Faust I (audio book)

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Fist. The first part of the tragedy in the Gründgens production of the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus
Studio album by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Publication
(s)

1954

Label (s) Deutsche Grammophon

Format (s)

3 LPs in linen cassette with text book, MC , CD

Genre (s)

Speech plate

Title (number)

22nd

running time

2½ h

occupation Paul Hartmann , Gustaf Gründgens , Käthe Gold , Elisabeth Flickenschildt , Max Eckard , Ullrich Haupt , Hansgeorg Laubenthal, Peter Esser, Gerhard Geisler, Rudolf Therkatz, Paul Maletzki, Karl Vibach , Kurt Weitkamp , Hans Müller-Westernhagen , Siegfried Siegert, Piet Clausen, Ursula Dinggräfe, Maria Alex, Sybille Binder, Mark Lothar (music)

production

Gustaf Gründgens, Peter Gorski

Studio (s)

Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus

chronology
- Fist. The first part of the tragedy in the Gründgens production of the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus Fist. The second part of the tragedy in the Gründgens production of the Schauspielhaus Hamburg

Fist. The first part of the tragedy in the Gründgens production of the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus is a speech record made by Deutsche Grammophon in 1954.

Of the many audio book and speech record productions that go back to the first part of Goethe's Faust drama, the one described here remains the most significant in terms of cultural history, not least because from today's perspective it is generally regarded as the first German-language commercial audio book .

First German audio book

The recording was at least the first German attempt to "reproduce a great dramatic poem of world literature as a whole on the record", the first coherent recording of a work written for the speech stage for the speech plate . This was made possible by the development of the long-playing record a few years earlier. The production management was in the hands of Gründgens' adoptive son Peter Gorski , while Gustaf Gründgens was responsible for the dramaturgical set-up and direction after his production at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus . The recording does not follow the later Hamburg production with Will Quadflieg, known from the film adaptation . However, the direction concept on which the speech record is based was first implemented by Gründgens in 1941 in the State Theater in Berlin . "Faust I" premiered in Düsseldorf on April 13, 1949 with Paul Hartmann , who later also spoke on the record production, in the title role under the direction of Gründgens. The recordings took place there in the old Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus from May 6 to 9 and from June 16 to 18, 1954. For some time now, this recording has been available as a CD edition in good digitized sound quality.

Focus on the word

At the end of the 1950s, the Faust recording was re-released in the "Literary Archive" of Deutsche Grammophon

The extensive renunciation of acoustic illusions largely distinguishes recordings from the radio drama of this time. The main focus in the implementation of the staging for the record is on the poetry as a linguistic work of art. The aim was by no means, as is often assumed today, to create a document of the Düsseldorf production by Gründgens (which the contemporary critics also viewed critically anyway), but rather to bring Goethe's drama to life and present it with the mere means of language to do as a stage performance does with the resources of the theater. In this sense, attempts have been made - also by deliberately shortening the text - to concentrate on the essence of poetry, to make the breath of poetry audible. With this objective in mind, the experienced stage musician Mark Lothar , with whom Gründgens worked closely, composed music that can only be used very sparingly. as early as the 1930s, Lothar and Gründgens had written chansons together for the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft on the occasion of Paul Apels' radio installation of Hans Sonnenstößers Höllenfahrt .

With the 54 Faust recording, standards were set that for a long time remained binding for the record set-up of plays: minimalist use of music, as far as possible avoidance of noises, full concentration on the poet's word - which also meant that one should also dispense with intermediate texts as far as possible.

Bold experiment

In a commemorative publication on the occasion of Deutsche Grammophon's 70th birthday, it becomes clear what a risky pioneering achievement the production and publication of the recording was - despite a dream cast that flocked to Gründgens with Paul Hartmann, Käthe Gold , Elisabeth Flickenschildt and Ullrich Haupt - when it says in retrospect

Implementing and recording an entire staging of spoken theater for the pure listening experience seemed an absolutely daring idea, both artistically and technically. Those who took the risk were aware of the first time and the experiment: the artists, the technicians and the merchants. The result became a sensation. There are few examples in the history of the record that a bold attempt has achieved similar success - that an experiment could be so groundbreaking. Almost a decade and a half after its publication, this recording, which remains one of Deutsche Grammophon's most popular cassette works, has lost none of its artistic presence and technical brilliance.

The production costs at that time amounted to around 40,000 marks. In the trade, the cassette finally cost between 69 and 75 marks, which was an enormous price for potential buyers at the approximate German average wage of 350 marks / month at the time. In the course of the first few years, however, 50,000 cassettes were sold, which is a record for literature recordings worldwide.

Lasting success

First edition

The first record editions appeared in luxurious equipment with a complete text booklet

The first edition of the production appeared in the fall of 1954 in a linen cassette with three long-playing records and a booklet, the appearance of which did not differ from the classical music productions published by the Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft at the time, with similar features later in the characteristic presentation of the newly founded one " Literary Archives ", which Ernst Ginsberg established as a literary brand of the record company with a green label and record label as a distinguishing mark, to which the success of the re-publication of the Faust recording made a significant contribution.

Literary archive

With the founding of the Literary Archive , outstanding scenes and monologues from the recording also appeared in individual publications, for example the school scene with Gründgens and Karl Vibach , who later assisted the director for the recording of the Hamburg Gründgens staging of Faust II for the same record company should take over, or a cross-section with various excerpts within the series "The Great Scene".

1970s until today

The continuous success of the work has led to a large number of new releases of the recording in various versions, in the 1970s / 1980s also together with the Hamburg Faust II recording as a complete edition of the Goethe work and on audio cassettes or CDs , most recently within a CD edition with all of Gustaf Gründgens' spoken works that have been preserved. To date, around 300,000 records of this recording have been sold.

Track list

Plate 1

Plate side 1

  • Prologue in Heaven
  • night

Plate side 2

  • In front of the gate
  • Study room 1st part

Plate 2

Plate side 3

  • Study room 2nd part
  • Auerbachs Keller in Leipzig

Plate side 4

  • Witch's kitchen
  • Street
  • Eve. A small, clean room
  • walk
  • The neighbor's house

Plate 3

Plate side 5

  • Street
  • garden
  • A garden shed
  • Forest and cave
  • Gretchen's room
  • Marthens garden

Plate side 6

  • At the fountain
  • Kennel
  • Night. Street in front of Gretchen's door
  • Dom
  • Cloudy day. field
  • Dungeon

Further recordings in stores