Karl Ristenpart

Karl Ristenpart (born January 26, 1900 in Kiel , † December 24, 1967 in Lisbon ) was a German conductor.

Life

Youth and studies

Karl Ristenpart was born the son of the astronomer Friedrich Wilhelm Ristenpart (1868–1913) and his wife Pauline (née Rettig; 1878–1942; see Paula Foerster ). He grew up in Berlin, but lived from 1908 to 1913 in Santiago de Chile, where his father directed the construction of the first observatory in the southern hemisphere. After the tragic death of his father, he returned to Berlin in 1913, where he experienced Hermann Scherchen's first concerts as a conductor. Ristenpart was so affected by his performance of Gustav Mahler's 5th Symphony that he decided to become a musician. His mother was Hermann Scherchen's first wife between 1919 and 1920. The First World War and its economic consequences delayed Karl Ristenpart's studies of music (1924–29) at the Stern Conservatory in Berlin and with Hugo Kauder at the Vienna Academy of Music .

Berlin years

During his time in Berlin, Karl Ristenpart founded two orchestras: the Karl Ristenpart Chamber Orchestra (Berlin, 1932) and the RIAS Berlin Chamber Orchestra (1946). Later, in 1953, the Saarland Chamber Orchestra was founded . He was best known as a Bach and Mozart conductor.

In 1930 Ristenpart married Ruth Christensen in Berlin. Musicians from the circle of this talented pianist and harpsichordist soon formed the core of the Karl Ristenpart chamber orchestra: concert master Helga Schon, solo violist Charlotte Hampe, solo cellist Helma Bemmer. This ensemble with around 15 strings played mainly baroque and contemporary works in concerts or for the radio. However, the career of its leader was inhibited from 1933 onwards because Ristenpart refused to become a member of the NSDAP. During the Second World War he was able to avoid being drafted into the Wehrmacht until 1944 by undertaking eleven long front tours with his orchestra from Norway to the Balkans and Greece.

As early as the summer of 1945, Ristenpart included works by his favorite composer Gustav Mahler in the program of his first public concert in Berlin. From February 1946, Ristenpart was commissioned to set up choral and orchestral music at RIAS (radio in the American sector). He soon began to record works from Monteverdi to Stravinsky , including Mahler, Hindemith and Schönberg , with the RIAS Chamber Orchestra, the RIAS Choir (from 1948 RIAS Chamber Choir ) and from 1947 also with the RIAS Symphony Orchestra.

In this second phase of his work, Ristenpart gained international recognition primarily through his "J. S. Bach cycle" (March 1947 to December 1952). In addition to tape recordings of most of the choral and orchestral works for the RIAS (including 70 cantatas), a Bach concert with a cantata was performed twice a week in the Evangelical Parish Hall in Berlin-Zehlendorf with the Karl Ristenpart chamber orchestra and well-known soloists. In this cycle a legendary recording of cantatas 56 and 82 was made with the baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and the oboist Herman Töttcher. When it became apparent at the end of 1952 that the RIAS could not continue to finance all of its orchestras, Karl Ristenpart accepted an offer from Saarländische Rundfunk GmbH and left Berlin in the summer of 1953.

Saarland Chamber Orchestra

The Saarland offer (which was strongly linked to the cultural and political interests of France at the time) consisted of founding a chamber orchestra with which Ristenpart was to deliver recordings for both the Saarland radio and the French record label "Les Discophiles français". This unusual combination was created through the commitment of the Belgian-French clergyman and musicologist Carl de Nys , who was employed by Radio Saarbrücken , who was primarily interested in a record production of Bach cantatas for France and who did everything to bring Ristenpart to the Saar.

Within a few weeks, Ristenpart built an orchestra of around 16 strings. Ten of these young musicians came from Berlin, including the brilliant Hendel Quartet, whose leader, Georg Friedrich Hendel , was now concertmaster. The Saarland Chamber Orchestra gave its first public concert in Saarlouis as early as October 1953. With soloists such as Jean-Pierre Rampal , Pierre Pierlot and Robert Veyron-Lacroix , the ensemble was able to conquer Paris less than a year later.

Chamber orchestra of the Saarland Radio

With the inclusion of Saarland Radio in ARD , the ensemble called itself the Chamber Orchestra of Saarland Radio from 1957 . The exemplary continued collaboration of the German strings with mainly French soloists was now to become Ristenpart's hallmark and was evident in the production of 170 LPs until his death in 1967, as well as in hundreds of recordings for the Saarland radio and triumphant concert tours. With these recordings, which Le Club français du Disque and Erato marketed around the world, Bach's Brandenburg Concerts , the orchestral suites , some cantatas and the art of fugue , as well as several records with Haydn and Mozart works, have a whole generation of musicians, mainly in France and minted in the USA. But also for LPs with contemporary works by Benjamin Britten , Albert Roussel and Paul Hindemith, the Chamber Orchestra of Saarland Radio and Karl Ristenparts were awarded several Grand Prix du Disque . The close collaboration between Ristenparts and Peter Rocholl , who, as the television producer and music editor of Saarland Radio at the time, was responsible for numerous programs on the ARD television program , also increased the level of awareness of many of the recordings .

Ristenpart's reputation as a Bach and Mozart conductor overshadowed the fact that he conducted works by at least 50 other composers on LPs, and even recorded 230 (half of them contemporary) on tapes, which are now in the music archive of Saarland Radio lie in Saarbrücken.

His grave in the Saarbrücken cemetery St. Johann

In December 1967, Ristenpart suffered a heart attack while touring Portugal with the Gulbenkian Foundation's chamber orchestra . He died on December 24th in a Lisbon hospital. The Saarland Radio Chamber Orchestra survived him for another four years, from 1968 to 1972 under the direction of the cellist and former founder of the Zagreb Soloists, Antonio Janigro . In the summer of 1973 it merged with the Saarbrücken Radio Symphony Orchestra .

bibliography

• Charles W. Scheel: Karl Ristenpart. The workshops of the conductor: Berlin, Paris, Saarbrücken , Saarbrücker Druckerei und Verlag, 1999, ISBN 978-3-930843-43-5 . This biography and documentation contains a CD with four recordings by the Saarland Radio Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Karl Ristenparts:

1. WA Mozart, Symphony concertante in E flat major for 4 wind instruments and orchestra (29'05; 1954) - Pierre Pierlot (oboe), Jacques Lancelot (clarinet), Gilbert Coursier (horn), Paul Hongne (bassoon).

2. Albert Roussel, Concerto for small orchestra op.34 (11'30; 1955).

3. André Jolivet, Concerto for flute and string orchestra (13'00; 1960) - Jean-Pierre Rampal (flute).

4th JS Bach, 4th Brandenburg Concert (15'35; 1967) - Georg Friedrich Hendel (violin), Kurt Cromm and Holger Ristenpart (flutes).

• Charles W. Scheel and Damien Ehrhardt (eds.): Karl Ristenpart et l'Orchestre de Chambre de la Sarre (1953–1967) - Karl Ristenpart and the Saarland Chamber Orchestra . Peter Lang (“Convergences” series), Bern 1999, ISBN 978-3-906762-25-8 .
• Richard Freed: The Aristocratic Ristenpart , in: Classic Record Collector , London, Spring 2006, pp. 10-17.
• Charles W. Scheel (Ed.): Gustav Mahler in the correspondence Karl Ristenpart – Richard Freed 1967 , trilingual special issue of the Cahiers de l'Amefa , Saarbrücken 2007, OCLC 239698354 (including CD with recording of the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony from 1959) .
• Hans Christoph Worbs, Nicholas Anderson:  Ristenpart, Karl. In: Grove Music Online (English; subscription required).

Discography

Original LP recordings with Karl Ristenpart as conductor

Complete list in the Scheel / Ehrhardt publication, from Peter Lang 1999:

• Only one LP from his production with the Karl Ristenpart Chamber Orchestra in Berlin (archive 14004, J. S. Bach cantatas 56 and 82 with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Hermann Töttcher);
• 169 LPs with the Saarland Chamber Orchestra, including 2 in Germany (Archive and Electrola) and 167 in France (2 Lumen, 4 Club National du Disque, 1 Harmonia mundi, 95 Discophiles français, 24 Erato, 42 Club Français du Disque);
• 4 with the symphony orchestra of the Süddeutscher Rundfunk Stuttgart (Checkmate, USA).

Released as CDs

• Archive 14004 with cantatas 56 and 82 (Polydor International / DG Classics, 1997 and repeatedly since then).
• Several Club Français du Disque, Musidisc and Erato LP recordings of Bach, Mozart and Haydn works with the SKO under Ristenpart were released as CDs in the 1980s and 1990s under the Accord or Erato labels.
• A 6-CD set was released by Accord / Universal in 2000 with Bach orchestral works (including Brandenburg concerts, orchestral suites and Art of Fugue )
• In 2005 a 4-CD set “L'art de Teresa Stich-Randall” was released by Accord / Universal with Bach, Handel, Mozart and Schubert masses, mainly with Ristenpart and the SKO.
• In 2006 a 2-CD set with cantatas 56, 82, 140, 169, 211, 212 was released by Accord / Universal
• In the USA, a large selection of Ristenpart's recordings for Club Français du Disque can be ordered as CDs via www.rediscovery.us.
• The Association Jean-Pierre Rampal has been marketing new CD editions of most of the SKO's early recordings with French soloists for Saarland Radio (1954–1957) under its Premiers Horizons Disques label [www.jprampal.com] since 2006 . Recordings of works by Frank Martin , Willy Burkhard , Peter Mieg , Jean-Michel Damase and others
• “The RIAS Bach Cantatas Project” (9-CD box - Audite 21.415, 2012); Studio recordings from Berlin (1949–1952); 29 JS Bach Cantatas (BWV 4, 19, 21, 22, 31, 32, 37, 38, 39, 42, 47, 52, 56, 58, 73, 76, 79, 88, 106, 108, 127, 140, 160, 164, 176, 178, 180, 199, 202); Karl Ristenpart - RIAS Chamber Orchestra - RIAS Chamber Choir - RIAS Boys Choir - Soli: Helmut Krebs | Agnes Giebel | Ingrid Lorenzen | Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau | Walter Hauck | Gunthild Weber | Annelie's west | Johanna Behrend | Marie-Luise Denicke | Lorri Lail | Lilo Rolwes | Gerhard Niese | Edith Berger-Krebs | Gertrud Birmele | Charlotte Wolf-Matthäus | Gerda Lammers.

Web links

• Works by and about Karl Ristenpart in the catalog of the German National Library
• Cahiers de l'Amefa Gustav Mahler in the correspondence between Karl Ristenpart and Richard Freed (1967)