RoR: Forum

I am not an expert in classical music, nor am I studied in Karajan's biography beyond having watched the 2008 documentary Karajan. There seems to be no evidence he was a Nazi ideologue. He did face a dilemma in his youth. In Germany positions as conductors were government jobs. The enabling act, giving Hitler dictatorial powers in Germany, was passed in March 1933, fifteen days before Karajan joined the party. He could have ended his career or become a member of the party. He chose the latter. The effect was not to support the state monetarily or ideologically, but to lend it his prestige, and to let him live off it. Others fled Germany. Had he done so it is unlikely as mere ex-Kapellmeister of Ulm he would have ever had a career. He was obviously weak and ambitious.

I much prefer his recordings of Beethoven over any other conductor's.

Wikipedia

Karajan was born in Salzburg, Austria-Hungary, as Herbert Ritter von Karajan.[11] He was a child prodigy at the piano.[12] From 1916 to 1926, he studied at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, where he was encouraged to concentrate on conducting by his teacher, who detected his exceptional promise in that regard.

In 1929, he conducted Salome at the Festspielhaus in Salzburg and from 1929 to 1934 Karajan served as first Kapellmeister at the Stadttheater in Ulm. In 1933 Karajan made his conducting debut at the Salzburg Festival with the Walpurgisnacht Scene in Max Reinhardt's production of Faust. It was also in 1933 that von Karajan became a member of the Nazi party, a fact for which he would later be criticised.

In Salzburg in 1934, Karajan led the Vienna Philharmonic for the first time, and from 1934 to 1941, he was engaged to conduct operatic and symphony-orchestra concerts at the Aachen opera house.

Karajan's career was given a significant boost in 1935 when he was appointed Germany's youngest Generalmusikdirektor and performed as a guest conductor in Bucharest, Brussels, Stockholm, Amsterdam and Paris [1] [13]. In 1937 Karajan made his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic and the Berlin State Opera, conducting Fidelio. He then enjoyed a major success at the State Opera with Tristan und Isolde. In 1938, his performance there of the opera was hailed by a Berlin critic as Das Wunder Karajan (The Karajan miracle). The critic asserted that Karajan's "success with Wagner's demanding work Tristan und Isolde sets himself alongside Furtwängler and de Sabata, the greatest opera conductors in Germany at the present time".[14] Receiving a contract with Deutsche Grammophon that same year, Karajan made the first of numerous recordings by conducting the Staatskapelle Berlin in the overture to Die Zauberflöte. On July 26, 1938, he married his first wife, operetta singer Elmy Holgerloef. They would divorce in 1942.

On 22 October 1942, at the height of the war, Karajan married his second wife, Anna Maria "Anita" Sauest, born Gütermann. She was the daughter of a well-known manufacturer of yarn for sewing machines. Having had a Jewish grandfather, she was considered Vierteljüdin (one-quarter Jewish). By 1944, Karajan was, according to his own account,[citation needed] losing favor with the Nazi leadership; but he still conducted concerts in wartime Berlin on 18 February 1945 and fled Germany with Anita for Milan a short time later.[15] Karajan and Anita divorced in 1958.

In the closing stages of the war, Karajan relocated his family to Italy with the assistance of Victor de Sabata.[16] Karajan was discharged by the Austrian denazification examining board on 18 March 1946, and resumed his conducting career shortly thereafter.[17]

Post 1

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 4:16am

I reject the premise.

In any time and place, in any culture, there are always some accomplished individuals. But the numbers cannot be ignored. Germany was a civilized and educated place now and then.
University of
Heidelberg 1386
Leipzig 1409
Rostock 1419
Greifswald 1456
Freiburg 1457
Munich 1472
Mainz 1477
Tübingen 1477
Marburg 1527
Jena 1558

The Thirty Years War was fought in Germany, taking one-fourth of the population. From 1648 forward, Germany again blossmed. But that hiatus was undeniable. It was why Goethe (and Marlowe) could place Faust vaguely in the 15th century.

By the time that Germany was formed in 1871, that intellectual leadership was waning. It was that "Germany" was only a place, not a nation, that made it great. Diversity within a cultural framework of common language was the key. That was why Classical Greece thrived. It is why American unversities are the envy of the world today: we have no "national system" of education. Unlike Japan and Germany and France, in America even though they are publicly financed, our schools compete through diversity.

America drew Europe's finest. In that sense, America caused World War One and World War Two just by taking from Europe anyone and everyone with a shred of individuality, with any sense of self or self-worth, potential or even the desire for potential. Millions upon millions came here. Who was left behind?

World War One destroyed millions more, especially of the young, and especially young men. Everyone knows that Joyce Kilmer was killed in that war.

Charles Sorley Scottish war poet shot in the head by a sniper at the Battle of Loos 1915
René Eugène Gateaux French mathematician killed in action 1914
Henry Moseley British physicist killed in action 1915

It might have been better if the women of Europe had filled the cultural and intellectual vacuum but that is a strong counterfactual and the fact remains: Europe was so depleted of intellect -- depleted of soul -- that its horrible collectivism was inevitable.
And a conductor only presents someone else's music. I grew up in Cleveland. George Szell's Mozart was the gold standard, but we also had young Louis Lane and young Robert Shaw. Of my favorite music, I have different recordings by different conductors and they sound somewhat different, but you would have to be really steeped in Beethoven to say that he would have approved of this man's but not that man's interpretation. Conductors are not generators.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 2/14, 4:29am)

Post 2

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 6:11am

Ahhh, but then there was Leopold Stokowski...
[no, he was not German - but he certainly was a generator...]
(Edited by robert malcom on 2/14, 8:57am)

Post 3

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 10:45am

"I reject the premise."

Note that Michael doesn't identify the premise he is rejecting. (Neither in his encyclopedic discourse on Teutonic history does he mention the words Nazi, Hitler, or Third Reich.) That's because the premise he is accepting is that of moral and cultural relativism:

"In any time and place, in any culture, there are always some accomplished individuals."

In other words, times and places just happen, and the actions of individuals have no moral relevance to the character of the era at hand.

Herbert von Karajan was a great musician. He was also an ambitious man who was prepared to sacrifice and be sacrificed in order to secure his role as a pampered parasite of the Nazi state. He could have chosen obscurity. He chose accommodation. If you are not distracted by "Diversity" and the Thirty Years War (1618-1648)* it is not hard to admit this.

Look at all the "facts" that Michael adduces to prove his "point." It is evasion by irrelevance-overload. The questions at hand are what was the nature of the Nazi regime, and did Karajan, Furtwaengler and Boehm support it? The question of whether conductors who willingly performed for the Third Reich were morally culpable when they could have fled or gone on strike is a well-formed one. The fact that the mediocre American Poet Joyce Kilmer was killed at the Second Battle of the Marne in WWI is as relevant to that question as whether Michael Rockefeller who disappeared travelling in New Guinea in 1961 was eaten by crocodiles or headhunters.

At essence the Nazi regime was an ideological totalitarian state. Karl Boehm was present in 1923 at the Nazi Beer Hall Putsch. Herbert von Karajan joined the Nazi party. Furtwaengler was offered, but turned down the directorship of the New York Philharmonic in 1936, after the anti-semitic Nuremberg laws had been issued. It is not possible to believe that these men did not know the nature of the regime and the questions it posed them, even if there were people like Michael surrounding them talking about "the civilization of the Germans" while ignoring the bodies in the street.

--
*Note that "Diversity" (a floating abstraction if ever there was one) was the primary cause of the Thirty Years War.

Post 4

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 1:24pm

My question was much broader: it's generally believed that art, education makes people better. Just show them a way, give them knowledge and everything else is just a matter of time. Renaissance, Enlightenment, and now "Rebirth of Reason". But did it ever work? Don't get me wrong, I would love to see the positive answer. There are just few inconvenient facts, and they really bother me.

This video is not just about conductors: you see the theater full of Nazis, they understand and treasure classical music, they have tears in their eyes. These are cultured, educated, polite people. And many of these people not only were members of Nazi party, they actively participated in their deeds. ... (Some concentration camps survivors could not stand classical music for the rest of their lives. No wonder the European music was effectively eliminated after WWII - European musicians had no moral grounds to defend it).

Socialism and ideas of collective good were present in European art and philosophy long before WWI and WWII. Beethoven 9th is a hymn to collectivism. Beautiful music.

American universities are full of socialist propaganda. You might dismiss some people as fools with diplomas, but not all. They are no fools. Intellect, education, appreciation of art, sense of superiority - they have it all.

So what went wrong?

Post 5

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 3:11pm

The political rise of the Nazis would never have occurred except for the terms imposed on Germany at the Treaty of Versailles. A cultural/ideological/philosophical explanation alone does not work. Without the imposition of the Weimar Republic and the dismemberment and rape of Germany there would never have been the instability and the grievances which allowed the rise of Nazism under the mantle of nationalism.

Post 6

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 3:33pm

Maria Feht wrote: "Germany was one of the most civilized and educated countries; some of the brightest minds were teaching in their universities; German theaters, operas, museums, philosophy, science, engineering were the best in the world. Yet, their deeds were evil.

American universities are full of socialist propaganda. You might dismiss some people as fools with diplomas, but not all. They are no fools. Intellect, education, appreciation of art, sense of superiority - they have it all. So what went wrong?

To answer the question: Wrapping yourself in a mantle of great ideas does not make you a moral person. "Rebirth of Reason" does not mean the establishment of just any kind of logical undertaking that happens comes along. We are not trying to save the world through chess.

Germany, indeed, had a great culture, but that greatness was lost in the generation before World War One. That greatness had begun to wane by the middle of the 19th century, but it takes time for the sun to set, especially in the northern latitudes, it seems. The society that allowed the Nazis to take power was not educated or civilized. That is why the Nazis could control it. There was no one to oppose them.

European classical music has been called one of the best 100 things of the last 1000 years. As pleasant as it is, it is only a consequence of the ideas of the time. From Baroque, through Classical and Romantic to Impressionist, it was at once an expression and a reflection of deeper and broader philosophical issues. As the rush to collectivism accelerated, people of privilege left. (Those who only aspired to it had come here already.) Physicists and economists quit Europe ... and Europe, especially the Germans, paid the price for chasing them away. (No sense in demonizing the Germans, though. Poland was a military dictatorship, again a consequence of the Polish Brain Drain of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Millions of Italians came here from 1900-1920, and fascism filled the void there.

It is fair to ask if Von Karajan was evil. The same question could be applied to 80 million others as well -- or to many of them. What about Heisenberg, Meitner and Hahn? Was Lisa Meitner not smart enough to see what was coming? Sorting out individuals, however, is hard work. It takes a tribunal. Then you have to live with those consequences, considering that you can become your enemy.

I have Von Karajan conducting Wagner. Should I smash the disk? I have been reading Friedrich Hayek. He pointed out that a free market system does not reward people according to their moral worth, but only according to the values that others find in their work.

On the other hand, as a numismatist, when I come across a Nazi coin (which happens with mixed bulk lots), I throw it in the trash. Other collectors find that silly. They would pay me for them. I am happy to take the small loss as the small cost of sending them all to the landfill of history. Maybe I'll do the same with Highlights from the Ring. But, then the next step would be never to order a pizza from any shop displaying the pope, and I'd never have a good pizza again.

The thing with moral dilemmas is that they are not easily, if ever, solved. That's why they are dilemmas. Some Objectivists find that so threatening that they attack the people who state the problem in order to reduce their cognitive dissonance.

Ted: It was not diversity that caused the Thirty Years War: it was intolerance. The rise in trade and the secularization of knowledge tapped off the brains of the Church and after a century or two, the loss was unremediable, not the Church was ever tolerant. Men like Pope Sylvester II (Gerbert d'Aurillac) and women like Hildegard vom Bingen were rare enough. By 1500, they were no longer possible. But I digress.

Der Kerl hat geschrieben: The political rise of the Nazis would never have occurred except for the terms imposed on Germany at the Treaty of Versailles. A cultural/ideological/philosophical explanation alone does not work

Ja, doch! Look at Austria. They went through all the same problems. But the Austrian government had (hey!) Austrian economists. The government borrowed gold, stabilized the currency, and lived within its means, and even issued gold coins -- interestingly enought with a hammer and sickle in its claws -- and generally avoided the problems that Germany sank into. It was not perfect, but it is a test case. Versailles was unfair, but the world is unfair and Versailles was not caused by exceptionally evil politicians. It was like Germany a consequence. Compare Versailles to the Congress of Vienna 1815. That was reasonable people truly enlightened attempting to make the best of a bad situation. Versaille was revenge by people who believed in retributive justice.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 2/14, 4:08pm)

Post 7

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 5:14pm

Not having defined "Diversity" the claim cannot be rationally evaluated. That "Diversity" is good is an arbitrary claim based on a floating abstraction. One can quite easily say that had there been a uniform religion in a single nation state there would have been no Catholic versus Protestant civil war. The "Diversity" that existed in the Holy Roman Empire at that time amounted to myriad princelings each with his own church and his own competing government agency. A wonderful test case for anarchism.

Post 8

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 6:45pm