Hans Brückner (Author)

Hans Brückner (born October 6, 1897 in Munich , † April 6, 1941 ibid) was a German music writer, composer and editor during the Nazi era . As a member of the NSDAP , he saw himself - like Fritz Stege - as a self-proclaimed “cultural censor” who, with his journalistic activities, supported the reorganization of music production and performance in line with the Nazi ideology.

Life

Brückner was a soldier in World War I and at the beginning of his career was active as an author of operetta songs for provincial theaters. In August 1928 he became a member of the NSDAP. As publisher and editor-in-chief of the Kampfblatt Das Deutsche Podium , which he founded, with the subtitle of the specialist journal for light music and music restaurants , he particularly agitated against jazz music popular in Germany , against colored people and Jews; his role model was the writing style of Julius Streicher ( Der Stürmer ), with whom he was friends. In addition to anti-Semitic inflammatory articles (“How they lie”), he wrote the book Musikalisches Juden-ABC with the strings confidante Christa Maria Rock , which was “the attempt to exclusively list composers, librettists, musicians, singers, lyricists, music writers and Musicologists of Jewish origin ”.

Brückner defamed the composer Darius Milhaud in a perfidious way and using the Nazi racial typology :

“His square skull with its sensual shapes and insidious gaze betrays him, as does his genuine Jewish egoism. Just as harsh and brutal as his selfishness turned out to be in life, are his harmonies , the means of polytonality , with ample use of diatonic themes. "

- quoted by: Annkatrin Dahm : The Topos of the Jews

With his research, Brückner sought to promote the exclusion of all “Jewish tribes, mixed race, Jewish relatives and Jewish infiltrates” from 'German' musical life . Michael H. Kater wrote in his book on Daring Play - Jazz under National Socialism : “In his opinion, the anti- Semitist policy of the regime was not sufficient and fast enough, especially the fact that the RMK purge of Jewish dance and jazz musicians was undermining him Delays and bureaucratic incapacity suffered. That is why he devoted his publishing career to the goal of exposing as many "music Jews" as possible and driving them out of business ”. In the book publication, Brückner claimed to be capable of a special “Jewish nose”, which especially “let off steam in the unmasking of the 'cover names'”. Brückner's foreword says:

“So let the Jew begin to reflect on his culture and his music. We Germans have already started to give him the necessary time, and we are busy for us to return our German music to the German spirit and to our ancestral style. "

- From: Judaism, anti-Semitism and German-language literature from the First World War

With his denunciation activities, Brücker ignored the Fuehrer's decision made after the Röhm Putsch in 1934 that the further nationalization policy should not be carried out through self-help of the party members, but should be carried out in an appropriate bureaucratic process. “But Brückner supported anti-Semitism on the grassroots; his reporters dragged Jewish musicians off the stage and insulted them in his newspaper, accusing them of ousting "Aryan" Germans. ”Among the victims of his crusade was u. a. the violinist Paul Weinapel , who worked in the Berlin Sherbini bar in 1935. At Brückner's pressure on the German Podium , Weinapels pianist was dismissed and replaced by Fritz Schulz . Brückner's research also brought to light the “non-Aryan” origins of the band leader James Kok .

Another victim of Brückner's calumnies was the German-American guitarist Harold M. Kirchstein , co-founder of the successful jazz septet Golden Sieben , because of his Jewish-sounding name . "Since Kirchstein, whose mother was of Polish descent, could not prove his" Aryan "origin to the Nazi authorities, one day in 1937 he disappeared from Germany overnight with the support of Georg Haentzschel in 1937 [...]". The subject of Brückner's attacks were also the directors of the large dance and entertainment orchestras, which had swing numbers by Jewish composers (such as Irving Berlin and George Gershwin ) in their repertoire. The band leaders Hans Rehmstedt and Kurt Widmann were warned by Brückner in 1937. "Counter-arguments that listeners often demanded such music were rejected on the grounds that it was the duty of" Aryan "musicians to educate their audiences by constantly performing non-Jewish programs."

Since Brückner had few friends in the party, the public in the Nazi state reacted rather reserved, the Völkischer Beobachter even disapprovingly with a meeting. This was mainly due to the many errors in the first edition, which led to the Reich Chamber of Culture receiving numerous complaints. Brückner and Rock had u. a. Max Bruch referred to as a Jew; They also claimed that the conductor Erich Kleiber was actually called Klaiber , which should indicate his Jewish origins. Due to his activities, Brückner was regarded by the Nazi authorities as a "simple-minded fanatic who only causes trouble [...] The fact that this Brückner has declared war on jazz seems to have had a certain protective function for Teddy Stauffer and his colleagues" : In addition, Brückner and other followers propagated dance music instead of jazz , "which even in high party circles only caused yawns". Joseph Goebbels wrote in his diary in November 1935, coming from an event with German dances : “One can only say: 'Back to jazz'. A terrible, inflated amateurism . I suffered."

Above all, Ralph Benatzky's complaint that Brückner thought he was a Jew prompted Goebbels to request a revised second edition from the authors, which appeared in 1936. Brückner published a third, revised version in 1938 at great financial sacrifice. In 1941 the Reich leadership of the NSDAP published its own certified Jewish leader, the Lexicon of Jews in Music ; however, this time jazz musicians were demonstratively excluded.

Hans Brückner, who lived in Munich, also wrote a number of hits and popular music, such as “Das Sommerfest”, “Greetings from afar”, “Herrgott, protect the German Rhine” or “What the old beach chair dreams”; in the opinion of Oliver Hilmer "all awkward pieces full of kitschy penny-penny romance."

Fonts (selection)

• with Christa Maria Rock (Ed.): Judaism and Music - with an ABC of Jewish and non-Aryan music enthusiasts . 3rd edition, Munich: Brückner, 1938, (1st edition 1935, 2nd edition 1936)

Web links

• The German podium at source of silence

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hans Brückner in the Bavarian Musicians' Lexicon Online (BMLO)
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Otto Hilmes: Berlin 1936: Sixteen days in August . 2016
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Annkatrin Dahm: The Topos of the Jews: Studies on the history of anti-Semitism in German-language music literature. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007, p. 318
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} Michael H. Kater : Daring game. Jazz under National Socialism . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Cologne 1995, ISBN 3-462-02409-4 .
5. ^ ^{A b} Michael H. Kater: The Twisted Muse: Musicians and Their Music in the Third Reich , p. 84
6. ^ Michael H. Kater : Different Drummers: Jazz in the Culture of Nazi Germany . 2003, p. 227
7. ↑ Judaism and Music - with an ABC of Jewish and non-Aryan music enthusiasts, Hans Brückner, Christa Maria Rock (ed.), 3rd edition, Munich: Brückner, 1938, (1st edition 1935, 2nd edition 1936), cf. . Sources on Viktor Alberti: University of Hamburg
8. ↑ Judaism, Anti-Semitism and German-Language Literature from the First World War , ed. edited by Hans Otto Horch, 1993, p. 242.
9. ↑ Michael H. Kater: The Twisted Muse: Musicians and Their Music in the Third Reich , p. 84
10. ^ Theo Stengel , Herbert Gerigk : Lexicon of Jews in Music. With a list of titles of Jewish works. Compiled on behalf of the Reich leadership of the NSDAP on the basis of official, party-checked documents (= publications of the Institute of the NSDAP for research into the Jewish question, vol. 2), Berlin: Bernhard Hahnefeld, 1941, (1st edition 1940).
11. ^ The summer festival, cheerful concert piece , music and text: Hans Brückner, arrangement: Helmut Ritter; Hans Brückner Publisher: Edition Wipermo Joh. Zientner, Augsburg, Berlin