[오스트리아]Johann Rufinatscha

 

(1812 – 1893^[1]/81세) was an Austrian composer, theorist and music teacher.

Rufinatscha was born in 1812 in Mals (Austria, now in the Italian province of South Tyrol). At the age of 14 he came to Innsbruck, where he studied the piano, violin, and musical study at the conservatory. After that he settled in Vienna, where he would remain for the rest of his life.

During his lifetime he was most prominent as a teacher of piano and harmony in Vienna. Rufinatscha seems to have spent most of his life teaching rather than composing actively, which would explain why he composed relatively few pieces. He knew Johannes Brahms and composed a number of works (including several symphonies) during the period in which Brahms refused to publish any symphonic works.^[3] While predicted by contemporaries to become a major composer of his day, this did not turn out to be the case, and as such he is still relatively obscure. However, as a music teacher he was influential; among his pupils were composers such as Ignaz Brüll and Julius Epstein. He died in 1893 in Vienna.

Rufinatscha is recognised as one of Tyrol's most important composers of the 19th century. His works can be said to form a connection between those of Franz Schubert and Anton Bruckner. Shortly before his death Rufinatscha decided to donate the manuscripts of his compositions to the Tyrolean provincial museum, where they remain to this day. In the past few years some of his works have been recorded on CD, and are for sale from the Museum's shop.

"Much the same could be said about the Sixth Symphony

which further weakens the argument that Brahms's compositional struggles had a deleterious effect on Rufinatscha. Indeed if there is one composer to whom Rufinatscha seems significantly indebted here it is Schubert. The time scale of the symphony feels Schubertian, and there are passages -- most strikingly the central trio section of the Scherzo -- that do sound rather like Schubert: the Austrian rural Ländlercharacter, and some of the harmonic shifts, has definite Schubertian overtones. But how much of Schubert's large scale music could Rufinatscha actually have known in 1865? Performances of the notoriously challenging Great C major Symphony were still far from frequent in the 1860s. The Unfinished Symphony had its Viennese world premiere in December 1865, though that would surely have been too late for it to leave any mark on Rufinatscha's Sixth. His knowledge of the symphonic Schubert must have been based on the youthful and decidedly classical symphonies Nos 1-- 6. As for posterity, the haunting woodwind and horns exchanges at the start of the trio make one wonder if Bruckner ever saw the score (Rufinatscha's expansive approach to musical form also suggests a kinship) -- but again, when would Bruckner have had the opportunity? He certainly wasn't a member of Brahms's charmed circle."

"Schubert's name also springs to mind listening to the imposing opening tutti. For just one bar the orchestra carves out a simple unison figure on the tonic chord: so far, so classical. But almost immediately the harmonies begin to stray compellingly, as in so many of Schubert's finest symphonic works. Within just nine bars we have reached the remote key of D flat major, a semitone step down from the home key of D, in which horns and solo cello deliver a nobly expressive variation on the opening unison figure. Rufinatscha's developments of his leading motifs can be surprisingly subtle and resourceful: did Brahms remember this? From this dramatically fluid introduction a bracing Allegro con fuoco theme emerges, but for all the energy, Rufinatscha's pacing of the argument is much more leisurely than Beethoven -- or than a more recent symphonic 'god' like Mendelssohn."

"The Scherzo is in the key of E flat -- a semitone step up from D major. The melodic writing is so characteristically 'Austrian' that one can't help wondering if memories of the folk music of Rufinatscha's South Tyrolean childhood resurfaced here. The main theme is particularly infectious: a fine example of the kind of tune German speakers call an Ohrwurm (Ear-worm). Stark contrast is provided by the Largo, its sombre opening figure given a special sepulchral colouring by low clarinets, bassoons, violas and cellos."

"Here, strikingly, Rufinatscha avoids sustained lyricism. A great deal of the melodic writing is tense and short breathed: expressively charged phrases are often passed around the orchestra rather than encouraged to take flight. It is left to the finale to clear the air and establish a suitably festive mood. There are times when one has to remind oneself that this movement was written twelve years before the finale of Brahms's Second Symphony. Here, too, we find an example of Rufinatscha's unfettered attitude to musical argument. The main theme is cast in a sturdy two-in-a-bar (ONE-two TWO-two), but the contrasting second theme is triple time: a dancing onE-two-three TWO-two-three which may put English listeners in mind of Elgar. The effect is delightfully spontaneous. Eventually the finale builds to a resolute and rousing conclusion -- which leaves one wondering yet again: what happened to Johann Rufinatscha?"

 

 Compositions

Rufinatscha appears to have composed 6 symphonies. The following is a list of his known compositions:

Orchestral works

• Symphony No. 1 in D major "Mein erstes Studium" (composed: Innsbruck, 1834; performed: Innsbruck, 1844)
• Symphony No. 2 in E flat major (composed: Vienna, 1840; performed: Vienna, Feb.1844)
• Symphony No. 3 in C minor (string parts only have survived; composed: Vienna 1846; performed: Vienna, September 1846; wind/brass parts being reconstructed by Michael F.P.Huber for first modern performances on 24 and 25 November 2012)
• Symphony No. 4 in B minor (formerly known as No.5 - composed: Vienna 1846; performed: Vienna, October 1846?)
• Symphony No. 5 in D major (formerly known as No.6 - composed: Vienna 1850; performed: Vienna, Easter Monday 1852?)

Notes: (i) The work formerly identified as 'Symphony No. 3 in F major - lost' never existed. Instead, it seems that the work in F major is actually a concert aria with an opening orchestral section in the same key (which was taken to be the opening of an unidentified symphony). (ii) the work formerly identified as 'Symphony No. 4 in C minor' (1846 - of which only the piano four-hands adaptation of its three extant movements survives) is now properly identified as 'Three Movements of a Symphony in C major (not minor): orchestral version presumably never performed'. It is undated. It was erroneously identified as the Symphony in C minor now known as No.3 (above).

• Piano Concerto (1850): scored for both orchestra and piano four-hands
• Serenade for Strings (nd)
• Innerer Kampf ("Inner Struggle"), orchestral overture (nd)
• Die Braut von Messina ("The Bride of Messina"), orchestral overture (1850)
• Dramatische Overture (1878)

Chamber Music

• String Quartet in E-flat major (1850)
• String Quartet in G major (1870)
• Piano Trio in A-flat major (1868): third movement seems to be a reworking of the 2nd movement of the Piano Concerto.
• Piano Quartet in C minor (1836)
• Piano Quartet in A-flat major (1870): the first and the last movements possibly are reworkings of earlier compositions.

Instrumental works

• Sonata for Piano 4-hands in D minor (1850)
• Piano Sonata No. 2 in C major, Op.7 (1855)^[4]
• 6 Character Pieces, Op.14 (by 1871)^[5]
• Piano Sonata in D minor, Op.18 (1880)