Herbert von Karajan

Austrian conductor

• Born: April 5, 1908
• Birthplace: Salzburg, Austro-Hungarian Empire
• Died: July 16, 1989
• Place of death: Anif, Austria

Karajan, the finest conductor of the postwar period, was the conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and was named conductor for life of that organization in 1955. He was also the head of the Vienna State Opera, of the Salzburg Festival, and of the Philharmonia Orchestra of London.

Early Life

Herbert von Karajan (fuhn KAHR-ah-yahn) was born in Salzburg, Austria (then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire). Salzburg enjoys a rich musical history as the home of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Joseph Haydn, Ludwig van Beethoven, and many other composers of orchestral and opera literature. Because of this musical heritage, great performers, composers, and conductors were relatively common in Austria. Great music, performed with technical grace and interpretation, seemed always just around the corner for the young Karajan.

Karajan, who would someday be considered a virtuoso conductor, and one of the last Austro-German traditionalists, began his career as a young piano prodigy. His first public performance came before the age of eight, and, although he soon left the piano keyboard for the baton, his piano skills were always of great value to him as he studied and prepared conducting scores. He first began studying conducting at the Vienna Conservatory of Music, where his teacher was Franz Schalk, who is remembered primarily for his recordings of Beethoven’s Sixth and Eighth Symphonies. From Schalk, Karajan learned many conducting techniques to enhance the natural flow of the music as well as refinement and lyricism. His first conducting post was with a small group of musicians in Ulm, but he soon left that position for a post as conductor of the orchestra at Aachen, where he remained for seven years.

In addition to his life of exciting musical experiences with many orchestras and opera companies, Karajan was a daredevil race car driver, an accomplished yachtsman, an expert pilot, and a downhill ski racer. He was known as one of the best amateur skiers in Europe. Karajan lived a fast-paced life of excitement, which may have had an effect on his married life, as he was married three times. Many people, some much younger than he, found it difficult, if not impossible, to keep up with him. He was as much at home climbing mountains or racing automobiles as he was at the conductor’s podium.

Life’s Work

In 1933, while conductor of the Berlin Opera, Karajan joined the Nazi Party as a method of furthering his career and in hope of being in the favor of the ruling influences. Hermann Göring was a strong supporter of Karajan’s assuming the position of permanent conductor at the Berlin Opera, which set Karajan in opposition to Wilhelm Furtwängler, who was being supported by Joseph Goebbels for the same position. Later, as Karajan saw the full impact of Nazi domination, he became very ashamed that he had counted himself among the Nazis and tried to break all connections with the Nazi Party. Although he was never known to speak of his Nazi past, it was evident throughout his life that the decision to join the Nazi Party haunted him.

It was after the war that Karajan’s rapid ascent as a conductor began. There was something about this short, slim, handsome, dynamic conductor that seemed to make musicians beat a path to his door. For many years he was the supreme conductor in Europe and was equally popular in other parts of the world. He had the reputation in the United States of being a virtuoso conductor, and, when he conducted the Berlin Harmonic in New York in 1955, the music critics saw him as a conductor whose gestures were restrained and tasteful and who was completely objective in his interpretations. This surprised many people, who considered that a man of Karajan’s lifestyle, one who loved to climb mountains, ski in racing events, and the like, would show passion in his conducting gestures. Many people expected to see a choreographic onslaught of emotion and reckless energy, but what they really found was a man of conducting efficiency and tender restraint. Karajan indeed was flying high and in so many directions by 1960 that he seemed to be a one-man airline, or at least he was wealthy enough to own one. He was simultaneously head of the Vienna Staatsoper, of the Salzburg Festival, and of the Berlin Philharmonic; he was also one of the chief conductors at La Scala and conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra in London.

For a while it appeared that Karajan was going to seize all of musical Europe and challenge the rest of the world. In anything he did, he had the compulsive desire to excel, to dominate, to command, and to perfect. There are more than eight hundred recordings to his credit with many major symphony orchestras of the world as well as with his beloved Berlin Philharmonic. He was considered by many critics and professional musicians to be arrogant, at times flamboyant, and rather expensive to have around. His seeming inability to make and keep associations followed him wherever he traveled.

Karajan was known as demanding in every aspect of a production and was often criticized for his insistence on total direction of a production, including staging, lighting, music, and scenery. Although he was considered by many not to be a good administrator in production affairs, he still knew tremendous successes at the podium.

The Austro-German school of conducting, which Karajan seems to represent the best, incorporates styles that have been held in common by all German, Austrian, and Hungarian conductors, even though conductors may have varied individually in expression of those styles. The Austro-German school features a tradition that has its roots in the nineteenth century. Karajan is considered to have been the last of the Austro-German school as well as a bridge into a whole new tradition of conductors. This school is so new, in fact, that it has yet to be fully defined or named.

The Austro-German school taught Karajan that musical essence is the key to successful understanding, by musician and listener alike. Karajan, like other postwar conductors, was noted for taking very seriously often arrogantly his responsibility as musical representative of the country that produced the great, unbroken line of master musicians from Johann Sebastian Bach to Gustav Mahler. Because of this serious attitude, rehearsals conducted by Karajan were often considered intense and one-sided. He was interested in one basic musical element making music as authoritatively, as honestly, as unostentatiously as possible. His conducting gestures always had an extraordinary degree of finish and, often, power. He strove to serve the wishes of the composer in the reproduction of his music. Study of the score, knowledge of related pieces, and understanding the composer’s life, times, and musical form and structure were mandatory for Karajan, even before rehearsals began. When beginning a new piece of music with the orchestra, Karajan always tried to achieve rehearsal perfection, striving for complete mastery of detail and mechanization. Next, he would usually suggest that the musicians play with a certain amount of freedom in the performance so that they could feel the sensation of making music by individual means. Through technical perfection and freedom of expression, a level of emotion was shared by the orchestra and conductor together.

To Karajan, conducting was more of a communication of feelings than a keeping of beat. He boasted to his students that he could have both wrists tied to his sides, and the orchestra would still feel his beat. Like the famous conductor of the classical period Gasparo Spontini, Karajan used to say that he could conduct an orchestra with his eyes alone. He was a firm believer that rhythm is a mysterious force that goes out in pulses from the conductor to the performers. It is this inner rhythm that is more important to musical flow than that conveyed through arm and body movement.

Karajan resigned the Berlin post in April, 1989, because of failing health. He died in Anif, Austria, an area very near to his childhood home of Salzburg, on July 16.

Significance

Karajan, although in constant demand with European orchestras, conducted only fifteen performances at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Yet few as they were, they were of great importance, if only because Karajan almost never came to the United States as a guest conductor and only rarely appeared there with the orchestras with which he was so involved all of his life in Europe the Berlin and Vienna philharmonics. If Karajan’s history in the United States is sparse, his impact on classical music and opera in the United States, as well as throughout the world, is nevertheless beyond calculation. His recorded legacy is his performance legacy, and, to at least two generations of music lovers, his recordings were the keys that unlocked the riches of the repertory. First with the Philharmonia Orchestra in London and later with the Berlin and Vienna philharmonics, Karajan recorded and often rerecorded that legacy.

It is doubtful that there will be anyone to fill the vacancy left by Karajan: He was considered the general music director of the world for many years, and his nearly six hundred recordings are left as textbook examples of the efficacy of rehearsal, casting control, and overall structural vision. For that reason, Karajan’s contributions to music in the later twentieth century are engraved permanently in memory.

During his thirty-five years at the helm of the Berlin Philharmonic, which he molded into the most commanding symphony in the world, Karajan won acclaim as a master musical architect, achieving a remarkable fusion of precision and power. He lived an intensely passionate lifestyle. He made a goal for himself never to fritter away one moment of his life, and he achieved that goal.

Bibliography

Green, Elizabeth A. H. The Dynamic Orchestra. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1987. This book discusses how conductors prepare, inspire, and interact with orchestras. Includes many examples of Karajan’s leadership and short stories of his conducting.

Holden, Raymond. The Virtuoso Conductors: The Central European Tradition from Wagner to Karajan. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2005. A study of the major conductors and composers of Central Europe up to and including Karajan. The chapter on him is called “Das Wunder Karajan.” Also includes chapters on Mahler and Richard Strauss, among others.

Hurd, Michael. The Orchestra. New York: Facts On File, 1980. Written from the orchestra member’s point of view, this book describes the relationship of performer and conductor with various examples of Karajan and others who have made an impression on the conducting profession in modern times.

Matheopoulos, Helena. Maestro: Encounters with Conductors of Today. New York: Harper & Row, 1982. The text is written in the style of an interview with Karajan, providing insight into his views of the role of conductor.

Osborne, Richard. Herbert von Karajan: A Life in Music. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2000. Osborne, a British music critic who previously published a book of his interviews with Karajan, provides an exhaustive and fascinating biography of the conductor.

Schonberg, Harold C. The Great Conductors. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1967. A life sketch of Karajan including his schooling, early career, and life accomplishments.

Stuckenschmidt, H. H. Germany and Central Europe. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971. Part of the Twentieth Century Composers series. Details the Austro-German school of conducting and how it relates to the music of Europe. Karajan is mentioned in his relationship to the music of composers such as Mahler.