Between 1870 and the turn of the century Raff was one of the giants of the musical world. Not only were his compositions played everywhere, they were written about and analysed in detail. Even from the outset critical opinion wasn't uniformly positive, any more than it was for even his most august contemporaries, but it is clear that he was regarded as a very important composer. The seriousness with which Raff's works were analysed, and the speed with which critics and musicologists rushed into print with detailed descriptions and interpretations of them, attests to his standing in serious musical circles in the second half of the 19th. century.
Some of this contemporary musical description is reprinted here:
Symphonies Nos.3, 5 and 11
Philip Henry Goepp (1864-1936) was a Philadelphia teacher and composer. Published at the turn of the 20th. century, his three volumes "Symphonies and Their Menaings" were widely read at the time. In them he describes and analyses the most significant symphonies then in the American concert repertoire. Goepp devotes forty pages of the Second Series to three of Raff's symphonies:
Symphony No.3 Im Walde
Read Goepp's description (goep_1.pdf 397KB)
Symphony No.5 Lenore
Read Goepp's description (goep_2.pdf 485KB)
Symphony No.11 Der Winter
Read Goepp's description (goep_3.pdf 475KB)
La Fileuse op.157 no.2
To complement an 1882 American Edition of one of Raff's most beloved piano pieces, the editor, A R Parsons, wrote an extensive "explanatory preface". It could easily be dismissed for its arch, flowery language and analysis ad absurdium of what is only a short, four-minute piece. Nonetheless, that such a small work was worth so much endeavour is a testament to Raff's standing at the time.
Download and display A R Parson's preface in Adobe Acrobat format (fileuse.pdf - 31KB). Also available in HTML format (9KB).
Listen to a recording of La Fileuse op.157 No.2
The English premiere of Welt Ende reported in The Times
Just as now, in Raff's day the London daily newspaper The Times published reports by it's music critics on significant concerts. As a prominent composer, Raff's compositions received their fair share of attention once they'd found their way to Britain. A year after his death, the Oratorio Welt Ende - Gericht - Neue Welt op.212 received its English premiere on 11 October 1883 at the prestigious Leeds Musical Festival under the baton of Sir Arthur Sullivan. This extensive report, which appeared in The Times the following day, is interesting not just for its description of the event and its judgment on the work, but also for its revelation that Raff had intended to attend the Festival himself.
Four Raff works reviewed in The Monthly Musical Record
The Monthly Musical Record was an influential English periodical which paid a great deal of attention to Raff's music in the 1870s. His new scores were regularly, and often favourably, reviewed in its columns. Four short reviews, of the Piano Suite in E minor, the Suite for Solo Violin & Orchestra, the Six Songs for Three Female Voices and the Erinnerungen an Venedig (Memories of Venice) for Piano, were published in two editions in 1874 and are reproduced here.
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