music Archives - understand-culture

The Ceiling Went Up Five Meters

The renovation of the State Opera Unter den Linden in Berlin was planned to take three years and cost 239 million euros. It took seven years and cost about 400 million euros. At the request of music director Daniel Barenboim, the ceiling of the hall was raised by five meters. A new gallery under the ceiling raised the reverberation time from 1.1 to 1.6 seconds. The house reopened on 3 October 2017.

Barenboim said: Ich bin erstaunt, wie hervorragend der Klang geworden ist. I am amazed at how excellent the sound has become. He also said: Natürlich wäre es besser gewesen, wie geplant nach drei Jahren wieder zu öffnen. Of course it would have been better to reopen after three years, as planned.

The Wire-Mesh Fence

In 1999 Regina Zindler of Auerbach in Saxony took a dispute with her neighbor to Richterin Barbara Salesch, a court show on the channel Sat.1. It was about a snowberry bush, a Knallerbsenstrauch, at her Maschendrahtzaun, her wire-mesh fence. Her claim was dismissed.

Stefan Raab made a song out of her Saxon pronunciation of the word. Maschendrahtzaun spent six weeks at number one in the German charts. Fans besieged her property, stole parts of the fence and damaged her house. She moved to Berlin and returned to Saxony only years later.

The Trial Shot in Der Freischütz

Carl Maria von Weber’s opera Der Freischütz had its premiere in Berlin on 18 June 1821. The libretto is by Friedrich Kind. The young hunter Max wants to marry Agathe and become the successor of the hereditary forester, the Erbförster. For this he must pass a Probeschuss, a trial shot. If he misses, he cannot marry Agathe. At a shooting contest, Max does not hit the target a single time, and the onlookers mock him. He then agrees to meet the hunter Kaspar at midnight in the Wolf’s Glen to cast Freikugeln, magic bullets. At the end, a hermit speaks for Max. He argues for abolishing the trial shot. Instead, he proposes a Probejahr for Max, a probationary year, so that Max can find his way back to the path of virtue. The prince accepts his judgment.

The Permit for Rock am Ring

In June 2016, the festival Rock am Ring took place on the airfield at Mendig. On the Friday evening, lightning injured a total of 71 people, according to the Red Cross. The organizers interrupted the festival after a crisis meeting with the interior minister of Rhineland-Palatinate, Roger Lewentz. Wir müssen alles dafür tun, dass keine neuen Verletzten hinzukommen, Lewentz said. We must do everything so that no more people are injured. Because another storm was expected for Sunday afternoon, the Verbandsgemeinde, the local association of municipalities, then withdrew the organizers’ permit to continue the festival. About 90,000 visitors had come. The concert promoter Marek Lieberberg spoke of höhere Gewalt, an act of God. He accused Lewentz of having pushed the responsibility for the cancellation onto the municipality. A spokesman for the interior ministry replied that Lewentz had already demanded that the event be stopped the day before.

Traffic Songs for School Children

Rolf Zuckowski is a German songwriter for children. Since 1979 his Schulweg-Hitparade, the school-route hit parade, has taught children how to behave in traffic. The car magazine Auto Bild called it die musikalische Bibel der deutschen Verkehrserziehung, the musical bible of German traffic education. Its best-known songs are Mein Platz im Auto ist hinten, my seat in the car is in the back, and Zebrastreifen, zebra crossing. A child knows to stop at red and to sit in the back of the car, the magazine wrote, from Rolf Zuckowski. For expert advice, Zuckowski went to the police traffic instructor at his daughter’s primary school and to the German Road Safety Council. His reason: Ich konnte ja nicht einfach so drauflossingen. I could not just start singing without knowing.

Thirty Years for the Ode

Friedrich Schiller wrote his poem An die Freude, Ode to Joy, in the summer of 1785. Ludwig van Beethoven wanted to set it to music while he still lived in Bonn. A letter from 1793 says he planned to. It took him a good 30 years to complete it, in the last movement of his Ninth Symphony. The symphony was first performed in Vienna on 7 May 1824. By then it held more than six years of work and many changes. Since 1985 the instrumental version of Beethoven’s ode has been the official anthem of the European Union.

“Success” Is the Middle Grade

German amateur bands, from village brass bands to fire brigade bands, perform before juries in Wertungsspiele, rated performances. The 2026 rules of the Saxon firefighters’ association are typical. Each piece is scored on ten criteria, from intonation to overall impression, up to 100 points. The band then receives a rating from fixed bands. Hervorragender Erfolg, outstanding success, needs 91 points or more. Plain Erfolg, success, covers 61 to 70 points. Below 60 points the band is recorded only as teilgenommen, took part.

Eight Services a Week

An orchestra musician’s working week in Germany is counted in Dienste, services. The collective agreement for orchestra musicians, as quoted by the Federal Labor Court in 2003, sets the limit. On average over eight calendar weeks, or 16 in concert orchestras, a musician has to play at most eight services a week. If most performances in that period are of works rated difficult by their score, the limit is seven. A 2008 position paper from the German Stage Association described a regular week as eight services of two and a half or three hours.

Practice Is Done at Home

On 19 December 1991 the Federal Labor Court decided a case about musicians of the Deutsche Oper Berlin. The dispute was about pay for a short strike. In its reasoning the court described the duty of an orchestra musician. To perform his services properly, he needs individuelle Vorbereitung durch häusliches Proben und Üben, individual preparation by rehearsing and practicing at home, in order to meet the orchestra’s quality standard. The collective agreement did not say this anywhere. According to the court, the parties to the agreement took it for granted, selbstverständlich.

Booed Staging, Cheered Singers

In July 2016 large parts of the audience at the Bayreuth Festival loudly booed Frank Castorf’s staging of Wagner’s Siegfried. On the same evening they cheered the singers frenetically. The conductor, Marek Janowski, received a Jubelsturm, a storm of cheers.