conducting of The Magic Flute at the Coliseum,
March 1970. But by then it was too late: Tintner, after a depressing two and half
years in which ‘nothing moved’, had already signed a contract to return to Australia,
to Perth and the ‘semi-professional’ West Australian Opera Company.
And there is much in this book that is not about music, or at least not music alone.
There are trenchant observations of and on anti-semitism, on life in New Zealand
and Australia from the late 40s to the mid-1980s, on veganism, on friendship, betrayals
and mistresses - and on wives and music: “You can’t compare music and wives, he said,
but the comparison made itself in the amount of time he allotted to each.” There
were three wives, Tanya being the third, and to say each found the role challenging
is understatement. Whilst Tanya was on the phone to Georg’s third daughter by his
second marriage, Georg, faced with his own disintegration and the intolerable prospect
of making a nurse of his wife, jumped from the eleventh floor balcony. He died shortly
afterwards. After his death Tanya Tintner spent several years trying to discover
who it was she was married to for over 20 years, and what his life had been like
before she knew him, conducting over 200 interviews and finally writing this extraordinary
memoir. The book is divided into four chronological sections, with a prologue and
an epilogue – but basically it falls into two parts, before and after the author’s
marriage to Georg. ‘Before’ is a well-researched and well-told biography; after
the marriage it has the added personal dimension of an emotional rollercoaster.
When you turn the last page you cannot think other than that this is a sad story:
“What remains is regret and the torment of wasted opportunities.” But as you cast
your mind back over what you have read, you can’t help but smile at the absurdities,
and then be humbled by the achievements and sheer courage, against all the vexations,
of the primary characters of this compelling history.
Brucknerians have reason to be grateful to Tanya Buchdahl Tintner not only for her
role in facilitating those already legendary Naxos recordings, but also for this
well-constructed, very readable book which is a testament to the power of Bruckner’s
music, not only in those remarkable performances, but also in the vexed life of one
of his greatest interpreters. Ken
Ward
__________________________________
1Hugo Wolf - Bruckner-Plädoyer 28 Dec. 1884 in Wiener Salonblatt. “Bruckner? Bruckner?
Wer ist er? Wo lebt er? Was kann er? Solche Fragen kann man in Wien zu hören bekommen”
2Georg Tintner was a composer, but it became increasingly difficult for him, for
reasons that are discussed in the book. What he considered to be his two finest
works were the Violin Sonata, and a five-movement work for string quartet and soprano,
The Ellipse. A recording of the Violin Sonata, and some pieces for piano, is available
on Naxos, Catalogue No: 8.570258
3Recordings of Tintner conducting Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Mahler,
Strauss, Schoenberg, Pfitzner, Delius, Sibelius, Lilburn and others are available
in the Naxos 13 volume Tintner Edition (available separately).
