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Johann Gottfried MÜTHEL (1728 - 1788): "Complete Fantasias - Choral Preludes"
Léon Berben, organ
rec: July 2017, Mühlberg (D), St.-Lukaskirche
Aeolus - AE-11131 (© 2017) (67'22")
Liner-notes: E/D
Cover & track-list
Scores
Spotify
Fantasia in E flat (I);
Fantasia in E flat (II);
Fantasia in F;
Fantasia in G;
Fantasia in g minor;
Fugenfantasie in C;
O Traurigkeit, o Herzeleid;
Prelude in C;
Variations on Jesu, meine Freude;
Herzlich tut mich verlangen;
Was mein Gott will, das gescheh allzeit
I suspect that the name of Johann Gottfried Müthel will ring a bell with only a few music lovers. If he is known, it is probably because of his organ works. However, even those are not that frequently played, probably because they are technically complicated and also not that easy to understand, as the present disc demonstrates.
Müthel was the son of an organist and was educated to the same profession; his main teacher was Johann Paul Künzen in Lübeck. At the age of 19 he occupied his first position as organist at the court of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. He was given the opportunity to go to Leipzig to study with Bach, but the master died only a few months after Müthel's arrival. Therefore it seems unlikely that the two were in close contact. Even so, like Goldberg Müthel is ranked among Bach's pupils. During his stay in Leipzig, he copied a number of Bach's keyboard works, such as the Chromatic fantasia and fugue and the English Suites. After Bach's decease, Müthel stayed for some time with his son-in-law, Johann Christoph Altnickol, in Naumburg, and then went to Dresden, where he became acquainted with Johann Adolf Hasse. He also came into contact with Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach and Georg Philipp Telemann. Little is known about the last stage of his career, when he worked in Riga as Kapellmeister and organist.
Müthel's oeuvre is not that large. It comprises some keyboard concertos as well as pieces for keyboard solo, including works based on chorales. He also published a collection of songs; a cantata and a sonata for transverse flute and basso continuo have been preserved in manuscript. Today Müthel may be a largely unknown quantity, that was not very different in his own time. It was in particular Charles Burney, who paid some attention to him. He emphasized the technical virtuosity of Müthel's keyboard works. "When a student upon keyed instruments has vanquished all the difficulties to be found in the lessons of Handel, Scarlatti, Schobert, Eckard, and C.P.E. Bach; and, like Alexander [the Great] laments that nothing more remains to conquer, I would recommend to him, as an exercise for patience and perseverance, the compositions of Müthel; which are so full of novelty, taste, grace, and contrivance, that I should not hesitate to rank them among the greatest productions of the present age. Extraordinary as are the genius and performance of this musician, he is but little known in Germany (...)".
Müthel's keyboard works are not only technically demanding, but they also have a very individual character. His contemporary Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart wrote: "His pieces have a completely original character: dark, ominous, unusual modulations, idiosyncratic in motions, inflexible against the fashionable taste of his contemporaries." He adds that Müthel "wraps himself in his obscurity and only gives us concertos, sonatas, and other clavier pieces from time to time (...)".
These quotations confirm the impression that Müthel's oeuvre is not easily accessible, which explains why he is not that well represented on disc. Léon Berben's disc includes the complete fantasias, which are definitely his most complicated and most personal creations. They seem to lack any coherence and structure, and sound if they are improvised on the spot. Often the different sections take just a few bars, and then Müthel turns to a different idea. Given the many contrasts between sections of these fantasias, one needs to have access to different manuals: the organ in the St. Lukaskirche in Mühlberg (Franciscus Volckland, 1729/Ernst Friedrich Hesse, 1823) has two manuals and pedal. The latter is of great importance, as it plays a major role in many of Müthel's works. The Fantasia in g minor, for instance, includes some virtuosic pedal passages. In the Prelude in C, Müthel even confines himself to the pedals: the whole piece is played on the pedal board. It is followed by another curious work, the Fugenfantasie in C. The fact that it is in the same key as the prelude may have inspired Berben to play them as if they belong together, with little space between them. However, the track-list does not indicate that they are formally connected. It is a strange work that opens in the usual way, but soon it takes the character of a fantasia, like the other fantasias included here. It takes almost thirteen minutes, which makes it by far the longest work on this disc.
The pieces based on chorales are very different from, for instance, those by Johann Sebastian Bach and even many of Müthel's contemporaries, such as Gottfried August Homilius. In Herzlich tut mich verlangen, the chorale melody is heavily ornamented, sometimes close to being unrecognizable. That is even more the case in the three variations on Jesu, meine Freude. In the first, the chorale is again strongly ornamented, but in the second, it is hardly recognizable anymore. The last is an extended harmonisation, in the harmonic language typical of the time.
This disc offers the opportunity to become acquainted with a composer, who - like some of his contemporaries, such as CPE and Wilhelm Friedemann Bach - wrote in an idiom which was very much his own and hard to understand by his contemporaries. Even today, only few performers dare to delve into his oeuvre. Léon Berben deserves praise for taking up the challenge to bring this music to our attention. His performances are pretty much ideal: he effectively uses the possibilities of the organ in order to explore the idiosyncracies of Müthel's keyboard works. The acoustic is rather dry, which I normally find rather problematic in organ music. However, the fantasias are likely not meant as music for the church, and because of the many contrasts which sometimes follow each other pretty quickly, the acoustic is an advantage rather than a problem.
Even those who are no real organ lovers should investigate this disc with music of a stubborn and unusual nature.
Johan van Veen (© 2020)
Relevant links:
Léon Berben