Invitation to the Dance 2

 

Hear that beat? Then move your feet! That's the basis for any dance form. But a dance can also be a form of display, a pageant of fashion and beauty. That's what this postcard shows in a drawing of an elegant couple dressed in clothing from the late 18th century. A gentleman wearing breeches, justacorps coat, and powdered wig leads a young woman in a huge gown as she swirls around for all to see. Is this couple taking a turn in a minuet?

Here is an example of a minuet performed in period costumes. A minuet was originally a French social dance for two people, usually written in a triple 3 beat time signature. 

The artist is Ferdinand von Řezníček (1868–1909) whose work I first shared on this blog back in January in Invitation to the Dance. Though born in a district of Wien, Austria, Reznicek studied art at the Academy of Fine Arts in München, Bavaria, initially focusing on landscape art. But after his graduation he chose to remain in München finding work as a commercial artist for several German society magazines that were published there. In 1895 Reznicek joined a new satirical magazine called Simplicissimus where his drawings helped to make it a success across Germany and Austria. This postcard was part of a series published by the magazine and sold to the public beginning in about 1905.

 Simplicissimus
1 August 1905
Source: The Internets

This card was sent to Frau M. v. Eye of Berlin. The postmark is unclear but, as you will see, it was likely sent sometime around 1907-08.

* * *

The couple on this second card are from several decades later, perhaps, I think, the 1870s to judge by the bustle and hats. A young woman in a large hooped dress and blue bonnet gazes into the eyes of her beau who wears plaid trousers, suit coat, and a tall 3-liter top hat (fittingly called a Zylinder in German.) The way that they clutch each other looks like acceptable dance etiquette to me, but maybe she just tripped on her hem.  

Perhaps they are dancing a Zwiefacher, a southern German folk dance popular in Bavaria. It is characterized by a quick tempo and changing beat patterns that alternate between odd and even time signatures, changing from three to two beats per bar. Here is an example with a tune called "Alte Kath".

The front of the card has a handwritten date confirmed by the postmark of 22 February 1908. As with the previous card it was sent to Frau M. v. Eye. of Berlin. Her full address says "Berlin Halensee, Westfälische Str. 40/IV" which is a neighborhood in the the district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, west of Berlin's city center.

 

Frau v. Eye's address in Berlin is still a residential and shopping area, though very much improved 120 years later.

40 Westfälische Str. Berlin
The entry door is next to the sign for Chang Thai massage

* * *

This couple are really stepping out with best foot forward. The gentleman is in tight breeches and a trim tailcoat without hat. His partner wears a light blue gown with several frilly layers but with much less fabric and undercarriage than the previous ladies' costumes.  

I think they may resemble a dance called the German Cotillion fashionable in the mid-19th century. The Cotillion originally was set for four couples in square formation, it followed a courtly version of an English country dance, the forerunner of the quadrille, which became the square dance in America. The German version of the Cotillion involved more couples and was a popular balls dance. Here is an example of which has dancers doing lively steps similar to the couple in the drawing.

This postcard was also sent to Frau M. von Eye of Berlin. It is dated 24 April 1907 on the front message and this time the sender included his name—Alfred. 

I featured two of Reznicek's postcards sent by Alfred in my first story, Invitation to the Dance, and I have two more which I will save for another story on Reznicek's artwork. Clearly he bought a packet of this series and enjoyed sending them to Frau von Eye. I suspect he was her husband, but he might easily be her son, brother, or something else as the handwriting is so wrinkled that I am unable to decipher it to determine their relationship. 

* * *

This last couple are entwined so closely that I feel sure it must be a dance closer to 1900 than 1800. The gentleman is in formal white tie and tails and the woman has on an elaborate gown with an enormous feathered hat. Reznicek clearly attended many society balls and dance halls to sketch so many variations on steps and positions. 

The couple's posture and animation suggests to me a lively two-step dance like a polka. Here is an example, courtesy of YouTuber Jason Anderson, of a fast polka during the 2019 Ball der Pharmacie (Pharmacy Ball) in the Vienna Hofburg. Music: Tritsch Tratsch Polka by Johann Strauss Jr. 

This postcard was actually sent from Salzburg, Austria but the postmark on Kaiser Franz Joseph's stamp is faded. Like the other postcards it likely dates from 1907-08. 

I am not an expert on historical German terpsichore so the previous video examples are just my own left-footed amateur interpretations of Reznicek's dancers. I welcome any alternate suggestions or corrections.

* * *

 Simplicissimus
March 1905
Source: The Internets

My final Reznicek drawing of dancers is taken from a full page caricature used in the special Carnival edition of Simplicissimus from March 1905. I used it in my previous story on his artwork but at the time I did not research the cartoon's title and caption. I thought it was just a silly lampoon of a short man embracing a taller woman. This week I consulted my A.I. assistant Claude and asked him to translate the caption. The speaker is the tall masked woman.

„Sehgn S', döß hab' i glei g'sehgn, daß Sie a Preiß san.
Döß macht aber nix, wenn S' nur sonst an ordentlicher Mensch san!"

~
"You see, I could tell right away that you're a Prussian.
But that doesn't matter, as long as you're otherwise a decent person!"

Claude also gave me such a detailed description of the historical and political context of this illustration that I include it here as a demonstration of how the new Artificial Intelligence systems can help researchers like myself. There is more to this couple's dance than meets our eyes 121 years later.  

Claude:  This is a classic piece of Bavarian/Austrian humor. The dialect is distinctly Bavarian (note the phonetic spellings: "sehgn" for sehen, "döß" for das, "san" for sind, "nix" for nichts), and the joke hinges on the traditional rivalry and mild contempt Bavarians and Austrians held toward Prussians (North Germans). The title of the illustration is "Verbrüderung" — Brotherhood or Fraternization — which adds an ironic twist: the two are literally dancing in close embrace while the Bavarian woman offers this backhanded compliment to her Prussian partner. The humor is in the condescension wrapped in apparent goodwill.

The Bavarian dialect is quite thick here, which really does enrich the joke. Simplicissimus was a satirical Munich magazine, so Bavarian dialect humor appeared regularly in its pages — and poking fun at Prussians was practically a recurring sport for them.

The timing is also worth noting: 1905 puts this about 35 years after Bismarck's unification of Germany under Prussian dominance, a political reality that many Bavarians had never fully warmed to. The Kingdom of Bavaria had only reluctantly joined the German Empire in 1871, and cultural resentment toward the Prussian north lingered well into the 20th century. So this cartoon is tapping into something readers would have immediately recognized and enjoyed.

The title "Verbrüderung" makes it even sharper — it was a word associated with grand gestures of political and national solidarity, here deflated into a tipsy waltz and a gloriously patronizing compliment. Very much in the spirit of Simplicissimus, which delighted in puncturing pretension from all directions.

I can't resist adding one last video
of arguably the most celebrated dance couple of all time.
Here is the classic “Pick Yourself Up”
from the 1936 film Swing Time,
featuring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where Aunty Miriam and Uncle Frank
could do a turn or two. 

The Hidden Psyche of Great Men

 

A face is in profile
but is layered with other images.
It's a kind of photo portrait,
and yet there is more than meets the eye.

The person's features are recognizable
but within it is a fantastic specter
of other people and creatures.

Similar portraits are even odder
as if the collage was made
from too many unrelated things. 

Other portraits add a texture of drawings
almost like tattoos or transparent imagery
projected onto the face.

The artists trick the viewer into seeing an illusion
of more than just a picture of a famous person.
Their portraits also show symbols of their creations,
accomplishments, and ambitions.  

Today I present four examples of postcards from the 1900s
that used a composite metamorphic style of art
to celebrate famous people.

  

The first postcard is of German composer and conductor Richard Wagner (1813–1883) who is remembered for his many music dramas that transformed music and opera theater in the 19th century, notably for his four-part cycle: "Der Ring des Nibelungen" (The Ring of the Nibelung). Here his face appears in profile but his head is filled with characters from his operas. 

Visible in his "hair" are two swans which are birds that appear in Wagner's "Lohengrin". The central character, Lohengrin, a knight of the Holy Grail and son of Parsifal, travels in a boat drawn by white swan. The helmeted warrior woman in the upper portion holds a spear which connects to "Die Walküre" from the Ring Cycle. The sinuous female figures are the Rhine Maidens from "Das Rheingold" guarding the river gold. On the chin is a serpent figure which is the dragon Fafner from "Das Rheingold" or "Siegfried".   

Below the picture is a facsimile of Richard Wagner's signature and a four bar motif which is a bit of a puzzle that I have not solved. I think it's a phrase from Lohengrin but I haven't identified it yet. The tiny caption in the corner, "depose dans tous les pais" is a French trademark notice meaning "registered in all countries." Presumably this kind of art was produced in France. 

Richard Wagner (1813–1883)
Elliott & Fry studio, London, circa 1877
Source: Wikimedia

The best photo to match this illustration of Richard Wagner is a profile head shot taken at the Elliot & Fry studio in London in about 1877. The postcard was sent on 29 June 1909 from Meinersdorf, a small village in Saxony near Chemnitz. 

* * *

This second disembodied head might be unfamiliar as this man lived in the time before photography and his few portraits are paintings. The card's caption is a single word, a signature really:   Goethe.  

Most Germans in our time would recognize this name, if not the image, as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832), considered Germany's greatest author and a polymath in many subjects. His works include plays, poetry, and aesthetic criticism, as well as scientific treatises on botany, anatomy, and color.  

The imagery that covers his visage includes a horse and rider who carries a child. This refers to Goethe's 1782 ballad poem "Erlkönig" which depicts the death of a child assailed by a supernatural being, the Erlkönig, a king of the fairies. Many composers set the poem to music, but the most famous is a song by Franz Schubert. 

The sylph-like beings in the upper hair refer to Goethe's major 2-part tragedy,  "Faust I & II". This tragic story is about a scholar, Faust, who makes a pact with the devil (Mephistopheles) for unlimited knowledge and experience. Faust is depicted on the left eye with Mephistopheles at his shoulder. His love interest is young Gretchen, who is drawn onto Goethe's nose. 

The two figures on the right eye and cheek are from another famous ballad of Goethe's,. "Der Fischer"~ "The Fisherman". Written in 1779, this song tells a tale of a water-maiden (mermaid) who rises from the Rhine, seducing a fisherman with her song and then pulling him into the water until he is never seen again.  

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832)
1828 portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler (1781–1858)
Source: Wikimedia 

This painting of Goethe by Joseph Karl Stieler is perhaps the most well-known image of the writer and was likely used by the anonymous artist as a model for this metamorphose. This postcard has a postmark of 6 August 1909 from Marienbad, a renowned spa town in Austria which is now in the Czech Republic, and two more postmarks from Geneve and Lausanne. Switzerland. 

* * *

This next figure a bit more challenging, but clues are hidden in the man's white hat. Two very long airships and a balloon make up the cap and more blimps and balloons fill the face. A caption on the top reads: 

Unsere Zukunft liegt in der Luft. 
~
Our future lies in the air.

It is, of course, the great aviator of lighter-than-air flying machines, Graf~Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin (1838–1917). Regular readers should recognize his name if not his face and I have posted many stories on Graf Zeppelin's airships. In his time Zeppelin mastered the art of self-promotion as well as flight and his grandfatherly face made him a familiar luminary in German newspapers, magazines, and postcards, too.  

Graf von Zeppelin (1838–1917), circa 1911
Source: Wikimedia

This photo of Graf Zeppelin was likely taken around the time when his airships were achieving longer flight records and capturing the attention of the public in Germany and abroad. He seems to have adopted a type of ship captain's hat, one in white, like this one, and another in dark blue. It doesn't take much imagination to see balloons in his cheeks and mustache. 

This postcard was sent from Berlin on 28 May 1909. 

* * *

My final metamorphose postcard is possibly one of the most recognized public figures of his time as this man appeared in countless postcards. He is Wilhelm II (1859–1941), the last German Emperor (Deutscher Kaiser) from 1888 until his abdication in 1918. His face is almost tattooed with symbols of German nationalism. There are two imperial eagles, one grasps a map of Europe in its talons. A helmeted warrior wields a sword. A ship's captain, presumably Wilhelm, grapples with a ship's wheel, the chin, which has a motto: "Deutschland in der Welt Vor..."

Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859–1941)
1902 photo by Thomas Heinrich Voigt (1838–1896)
Source: Wikimedia

Wihelm may have been the most photographed head-of-state in his time. There seem to be an infinite number of him in many different uniforms, some not even German. This photo from 1902 captures an expression similar to that used for the metamorphose sketch. His determined face gazes slightly up and away, a kind of leadership pose that Wilhelm perfected. 

What made this metamorphose postcard more special though was the handwritten note on the back. 

5. VIII 1914
Zur Erinnerung
an die Mobilmachung
2 August
1914
~
For remembrance
on the mobilization
2 August 1914

Georg Elhing(?)

  

On 28 June 1914, Bosnian-Serb terrorists assassinated the heir presumptive to the imperial throne of Austria-Hungary, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg. Their murder set off a chain of events which quickly escalated into a diplomatic crisis. Complicated treaties and secret agreements between major and minor powers in Europe triggered military plans. In July reserve soldiers were called up to join their companies and regiments ordered to move towards their nation's borders. On 2 August 1914 Kaiser Wilhelm gave the command for his armies to mobilize. It was the the first day of The Great War, what we now call World War One. Georg remembered that day with this postcard. 

Did Georg serve in the war? Did he survive? What meaning did Wilhelm's metamorphic imagery have in November 1918? We can only imagine.

The symbolism in these metamorphose portraits are not profound. They are novelty picture puzzles, clever illusions that asks us to find rhymes and reasons. They seem to have originated around 1909 which was also when Sigmund Freud's work began to gain significant recognition in 1908–1910, following the publication of his major works like "The Interpretation of Dreams" (1899/1900) and "Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality" (1905). As it turns out the psyche of great men can be pretty ordinary and not all that interesting.

I have more metamorphose postcards
like this of other famous men 
and will feature them in a future story. 

I'll finish with a performance 
of Franz Schubert's setting of Goethe's Der Erlkönig.
The singer is the German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
accompanied by the English pianist Gerald Moore.
No one does it better than this.

Verse 1: 

Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind?
Es ist der Vater mit seinem Kind;
Er hat den Knaben wohl in dem Arm,
Er fasst ihn sicher, er hält ihn warm.
 

Translation:

Who rides, so late, through night and wind?
It is a father with his child.
He has the boy well in his arm
He holds him safely, he keeps him warm.

Verse 2:

"Mein Sohn, was birgst du so bang dein Gesicht?"
"Siehst, Vater, du den Erlkönig nicht?
Den Erlenkönig mit Kron' und Schweif?"
"Mein Sohn, es ist ein Nebelstreif."
 

Translation:

"My son, why do you hide your face in fear?"
"Father, do you not see the Erlking?
The Erlking with crown and tail?"
"My son, it is a streak of fog."

Verse 3:

"Du liebes Kind, komm, geh mit mir!
Gar schöne Spiele spiel' ich mit dir;
Manch' bunte Blumen sind an dem Strand,
Meine Mutter hat manch gülden Gewand."
 

Translation:

"You dear child, come, go with me!
Very lovely games I'll play with you;
Some colorful flowers are on the beach,
My mother has some golden robes."

Verse 4:

"Mein Vater, mein Vater, und hörest du nicht,
Was Erlenkönig mir leise verspricht?"
"Sei ruhig, bleibe ruhig, mein Kind;
In dürren Blättern säuselt der Wind."
 

Translation:

"My father, my father, and do you not hear
What Erlking quietly promises me?"
"Be calm, stay calm, my child;
The wind is rustling through dry leaves."

Verse 5:

"Willst, feiner Knabe, du mit mir gehn?
Meine Töchter sollen dich warten schön;
Meine Töchter führen den nächtlichen Reihn,
Und wiegen und tanzen und singen dich ein,
Sie wiegen und tanzen und singen dich ein."
 

Translation:

"Do you, fine boy, want to go with me?
My daughters shall wait on you finely;
My daughters lead the nightly dance,
And rock and dance and sing you to sleep,
They rock and dance and sing you to sleep."

Verse 6:

"Mein Vater, mein Vater, und siehst du nicht dort
Erlkönigs Töchter am düstern Ort?"
"Mein Sohn, mein Sohn, ich seh' es genau:
Es scheinen die alten Weiden so grau."
 

Translation:

"My father, my father, and don't you see there
Erlking's daughters in the gloomy place?"
"My son, my son, I see it clearly:
There shimmer the old willows so grey."

Verse 7:

"Ich liebe dich, mich reizt deine schöne Gestalt;
Und bist du nicht willig, so brauch' ich Gewalt."
"Mein Vater, mein Vater, jetzt fasst er mich an!
Erlkönig hat mir ein Leids getan!"
 

Translation:

"I love you, your beautiful form excites me;
And if you're not willing, then I will use force."
"My father, my father, he's touching me now!
Erlking has done me harm!"

Verse 8:

Dem Vater grauset's, er reitet geschwind,
Er hält in Armen das ächzende Kind,
Erreicht den Hof mit Müh' und Not;
In seinen Armen das Kind war tot.
 

Translation:

It horrifies the father, he swiftly rides on,
He holds the groaning child in his arms,
Reaches the farm with great difficulty;
In his arms, the child was dead.

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where someone is always watching.

Ladies with Brass - A to Z

 

Musical fads come and go, depending on the public's fickle penchant for new things. This postcard of the Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Ariosta“, directed by Herr E. Behncken, was once a type of musical ensemble that everyone recognized because they had heard one at their local music hall, beer garden, or city park bandstand. The six women and four men who played in this brass band were professional musicians who promoted their group with photo postcards of the band. Unlike a traditional band of just men, these Damen ensembles went out of their way to market how women were the principle performers. As proof of their popularity, I must have several hundred postcards just like this group in my collection. Today I'd like to present a small sample of these very brassy women A to Z. Sort of.

  

In the last decade of the 19th century and first decades of the 20th, women's bands and orchestras were very widespread thorughout central Europe, mainly in the German speaking regions, which in the time before the First World War was a much larger region than Europe in our 21st century. There were Damen Streich Orchester~Women's string orchestras, Damen Blasorchester~Women's wind bands; and Damen Trompeter Corps~Women's trumpet ensembles. The last one is my focus today. The Ariosta Trompeterinnen played several different valved brass instruments like tubas and trumpets, but the Trompeter-Corps in their name refers to the three natural trumpets seen standing on their bells at the front of the band. These instruments were a type of bugle without valves that was little different from the baroque trumpets that were played in miliary bands and royal fanfares.

The Ariosta band's postcard was never posted but we know it is an official postcard based on its printed description from multiple languages. (Extra points if you can name them all!)   A rubber stamp imprint for Karl Mohr's Conzerthaus  Werth in Duisburg indicates the venue where they performed. Duisburg is on the Rhine River in western Germany, north of Düsseldorf and not far from the border with the Netherlands.

* * *

This next group has a similar makeup of six young women and four men. They are the Österreichisches Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Bohème“ directed by Herr A. Lohmann. Their name indicates that they are from Austria, which at the time was part of an immense Austria-Hungary empire that encompassed dozens of ethnic peoples. Unlike the ladies in the Ariosta band who wore folksy white dresses with dark bodices and no hats, the women of the Bohème ensemble wear matching dresses with contrasting aprons and huge sombrero hats fitted with large pompons. Not surprisingly the men are not on display and are dressed in ordinary business suits. One of them must be the leader Lohmann but I'm not sure which one he is. Maybe the tallest man, second from right.

Notice that the women hold various brass instruments but there are four natural trumpets propped up in front. Typically these trumpets came as a quartet though they were all in the same key, usually E-flat. This postcard was sent on 7 March 1912 from Hamburg, Germany, about 550 miles from Austria's capital, Wien.   

* * *

This group is an octet of seven young ladies and one man. They are the Damen-Blas-Orchester „Erato“, Kapellmeister~conductor H. Schröder. The women wear matching dresses in a dark color with folk-type vests. Herr Schröder sits in the center at a table that has two rotary valve trumpets on it. The Blas-Orchester name suggests they played woodwind instruments too, but there are none shown here. Instead their brass instruments are clumped together in front with two pairs of natural trumpets leaning on chairs on either side. Notice the banners attached to the trumpets which were often embroidered with heraldic symbols like the eagle seen here. 

This card was sent on 13 November 1911 from Oberehn, a city now known as Obernai, a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France. But in 1911 it was in the German territory of Reichsland Elsaß–Lothringen acquired by the German Empire during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.

* * *

This brass band proudly promoted its heritage by choosing the name, Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Germania“, directed by A. Hardemann. This nine member ensemble had five women and four men. Herr Hartmann is likely the fellow with the biggest mustache seated in the center. The women are in identical dresses that have a navy collar. Their flat caps are maybe like a sailor but their sashes are not very nautical unless they are emergency flotation devices, too.  Their instruments are scattered on the floor with one young lady lying down and holding a natural trumpet. Two more are just left of her. 

As is the case with most of these groups, there are no names for any musicians except the leader. The women's string orchestras often had postcards of individual female soloists on flute, violin, or cello and brass groups would do the same for a female trumpeter. In most cases this was because the soloist was the daughter of the leader. It's quite likely that some of Herr Hartmann's children or even his wife are in this group, but those are details that history has forgot.

This postcard has a postmark of 14 November 191o from Waltershausen, a town in the south-western part of the district of Gotha in the state of Thuringia, Germany, about halfway between Frankfurt and Leipzig.

* * *

This is a larger ensemble of 12 musicans, seven women and five men. They are the Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Humoresk“, directed by H. M. Brunk, who surely is the man with the valve trumpet seated right. The women's outfits are another variation on a nautical style with cadet jackets and skirts with contrasting stripes. Everyone holds a brass instrument but standing front and center are three natural trumpets. 

This card was sent from Dresden on 4 June 1908. 

* * *

My next group is the Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Rhenania“, directed by F. P. Hartwig who sits center, I think. Like the leader of the Germania band, Herr Hartwig holds rolled-up paper, a symbol of a pianist or sometimes conductor. He leads seven young ladies and two other men. The women are dressed alike with a kind of decorative apron and no hats. Except for the leader and the woman playing drums, everyone else has a brass instrument. On the bass drum is a banner embroidered with the group's name and on the right are four natural trumpets, without banners but each wound with fancy tasseled rope.  

This card was sent on 9 August 1911 from Sudenburg, a district located in southwest Magdeburg, a city about 90 miles west of Berlin.

* * *

This group is another octet of five women and three men. They called themselves Fr. Weiher's Elite Damen-Blasorchester. The honorific Fr. stands for Frau~Mrs. The man standing center with a trumpet looks like he could be Herr Weiher, but is the tuba player seated next to him Frau Weiher? I can't say. Maybe she's the flugelhorn player to his right. The women are wearing white dresses with broad contrasting trim. Their little caps are fastened to their hair with dangerously long hatpins.  

This group adds pairs of mandolins and kettledrums to the ensemble as well as a folk xylophone called a Strohfiedel on the left under the smaller tuba. In the center is another quartet of natural trumpets complete with fringed banners.    

This postcard was mailed on 10 February 1913 from Strassburg, a major city in Alsace that, like Oberehn in the Erato band's postcard, was part of the German Empire in 1913. It is now known by its proper French name as Strasbourg.

* * *

My final band is the Damen-Trompeter-Corps „Zufriedenheit“, directed by Karl Hofert. It's another ten-piece ensemble with six women and four men. The word "Zufriedenheit" translates as "satisfaction", as in "I can't get no Zufriedenheit".  Despite the Trompeter Corps label there is actually one man with a clarinet standing third from left. I can't be certain he is the leader Herr Hofert, but he does have the best mustache. The women are wearing folksy German outfits but without caps or hats. The instruments shown are heavy on the low brass. but again front and center there are four natural trumpets arranged into a pyramid.  

This postcard was posted from Essen, Germany on 2 October 1909.

If anyone has read to this point they should recognize that I've gone A to Z in ladies with brass but have left out a few letters in the alphabet. Eighteen to be precise. I think I could have met that goal but that would be cruel to my readers. 

In the examples I've featured today, these musical groups were each ostensibly called a women's ensemble, but, as we can see, were actually a mixture of women and men, all professional musicians. That kind of integration of the sexes in the working world was not common in Germany, or really anywhere in the world in this era, as women had not yet attained equal rights under the laws for property, employment, or suffrage. But it was the way these German ladies were presented as talented entertainers that first caught my attention years ago when I began collecting these postcards. As I found more and more of them there was enough to see that a Damen Trompeter Corps was once a musical fad.  

I don't know exactly what music they played, but I believe their repertoire was mainly lighter music, popular songs and dances taken from many folk traditions within the larger Germanic culture. I use the word Germanic because it includes the many complicated regions of central Europe beyond Germany and Austria's borders where German was the principal language. 

But wait, there's more! In my collection there are an equally large number of postcards from non-German music groups, too. Hungarians, Czechs, Croatians, and more. And like the ones I've presented today these groups are often mostly women with a few men.  That's an A to Z challenge for another time.     

 

For anyone who can't get enough
of this unique type of brass ensemble

Here are my previous stories on Germanic ladies:
Ladies with Brass
Ladies of Brass with Hats
More Ladies of Brass
Even More Ladies with Brass
Still More Ladies with Brass

It's difficult to know how these groups sounded,

mainly because their concert repertoire was rarely recorded.

But we can get a little idea from a modern brass ensemble.

Here is the University of Kentucky Baroque Trumpet Ensemble
performing a piece of 17th century Italian music
entitled Sonata Tedesche da Tromba.

If it sounds familiar it's because the fanfare was arranged 
for the title track in many of Sylvester Stallone's  "Rocky" movies.

  

   Postcard Trivia   

Fourteen languages were used to label my first postcard of the Ariosta band as an official postcard approved by the Unione postale universelle. 

            1.    “Brefkort” = Norwegian 
            2.    “Carta postale” = Latin
            3.    “Post card” = English
            4.    “Carte postale” = French
            5.    “Postkarte” = German
            6.    “Cartolina postale” = Italian
            7.    “Dopisnice” = Czech/Slovak
            8.    “Открытое письмо” = Russian
            9.    “Levelező-lap” = Hungarian
            10.    “Briefkaart” = Dutch 
            11.    “Tarjetas Postale” = Spanish 
            12.    “Bilhete Postal” = Portuguese 
            13.    “Brevkort” = Danish
            14.    “Korespondenčni listek” = Slovene 

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where every day is Mother's day.