Theodor Kirchner (1823-1903) – Fallen Leaves

Theodor Kirchner (1823-1903)
Fallen Leaves
John Kersey, piano
RDR CD36

Audio sample:  Langsam, ausdrucksvoll, op 51 no 12

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Total time: 62 mins 5 secs

Verwehte Blätter (Fallen Leaves), op 41:
1) Moderato (3’00”) 2) Allegretto (2’17”) 3) Poco Allegretto (2’27”) 4) Allegro (1’36”) 5) Ziemlich langsam, zart (4’01”) 6) Andante (2’01”)

Albumblätter (Albumleaves), op 80:
7) Lento espressivo (2’25”) 8) Allegro (0’57”) 9) Moderato assai (3’33”) 10) Allegretto (3’23”) 11) Poco lento (1’10”) 12) Poco animato (1’15”) 13) Comodo (1’20”) 14) Vivace (1’06”) 15) Lento (2’20”)

An Stephen Heller (To Stephen Heller), op 51:
16) Andantino (4’06”) 17) Moderato (1’15”) 18) Allegro moderato (2’02”) 19) Etwas langsam und still (1’52”) 20) Poco Allegretto (1’57”) 21) Ruhig (2’05”) 22) Allegretto (1’22”) 23) Moderato (2’07”) 24) Sanft bewegt. Nicht schnell. (2’18”) 25) Sehr zart, nicht schnell (2’49”) 26) Con comodo (3’03”) 27) Langsam, ausdrucksvoll (2’22”)

Fürchtegott Theodor Kirchner, a pupil of Mendelssohn at the newly-founded Leipzig Conservatoire, composed over 1000 original works for piano, most of which are sets of miniatures. Kirchner expert Dr. Klaus Tischendorf, who has kindly provided the scores and 1861 cover photograph for these recordings, has described Kirchner as “the piano miniaturist of the Romantic era”.

Kirchner was recommended by Mendelssohn for the post of organist of Winterthur in Switzerland in 1843, and remained there for the next twenty years. The position gave him the opportunity to travel throughout Germany, and there he came into contact with Brahms and the Schumanns (he had first met Robert Schumann aged fourteen), who recognised in him an arch-Romantic and kindred spirit. He appears to have had a brief affair with Clara Schumann in the 1860s.

In 1862, Kirchner became director of the subscription concerts in Zurich, but remained there for only three years before returning to freelance life. He was appointed court pianist at Meiningen in 1872 and became director of the conservatoire in Würzburg the following year. Again, he did not stay long, and in 1876 moved to Leipzig for seven years, before going on to Dresden, where he taught score-reading. The year 1890 was a climactic one for him, for he abandoned his wife and family and went to live in Hamburg, where he was looked after by a former pupil. Four years later he suffered the first of two strokes that left him paralysed, and began to go blind.

“In his character there is no stability” wrote Clara Schumann. Kirchner’s career suffered because of his addiction to gambling and an extravagant lifestyle that was beyond his means, and his musical friends had periodically to bail him out from financial ruin. In 1884 a group including Brahms, Grieg, Gade and von Bülow raised thirty thousand marks to help him pay off his gambling debts.

The music on this disc dates from 1879 (op 41), 1880 (op 51) and 1887 (op 80), a time when Kirchner was reliant almost entirely on new compositions to provide his living expenses. The Fallen Leaves were reviewed at the time of their publication by Arnold Niggli in the Schweizerische Musikzeitung und Sängerblatt, who wrote “We must thus reckon the Fallen Leaves to be amongst the most delicately subtle of this master’s creations.” The high standard of this music is easily maintained in Kirchner’s tribute to the great pianist Stephen Heller, then very much in his twilight years, who responded “[Kirchner’s] works are my uncommon love. They give me true rest.” The op 80 set belongs to the same spirit of Innigkeit, and at its end quotes Kirchner’s first set of Albumleaves, op 7, which had been written some thirty years earlier.

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