2 - Max Heinrich, “Wizard of Song”

Summary

Even as late as the 1880s singers attempting to integrate the Lied into US concert life confronted a variety of barriers; in addition to difficulties of the German language, audiences preferred large-scale works and assumed the Lied was a rarified genre. Nevertheless, Max Heinrich (1853–1916), the acclaimed “Wizard of Song,” succeeded through performances that captivated audiences and immersed them in the world of each song, be it an intimate lyric or a dramatic ballad. His style and the critics’ reception of his recitals are compared with those of the equally famous baritones of his day, George Henschel and David Bispham. Although Heinrich did not make recordings, his philosophy that performing Lieder rested on a singer’s intellect is documented by numerous publications, including his annotated English-language scores of over 150 Lieder. His distinctive subjective performativity is explored through reviews and a discussion of Schumann’s “Die beiden Grenadiere.” At times critics observed that Heinrich’s interpretations did not conform to the published scores, and thus were in violation of the Werktreue tradition that was characteristic of Henschel. Yet highly perceptive critics, such as Philip Hale, acknowledged that his original interpretations encouraged listeners to perceive well-known pieces in new ways.