Tom Schnauber: Death and Waltzes

Death and Waltzes is a recording of music for string orchestra by German-American composer Tom Schnauber, performed by the dynamic and adventurous Russian String Orchestra (formerly Chamber Orchestra Kremlin), Moscow, led by its redoubtable Music Director, Misha Rachlevsky.

The recording features nine works all linked by themes suggested in the CD’s title. Some of the works are single-movement “in memorium”-type pieces.  Three are in fond and sometimes aching memory of other musicians: In Memory of Henri Temianka of the vivacious, witty, and brilliant violinist and conductor Henri Temianka; Tell Me About This Piece, Leroy of the gifted and underplayed composer Leroy Southers; and Die schwersten Fesseln of Schnauber’s first musical “hero”, J.S. Bach.  Another, Nachwort: Die Harfe, is in memory of the composer’s father, who died during the early stages of making this CD.

Of the remaining works, Eis-Walzer II  and Ziegenfusstanz are odd and off-kilter waltzes of sorts, reflections of Schnauber’s Alpine heritage and two left feet. Nacht der verklaerten Toten and Finds are stories told in music whose narratives involve both dancing and dying.  They invoke experiences by the composer’s fictional “alter ego”, eminent musicologist Johannes von Märland (b.1890 [sic]). This character’s adventures with zombies, jigs in fields of heather, and tunes lost in the woods have inspired the colors and forms of these textless works.