Foerster Eva

Josef Bohuslav Foerster's life spanned almost an entire century. In the year of his birth, Wagner laid the axe to the roots of tonality with "Tristan"; shortly after his death, Boulez did the rest… Hermann Bäumer and the Osnabrück Symphony Orchestra have documented Foerster's symphonic output on three albums. This commendable edition shows a master who was highly respected during his lifetime and who remained true to himself through all the upheavals. Raised in Prague, Foerster spent many years in Hamburg and Vienna and only returned to his homeland after the founding of Czechoslovakia in 1918. Tchaikovsky, Dvorak, and Grieg encouraged him in his younger years, and later Gustav Mahler sought his advice.

When he is remembered at all, Josef Bohuslav Foerster is remembered for one of two things: that he was the first person Mahler confided in when he finally figured out how to end his "Resurrection" Symphony in C minor or that he was the composer who wrote the conspicuously Mahlerian "Easter Eve" Symphony in C minor. As this Musikproduktion Dabringhaus und Grimm disc demonstrates, however, there was more to Foerster than that. These world-premiere recordings of the Czech composer's First Symphony in D minor and Second Symphony in F major with Hermann Bäumer leading the Osnabrück Symphony Orchestra show that before he was writing like Mahler, Foerster was writing like Wagner.

Neither Josef Bohuslav Foerster's Third Symphony of 1894 nor his Fourth Symphony of 1924 could be considered ahead of their time. Indeed, they are barely of their time. His Third has much of heroic middle period Dvorák and Brahms in it while his Fourth, the "Easter Eve" symphony, mixes the weight of late Bruckner with the expressivity of middle period Mahler. But whatever their time, they could and should be considered as vital works in their own right written by a talented, sincere, and distinctive composer.