Der Lenz ist da!

How glorious that there are two words for spring in German. There is the more familiar 'die Frühling' and then the literary 'der Lenz' – not, of course, that Eduard Mörike doesn't raise 'Frühling' to high poetic levels as a word. As the sun spilled through the windows of Entartete Musik towers this morning, I began to think of various evocations of spring in German. There is, of course, 'Du bist der Lenz' from the pre-climax of Act I of Die Walküre. Echt Wagnerian Mark Berry brilliantly described this moment in his programme note for a performance of that act at last year's Salzburg Festival:

Wagner captures the Volsungs’ springtime passion in all its immediacy, its immanence – always a primary concern to Wagner who, as a student of Young Hegelianism, stood determined to bring heaven down to earth. There is no Hans Sachs here, ready to counsel the youthfully impetuous that they need plan further ahead.

But the word 'Lenz' also triggers something a little less Hegelian in my mind, namely Walter Jurmann's gorgeous 'Veronika, der Lenz is da!', so brilliantly covered by the Comedian Harmonists. I have a dear friend called Veronica who absolutely craves sunshine and is often heard singing this gorgeously spry ditty.

Jurmann, who penned the song in Berlin in 1930, was born in Vienna. Having trained as a doctor, he became a cocktail pianist at the Panhans Hotel in Semmering, where he'd been sent to recover from a bout of pleurisy. Medicine went out the window and Jurmann moved to Berlin, where he continued to play the piano in the famous Eden Hotel (partly destroyed in the War), where he was heard by greats such as Lehár, Kálmán and Strauss. But it was working with the young Viennese lyricist Fritz Rotter (pictured together right) that Jurmann really made his name; 'Veronika, der Lenz is da!' was concocted by the pair while they were waiting for a meeting.

Its the song's off-the-cuff whimsy that makes it so brilliant. Indeed Jurmann had an intrinsic gift for creating Ohrwürmer in 30s Berlin and, after the rise of the Nazis, in America. His talents suited Hollywood perfectly, as he popped out greats such as 'San Francisco', Jeanette McDonald and then Judy Garland's famous showstopper, 'Cosi Cosa' for the Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera and several others. Towards the end of his life, Jurmann turned back to thoughts of Vienna and he died of a heart attack during a trip back to Europe. It was, of course, springtime. What will you be listening to as the days grow warmer?

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