all clear. The “wedding roast” could be served, although one of the meat suppliers of the possibly most important song festival in the world, based in Hohenems in Vorarlberg, was canceled due to corona.
After all, the aforementioned roast is a fairly seldom performed trio by Franz Schubert. However, this was also endangered because the up-and-coming bass-baritone Konstantin Krimmel, who was actually planned, had to pass due to viruses.
His voice colleague Andrè Schuen took over his role in “Hochzeitsbraten”, this extremely rarely sung humor trio about the catering of a proletarian marriage full of obstacles. It’s one of the favorites in Vorarlberg anyway. Supported by the American soprano Louise Alder and the Tyrolean tenor Martin Mitterrutzner, the concert with rare Schubert trios and opera arias went smoothly and brilliantly across the stage of the Hohenems Markus Sittikus Hall.
The neat turn-of-the-century building, decorated in a cheerful grey-yellow-green on the inside, was once a municipal gymnasium, then a multi-purpose celebration room. Even Krimhilden plays with orchestra and choir were held there in the 1950s – opposite, in the palace of the Counts of Hohenems built by Italian Renaissance architects, copies A and C of the Nibelungenlied were discovered in the 18th century.
The cosmopolitan nature of the 16,000-inhabitant town in the middle of the Rhine Valley, which only became a town in 1983, was also reflected in the settlement of Jewish fellow citizens by the sovereigns. So there was the Judengasse alongside the Christengasse. This mixed up in the 19th century. It was only at the end of the 20th century that this unique heritage was once again clearly and historically opened up.
Since 1976 there has also been the Schubertiade, founded by the popular singer-songwriter Hermann Prey. Born out of a star mood, the managing director at the time, Gerd Nachbauer, who was born in Hohenems, took it over in 1981 and has put it on a solid, privately financed footing to this day. For years, the idyllic village of Schwarzenberg in the nearby Bregenz Forest has served as a branch for the five festival periods, which run from the end of April to mid-October.
The halls with 330 (Hohenems) and 600 (Schwarzenberg) seats were well occupied for decades. An international audience faithfully and knowingly made the pilgrimage to Vorarlberg’s Lied Mecca. Busloads came from Holland and Britain. Of course, predominantly culture-hungry retirees on a leisurely short vacation, but they never died out, they grew back.
Just like the performers. After all, many experts consider the German language to be the most subtle way to put words into sound. So the founding generation of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Christa Ludwig, Prey and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau was gradually replaced by their students as heirs. This continues happily to this day. Andrè Schuen, who, with his sovereign accompanist Daniel Heide, performed Brahms’s “Beautiful Magelone” on texts by Ludwig Tieck in a strikingly striking manner, has long been the new Prey in Vorarlberg.
Interesting observation: The silver lake no longer glitters in the hall, there is a lot of blonde and brown and black hair color. “The people of Hohenems and the residents followed suit,” says Gerd Nachbauer, who nevertheless looks to the future with a little doubt. Corona has called into question some of the things that were taken for granted in the cultural sector, which had been healthy until then. After all, the locals have filled the gaps of the missing strangers.
The Schubertiade had happily balanced itself between supply and demand with the finest lied and chamber music. Nachbauer even found the time and means to set up and oversee seven museums in Hohenems as an accomplished historian. There are the Schubert and Schubertiade collections.
A Nibelungen Museum grew out of their own collection. He used the estate of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf to design lovingly designed showrooms (the recently arrived estate of the miracle tenor Fritz Wunderlich is also waiting under the showcases).
There is a Stefan Zweig memorial room – Zweig’s mother was born in the house. Hohenemser was also Schubert’s friend Salomon Sulzer, and a gallery commemorates the Jewish cantor. And for Salzburg’s Archbishop Markus Sittikus von Hohenems, builder of Hellbrunn Palace, water features were designed behind the hall named after him.
But now the big question arises: Will the international audience that ultimately finances this unique festival return? Gerhard Nachbauer is both confident and cautious at the same time: “The next three years will show whether something as precious as a concentrated song festival has a future. I believe so of course. But now we really have to woo new audiences. This is an opportunity.” He has had an artistic advisor for ten years. His name: Andreas Schubert.