The Emigre Era: A Fascinating Tale in Music

The Hitler era continues to fascinate, even obsess, today’s cultural and historical observers. In connection with “Exiles and Emigres: The Flight of European Artists From Hitler,” the current (through May 11) show at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the museum and five other sponsors mounted a recital of music by 13 of those artists--in the music division--at UCLA’s Schoenberg Hall Sunday night.

With stylish, even virtuosic, singing from American soprano Constance Hauman, authoritative pianistic support from William Vendice, a documentary multimedia accompaniment, and literate, informative commentary, the evening offered charms along with its lessons.

The unusual agenda was one of those charms. This is not overexposed music, even though one may have heard some of these songs and arias by Arnold Schoenberg, Frederick Hollander, Eric Zeisl, Ernst Toch, Erich Korngold and Kurt Weill before.

What is striking about all this repertory--written in the 1930s and ‘40s, and on both sides of the pond--is that, with the exception of Weill, who made conscious efforts to write in an American idiom once having arrived here, all these composers more or less pursued their previous paths, despite the enormity of the changes in their cultural and geographical home bases.

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And serendipity reigned: For film composers of this era, which the bulk of these writers became, the Middle European style of early 20th century music was exactly what Hollywood filmmakers required, and wholeheartedly accepted.

Hauman, whose career began at Long Beach Opera and who has amassed important international credits in the decade since, proved the right performer, delivering mordant personality and expressivity, in three languages, in songs that are both substantial and light.

The diva--for once, that word really fits--was aided in no small way by Vendice’s versatile if sometimes strident pianism and the contributions of narrator Christine Schnauber, who introduced some lesser-known composers, such as Austrian Walter Jurmann, who wrote the score to the film “San Francisco” and Czech Ralph Benatzky.

Mostly, however, Hauman dominated the evening with gorgeous singing, thrilling high-notes and probing attention to text, only flagging a bit near the long program’s end. Musically, she honed in on each item carefully and fondly; when she chose to bring down the house, as it were, in an aria by Emerich Kalman, she did so with practiced authority.

The steady parade of visuals--which added much to creating a sense of the era, was mostly taken from the LACMA show--was the handiwork of Howard Carey. They included evocative portraits, and in some cases, notably that of Schoenberg, showed off the fact that some of these musicians were crossover visual artists as well. Cornelius Schnauber, who co-produced the evening with Hauman, wrote the utterly engrossing commentary.