Music of the Mountains

 

It's a smile that gleams like sunshine.
From just a glance
we can recognize
that this is a fellow
of natural good cheer. 

Likewise the shy smile
of this young man
reveals a person we wish
we could hear more from.

And even though a smile
might be hidden
eyes can still invite us
to stop and listen.

Such is the power
of a good portrait photograph.

Today I present three photos 
of musicians I wish I could have met in person.
They represent a mountainous region of central Europe
called the Tyrolean Alps, whose folk traditions
have helped define western music.

 

My first Tyrolean folk musician is a man seated on a rustic fence below a magnificent snow-covered mountain. He wears lederhosen - short leather breeches, wooden clogs, wool shin-socks, and a broad floppy hat. Besides his smile, what first caught my attention was the small instrument he holds. It's called a recorder, or Blockflöte in German, a woodwind instrument that is very rare to see in antique photos, and the only example in my collection. And what makes it even more unique is that it's a little sopranino recorder in F, the second smallest member of the the recorder instrumental family. 

Recorders make a whistle sound and come in a wide variety of sizes. They are associated with so-called "Early Music" from the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque eras. Long ago in another life, I was a member of an early music consort that featured recorders and other forgotten wind instruments. For formal concerts we dressed in quasi-Renaissance costumes. I still have two handcrafted "peasant shirts", very like what this man is wearing, which my mother made for me. I also have about two dozen recorders.

This man's costume is characteristic of a rustic Germanic fashion that was worn in the Bavarian, Austrian, and Italian Alps. His cabinet card photo was taken at the studio of J. B. Rottmayer on Griessstätterstrasse in Berchtesgaden, a town in southeastern Germany, near the border with Austria, 30 km (19 mi) south of Salzburg and 180 km (110 mi) southeast of Munich. The town and its surroundings were once an independent state of the Holy Roman Empire. However during the turbulent Napoleonic era Berchtesgaden changed rulers a few times until 1810 when it was taken  over by the Kingdom of Bavaria. In the 19th century it became popular with tourists and the Bavarian royal family, the House of Wittelsbach, who maintained a hunting lodge in the former Augustinian monastery in Berchtesgaden. 

The Grand Hotel in Berchtesgaden, 1898
photo by J. B. Rottmayer
(later Grand Hotel Auguste Viktoria,
and from 1936 Hotel Berchtesgadener Hof.)
Source: Wikimedia

In 1898 the photographer of my alpine recorder player published a large landscape photo of Berchtesgaden showing the Grand Hotel Auguste Viktoria. His full name was Johann Bapta Rottmayer (1828–1899). Born in Wien - Vienna, Rottmayer became a successful photographer first in Wien, and later established studios in Graz, Brno, and the port of Trieste. He made countless carte de visites of Austria's aristocracy and upper class, as well as grand landscapes, seascapes, and urban views. However he did not start a studio in Berchtesgaden until around 1898 and then died  in 1899. So my photo very likely dates from 1898-1899. 

This portrait has a novelty quality which suggests it was a holiday/vacation style photo made to fool the folks back home. It's not impossible that this sunny fellow was outfitted in a costume borrowed from the studio and given a recorder and walking stick to complete the illusion of a mountain rustic. Even so, it is still a terrific portrait that delights the eye. 

Johann Rottmayer's name is still remembered because of his connection to a bizarre musical story.  In October 1863 a group of medical scientists exhumed the bodies of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1927) and Franz Schubert (1797–1828) who were buried near each other at a cemetery in Währing, northwest of Vienna. The purpose of this macabre disinterment was supposedly to prevent further decomposition to the bodies and establish more worthy resting places for these two great composers. After the skeletons were removed it was Rottmayer's duty to take a series of photographs of the skulls of both Beethoven and Schubert. Each body was carefully examined and measured and plaster casts were made of the skulls. Two weeks later the remains of both composers were reverently placed into new metal coffins and installed into vaults at the cemetery. 

The 1860s were a time when phrenology, a pseudoscience that involves the measurement of the skull, was used as a way to predict human behavior, personality, and intelligence. In the case of these two famous composers, it was thought that their musical genius could be determined from the shape of their brain case. Needless to say, phrenology is a stupid and wicked theory that has been disproven many times. 

To add further insult to the memories of Beethoven and Schubert, in June 1888 the remains of both composers were relocated to the Central Cemetery (Zentralfriedhof) in Wien. 

(Since Rottmayer's photos of Ludwig and Franz show them in a rather undignified condition, I've decided they don't need to be presented on this blog. Better to remember them by their music.)

* * *

In this photo postcard my second Tyrolean musician is standing in a photographer's studio dressed in longer lederhosen fastened below the knee, white stockings, sensible walking shoes, a wool jacket and a large hat with a long thin feather. The card's caption identifies him as Rudolf Hechensteiner, Zithermeister and on a table he displays his instrument, a zither. This string instrument has a strings over a fretted fingerboard and more open strings to add bass notes. It is usually played on a table which increases its dynamic resonance. Rudolf looks very young to be a master musician, late teens or early 20s maybe, but presumably the medals on his belt are a testimonial to his musicianship  

The postcard was sent from Kufstein, a city in the Austrian state of Tyrol, right on the southern border with Bavaria. It's the second largest Tyrolean town after Innsbruck, the state's capital. The postmark imprint on the green face of Kaiser Franz-Joseph is not clear but fortunately the photographer, D. Amort of Kufstein, has left a notice Nachdruck verboten ~ Reprinting prohibited with the year 1910. 

* * *

My last photo is another string player, this time an older man with a contraguitar, also known as a Schrammel guitar. He sits in a photographer's studio with dramatic thunderclouds looming in the backdrop. He is identified in a caption as Seppl Lorenz. Like my recorder player, he is dressed in lederhosen, wool shin-socks, wool jacket and a classic Tyrolean hat with its distinctive Gamsbart plume, made exclusively from hair taken from an Alpine chamois' lower neck. His mustache conceals a hint of a smile but the photographer has captured a moment in his eyes that I think conveys a lighthearted spirit. 

The card was sent from Chemnitz, Germany on 9 October 1919. I expect Seppl Lorenz earned those medals pinned to his jacket in the late war which may account for his good humor. Chemnitz is the third-largest city in the German state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden, and is about 260  miles north of Berchtesgaden, a long way from the Alps. But I think Seppl Lorenz's folk costume is enough to connect him to Tyrolean traditions. Certainly his Schrammel guitar is very much an Austrian instrument. 

To finish here is the "Schrupp-Schrupp Polka"
played on Zither by Balthasar "Hausl" Brandhofer
and on Kontragitarre by Florian Möckl.
Notice how bass notes are played
on the contraguitar with the right thumb
and on the zither with the right pinkie.

And to demonstrate how Tyrolean music
is connected to dancing,  

here is a short historic film
of a Tyrolean dance filmed in 1896.

It was colorized  by the "not.bw" project

and uses the jaunty zither music used as
the soundtrack for the 1949 British film "The Third Man". 

It was written and performed by Anton Karas.

 Berchtesgaden, Germany with a view of Mount Watzmann, 2007
Source: Wikimedia

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where you don't have to climb every mountain
to get to where you are going.