Music and Politics - Art Music

Art Music

Beethoven's third symphony was originally called "Bonaparte". In 1804 Napoleon crowned himself emperor, whereupon Beethoven rescinded the dedication. The symphony was renamed "Heroic Symphony composed to Celebrate the Memory of a Great Man".

Verdi's chorus of Hebrew slaves in the opera Nabucco is sometimes considered to be a kind of rallying-cry for Italians to throw off the yoke of Austrian domination (in the north) and French domination (near Rome) - the "Risorgimento". Following unification, Verdi was awarded a seat in the national parliament.

RAPM (The Russian Association of Proletarian Musicians) was formed in the early 1920s. In 1929 Stalin gave them his backing. Shostakovich had dedicated his first symphony to Mikhail Kvardi. In 1929 Kvardi was arrested and executed. In an article in The Worker and the Theatre, Shostakovich's The Tahitit Trot (from the ballet The Golden Age) was criticised. "Can one actually dance to such music", said Ivan Yershov. the article claimed it was part of "ideology harmful to the proletariat"". Shostakovich's response was to write his third symphony, The First of May (1929) to express "the festive mood of peaceful construction".

Prokofiev wrote music to order for the Soviet Union, but managed to keep his musical standard high. Cantata for the 20th Anniversary of the October Revolution (1937) is far from banal. Khachaturian's ballet Spartacus (1954/6) concerns gladiator slaves who rebel against their former Roman masters. It was seen as a metaphor for the overthrow of the Czar. Similarly Prokofiev's music for the film Alexander Nevsky concerns the attack of Teutonic knights into the Baltic states. It was seen as a metaphor for the Nazi invasion of the USSR. In general Soviet music was neo-romantic while Fascist music was neo-classical.

"I don't believe anyone venerates Mussolini more than I" said Stravinsky in 1930 to a Rome newspaper. By 1943 Stravinsky was banned in Nazi Germany because he had chosen to live in the USA. Beginning in 1940, Orff's cantata Carmina Burana was performed at Nazi Party functions, and acquired the status of a quasi-official anthem. In 1933 Berlin Radio issued a formal ban on the broadcasting of jazz. However, it was still possible to hear swing music played by German bands. This was because of the moderating influence of Goebbels, who knew the value of entertaining the troops. In the period 1933-45 the music of Mahler, a Jewish Austrian, virtually disappeared from the concert performances of the Berlin Philharmonic.

Richard Strauss's opera Die Schweigsame Frau was banned from 1935–1945 because the librettist, Stefan Zweig, was a Jew. In the Trblinka death camp, new arrivals were presented with a deceptive scene. A ten-piece orchestra played jazz and Jewish folk tunes Shloyme Klezmer stood by the entrance of the gas chambers and played with the orchestra as the bodies were gassed. He saw his son being led in and pulled him out of the line. As SS officer saw this and laughed. Shloyme smashed his violin over the SS officer's head and marched with his only child into the gas chamber