Paul Hindemith by Luttmann Stephen

Author:Luttmann, Stephen.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis (CAM)
Published: 2012-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

The Long Christmas Dinner (1960–61)

875. Briner, Andres. “Ergänzungen und Berichtigungen zu Thornton Wilder und Paul Hindemith.” HJb 12 (1983): 96–103.

Corrections to the compositional history of The Long Christmas Dinner as established by Schneider in his article on the Wilder–Hindemith correspondence (item 879). Also interesting for the suggestion that Wilder may have not felt up to a further collaboration with Hindemith because of Hindemith’s frequent textual alterations and dismissal of textual corrections.

876. Dahlhaus, Carl. “Das lange Weihnachtsmahl. Hindemiths Das lange Weihnachtsmahl in Mannheim uraufgeführt.” Theater heute 3, no. 2 (1962): 13–14.

Thoughtful, critical, but perhaps not entirely successful review of the opera’s premiere. Unlike Schubert (item 880), who would find the recurrence of motives as a means of implying memory, Dahlhaus finds it irritating, and declares that “the long backwards glance is foreign to Hindemith’s music.” Interesting also for its criticism of Hindemith as a conductor of opera.

877. Inwood, Mary B.B. “The Long Christmas Dinner by Paul Hindemith, Libretto by Thornton Wilder: An Eclectic Analysis.” Ph.D. diss., New York University, 1997.

878. Kemp, Ian. “Hindemith’s Long Christmas Dinner.” Musical Times 108, no. 1497 (November 1967): 999–1000.

Short but valuable essay on Hindemith’s last opera, noting the compositional means he uses to effect the seamless passage of time, the special qualities of the central sextet, and felicities of instrumentation.

879. Schneider, Norbert J. “Thornton Wilder und Paul Hindemith. Zu ihrem Briefwechsel anläßlich der Entstehung von The Long Christmas Dinner.” HJb 11 (1982): 147–88.

Account of the opera’s composition, based on correspondence and other documentary material. Analysis of what attracted Hindemith to Wilder’s play, and characteristics of Wilder’s personality and the relationship between the two. Also includes an account of their subsequent attempts to write a second opera.

880. Schubert, Giselher. “Der lange Blick zurück. Sujet und Form im Operneinakter Das lange Weihnachtsmahl.” HJb 31 (2002): 41–53.

Concentrated examination of changes in plot and formal conception from the original Thornton Wilder play to the finished opera. In the first stage of the play’s adaptation as a libretto, Hindemith required (and received) from Wilder a concentration of action as well as simplification and deindividualization of the characters’ spoken content. More revealing is Hindemith’s change in formal concept during composition, creating more surface differentiation (e.g., affect) between sections than originally planned, and greater underlying unity between them (e.g., by means of leitmotivs) in order to underscore aspects and moments of memory. Describes the resulting temporal effect as one of “kaleidoscopic stasis,” comparing this to contemporary notions of posthistory. A briefer (perhaps earlier) version of the article appears under the same title in Musiktheater im Spannungsfeld zwischen Tradition und Experiment (1960 bis 1980), ed. Christoph-Hellmut Mahling and Christian Pfarr (Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 2002), 43–50.

881. Schuh, Willi. “Paul Hindemith: Das lange Weihnachtsmahl.” In the author’s Umgang mit Musik. Über Kompositionen, Libretti und Bilder, 249–53. Zürich: Atlantis, 1970.

Review of the opera upon its premiere performance, originally appearing in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 21 December 1961. A model of perceptive critique; the insights about the play’s transformation into libretto and Hindemith’s compositional decisions in setting

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