Search - Tony Palmer's Film About The Salzburg Festival on DVD

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Anthony J. Lomenzo | Fort Ann, New York | 02/09/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This DVD is an excellent retrospective documentary on the Salzburg Festival with comment on and, moving to current times, from and about the major personalities who had originally shaped the festival and down through the present day and those so involved today.

As is known, there has been controversy regarding Tony Palmer's documentary and it's hardly any secret of the festival and various personalities of that era continuing their service to same during the Hitler era. In effect, various and sundry 'separating' the idea of Art from that of politics. This does not seem to sit well with Michael P. Steinberg who labels von Karajan as a "Nazi and true believer" [sic] but my problem with the Nazi labeling thing [and essentially, to hear some say it, including 'all' others so involved during the Hitler era] is that the labeler has the distinct benefit of 100% hindsight of duly knowing and in great detail all that was to come and hence freezing a frame of virtually anyone standing near a swastika from 1933 onward [and to the end of the war and the Nazi regime] but then applying what was 'later' learned 'after' 1945, and the KZ horrors and Holocaust therein, well, I'm not so sure that sweeping indictments can or should be made as if to suggest that "then", 1933 onward and even before the '39 Poland invasion, "they should have known better" or "why didn't they just walk away or leave" and if 'they' did 'not' walk away, ahhh, de facto "Schuld" ['guilt'] by association.

Steinberg also comments that the Austrian plebesite after-the-fact was "97% approval" [sic] and thus other comments of a "German invasion" [sic] by Austrians and per Steinberg becomes wholly negated with the suggestion that "they wanted it .. they welcomed it" or, put another way, what 'invasion' ! It's definitely a documentary with the bark on or warts if you prefer and there are some who are prepared to write-off Richard Strauss himself for accepting the Arts post he did during the NSDAP era and it's left to his great-grand daughter [a very attractive lady] to 'explain' which she attributes to his "ego" and in fact total separation of "art from politics." Böhm touches on that point too with regard to his father. Or Furtwängler's widow. Others, it will be noted, seem to be at great pains to 'quickly' mention during their interview that they were just children at the time of the war.

There is also documentary comment on the latter period of the Salzburg Festival and the 'modernization' [!?] of certain classic pieces a la Peter Sellars, et al, with latter day "updated" [!?] Don Giovanni's [Mozart] doing drugs [!] or "Jedermann" suddenly moving centuries ahead and now driving a Ferrari or assorted, IMO, tradition be damned kind of thing and the apparent need for change albeit 'only' for the 'sake' of change as if to say modern is decidedly and allegedly better and folks can 'relate' better to modern times by upping the classics in terms of their original era and setting, as it were, to modern times and scenarios. I disagree!

Personally, I'm not a subscriber to "updating" the classics nor tinkering with the original works of others where some of these "updates" and "tinkerings" have been embarrassing fiascoes where tradition is not 'modified' but literally trampled upon and run into the ground in toto in a sort of can-you-top-this 'presentation' where the outrageous passes for alleged art! Yes, I know, to each his/her own ... but mercifully so! I personally believe tradition has its place and does NOT become "stale" due to its 'age' and thus, goes the Sellars [et al] philosophy, in need of "reviving" when in fact each cast of a great classic play or opera or, since I play classical piano, each interpreter, brings to the piece a different approach, and granted forthwith, but fundamentally 'adheres' to the vision of the composer without 'modifying' same to the point of gross absurdity nor causing it to become virtually unrecognizable in its allegedly 'revived' or 'updated' form. But then, I've been called "an incurable romantic ... stuck in time" although my defense to that is time itself being the measure of the worth of the great classic masterpieces and concurrent classical era [generic wise] traditions that should be both retained ... and defended.

Doc Tony

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