【古殿唱片音樂故事】「我希望能與你同在」——孟德爾頌把最私密的家書，寫成了一部音樂日記：蘇聯時代，只有這一套——孟德爾頌48首《無言歌》全本錄音
古殿殿主
MELODIYA/USSR/ 33 C 10—10863-64(a) / 11595-96(a) / 11597-98(a)
1839 年，孟德爾頌（Felix Mendelssohn, 1809–1847）已經寫完三冊《無言歌(Songs Without Words)》，出版商 Simrock 想繼續出。他回信拒絕了：「無論漢堡的居民怎麼說，我都無意出版這類作品。天地之間若有太多這種東西，它們不會給任何人帶來愉悅。」（但後來仍是有繼續出版，他生前出版到六冊，生後兩冊，一共八冊，每一冊六首曲子，總共48首。）
這句話出自作曲家本人之手，寫在他人生最順遂的階段——三十歲出頭，萊比錫布商大廈樂團首席指揮，聲望如日中天，卻仍然覺得，這批小品不過是「彈給女士們聽的」東西，檯面上不值得與他的交響曲、清唱劇相提並論。
141年後，1980 年，蘇聯文化部旗下的國營唱片公司 Melodiya，把這 48 首《無言歌(Songs Without Words)》小品，一首不漏地全數錄了下來，印成三張一套的黑膠，交由鋼琴家維多利亞·波斯特尼科娃（Viktoria Postnikova, 1944–）演奏。
——這是整個蘇聯時代，唯一一套完整錄下孟德爾頌 48 首《無言歌》全集的版本。當年孟德爾頌並沒把它們當一回事，蘇聯的國營唱片卻把它們當成一部「百科全書」看待。這中間的落差，才是這套唱片真正值得說的故事。
藏在旅行書信裡的音樂——無言歌真正的起點
要理解孟德爾頌那句「不會給任何人帶來愉悅」，得先知道這些曲子最初是怎麼寫出來的。
《無言歌》最早的幾首，根本不是為了出版而寫，是孟德爾頌旅行在外時，直接寫進給家人的信。1830 年他從慕尼黑寫信給姊姊芬妮·孟德爾頌（Fanny Mendelssohn, 1805–1847），信裡說：「我希望能與你同在——但既然那不可能，我就寫了一首歌給你，表達我的心願與思念。」信末附上的，就是十六小節長的一段旋律——一首名副其實的「無言歌」。同一年，他人在威尼斯，又把後來題作〈威尼斯船歌〉的那首曲子，寫進了寄回家的信裡。
也就是說，《無言歌》最原始的功能，不是音樂會曲目，是書信。孟德爾頌用音樂描述異鄉的風景，用音樂交代自己此刻的心境——文字說不清楚的部分，交給旋律去說。這正是他自己後來堅持的立場：面對朋友想替《無言歌》配上歌詞、把曲子的「意思」明確化的要求，他斷然拒絕，說音樂想表達的，不是「太模糊而無法化為文字」的東西，而是「太確切，反而無法化為文字」的東西。
因為這批曲子橫跨了孟德爾頌從二十歲出頭到辭世前，將近二十年的創作生涯，依創作年代排列來看，48 首《無言歌》其實構成了一部「音樂日記」——每一冊，都是他人生某個階段的心境切片。這也是為什麼，1839 年他回絕出版商 Simrock 時的猶豫，讀起來不只是自我懷疑，更像是一種對「把私人書信變成商品」的抗拒——他擔心的，或許不是曲子不夠好，而是這些原本寫給最親近的人看的私密文字，一旦印成樂譜、賣給素不相識的「漢堡居民」，那份最初的真實會不會被稀釋。
不只是作曲家——他是十九世紀音樂教育與普及的巨人
但孟德爾頌終究還是把這些曲子出版了，而這個決定，其實與他一生的另一個身分緊緊相連：他不只是作曲家、指揮家，更是十九世紀音樂教育與普及事業裡，份量最重的人物之一。
1829 年，年僅二十歲的孟德爾頌在柏林指揮了巴赫《馬太受難曲》，這是巴赫去世近八十年後首次公開演出，直接點燃了整個十九世紀的「巴赫復興」。1835 年他接掌萊比錫布商大廈樂團，把這個樂團打磨成歐洲頂尖水準，同時確立了現代指揮家站在樂團前方、手持指揮棒的角色雛型。1843 年，他更進一步創辦了萊比錫音樂學院——德國第一所正式音樂院校，把音樂教育從師徒制的作坊模式，推向了有系統課程的現代教育體制。
而《無言歌》，正好落在這個更大的使命裡。十九世紀初，鋼琴正快速普及進入歐洲中產階級家庭，成為許多家庭的標準配備，卻很少有作品能同時滿足「業餘愛好者彈得動」與「藝術上站得住腳」這兩個條件。《無言歌》做到了——技巧門檻低到一般家庭主婦、女兒都彈得來，音樂語言卻絲毫不打折扣。把最私密的書信體驗，轉譯成一般人在自家客廳就能親手彈奏、親身體會的作品，某個意義上，正是孟德爾頌畢生「把嚴肅音樂交到更多人手裡」這個志業，最直接也最成功的示範。
這正是《無言歌》真正反差的地方：它是孟德爾頌所有作品裡最私人、最不設防的一批，卻同時也是他推廣音樂教育這個公共志業裡，觸及最多人的一批。
蘇聯為什麼要錄一套「客廳小品」的全集？
孟德爾頌的《無言歌》，本質上是十九世紀中產階級客廳裡的音樂——技巧不算艱深，情感私密內斂，寫給在家彈琴自娛的業餘愛好者。而它作為「音樂日記」的完整性，恰恰也是最容易在流通過程裡被犧牲的東西：1834 年孟德爾頌在卡塞爾拜訪理論家莫里茨·豪普特曼（Moritz Hauptmann, 1792–1868），對方想聽聽《無言歌》，他卻不情願地推辭，說這些曲子上不了檯面。而市面上絕大多數的錄音，也確實只把它們當成好聽的「小品」看待——只挑最有名的幾首，湊成一張精選輯了事。
放在冷戰時期的蘇聯語境裡看，這其實是個更奇怪的選題：官方美學推崇的是英雄主義、集體敘事、宏大結構，孟德爾頌這種私人化的、幾乎稱得上「布爾喬亞」情調的客廳音樂，並不是最討喜的宣傳材料。整整 48 首，八冊全收、依創作年代排列，這種完整呈現一部「音樂日記」的做法，在唱片史上都算少見，何況是出自一個講究「典型性」與「代表作」的計畫經濟出版體制。
Melodiya 卻選擇了完整。1978 年在莫斯科錄音，1980 年由阿普列列夫卡列寧勳章唱片廠壓製發行，三張一套，把 Op. 19、30、38、53、62、67、85、102 全部 48 首，依創作順序完整收錄，錄音師 I. Veprintsev、編輯 E. Slepnev——這是一次不折不扣的「百科全書式」工程，而不是一張討好大眾的精選輯。
這裡有一件事值得記下來：這套錄音同時也以 Eurodisc/Melodiya 的名義，授權在西德壓製發行過雙 LP 版本，說明這次錄音本身確實被視為有國際輸出價值的「完整版本」，而不只是內銷用的資料性錄音——但真正把它拆成三張、依照創作年代原貌完整呈現的，仍然是蘇聯國內這套紅標版。
選擇「全貌」的鋼琴家
要理解這套唱片為什麼會存在，也得先理解波斯特尼科娃這個人。
她 1944 年生於莫斯科的音樂世家，六歲進中央音樂學校，七歲就公開演出莫札特協奏曲。她的母親，是雅科夫·弗利耶爾（Yakov Flier, 1912–1977）收的第一位學生——多年後波斯特尼科娃自己也進了弗利耶爾門下，完成研究生學業，母女兩代人，拜在同一位老師門下。弗利耶爾本人出自伊貢諾夫（Konstantin Igumnov, 1873–1948）一脈，這條師承線索，連結到俄羅斯鋼琴學派裡與涅高茲（Heinrich Neuhaus, 1888–1964）並列的另一大支柱——強調對原譜的細膩尊重、不張揚的音樂內在邏輯。
但真正讓這張唱片說得通的，不是師承，而是波斯特尼科娃這一生反覆出現的一個習慣：她從不甘於「精選」。她的獨奏會經常整場只彈一位作曲家——史卡拉第（Domenico Scarlatti, 1685–1757）奏鳴曲之夜、孟德爾頌《無言歌》全部八冊、蕭邦（Frédéric Chopin, 1810–1849）或蕭士塔高維契（Dmitri Shostakovich, 1906–1975）專題；或者整場只彈一個地域的作品——塔涅耶夫（Sergei Taneyev, 1856–1915）與阿連斯基（Anton Arensky, 1861–1906）這種罕演的俄羅斯曲目、葛利格（Edvard Grieg, 1843–1907）與西貝流士（Jean Sibelius, 1865–1957）、德弗札克（Antonín Dvořák, 1841–1904）與史麥塔納（Bedřich Smetana, 1824–1884）。別人挑名曲，她挑全貌。
錄下《無言歌》全部 48 首而非幾首名曲，不是一次孤立的決定，是她一輩子的藝術性格。
而這個「不要精選、要全貌」的性格，她婚姻裡的另一半，恰好也有。
一對「不管冷門不冷門」的夫妻
1969 年，波斯特尼科娃嫁給了指揮家根納季·羅傑斯特汶斯基（Gennady Rozhdestvensky, 1931–2018）——這是她的第二段婚姻，第一任丈夫是小提琴家兼指揮家弗拉基米爾·斯皮瓦科夫（Vladimir Spivakov, 1944–），兩人所生之子後來由羅傑斯特汶斯基正式收養，也成了職業小提琴家。
羅傑斯特汶斯基這個人，在整個蘇聯音樂圈裡，是出了名地不管作品「討不討喜」。他公認是一批艱澀而多元曲目的推動者，包括在蘇聯體制對申特克（Alfred Schnittke, 1934–1998）與古拜杜莉娜（Sofia Gubaidulina, 1931–2025）這些作曲家皺眉頭的年代，仍然大力演出並錄製他們的音樂。他一生指揮並錄製了將近八百部作品，橫跨了曲目庫裡的常備經典與長期被冷落的冷門之作——1974 到 1985 年間，他更專門帶領室內劇院樂團，深耕較為冷僻的曲目編制。
換句話說，這是一對夫妻，各自用自己的方式，堅持著同一件事：不要只給觀眾「大家都想聽的那幾首」，要給全部——不管全部裡面有多少是冷門的、私密的、容易被忽略的。波斯特尼科娃錄《無言歌》全 48 首，和羅傑斯特汶斯基堅持指揮沒人願意碰的作品，是同一種藝術倫理的兩種表現形式。這也是為什麼，封底文案會特別提到兩人的雙鋼琴合作——他們的婚姻，本身就是這套唱片精神的延伸。
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【Gudian Music Stories】
“I Wish I Could Be with You” — How Mendelssohn Turned His Most Intimate Family Letters into a Musical Diary: The Only Complete Soviet Recording of Mendelssohn’s 48 Songs Without Words
MELODIYA / USSR / 33 C 10—10863-64(a) / 11595-96(a) / 11597-98(a)
In 1839, Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847) had already finished three books of Songs Without Words (Lieder ohne Worte). When his publisher, Simrock, expressed interest in publishing more, Mendelssohn declined in a letter:
"Whatever the good people of Hamburg may say, I have no intention of publishing anything of the kind. There is too much of that sort of thing in the world already, and it brings pleasure to no one."
(Yet, more volumes followed. Six books were published during his lifetime and two posthumously—totaling eight books of six pieces each, making a complete set of 48.)
These words came directly from the composer's own hand at the pinnacle of his life. In his early thirties, serving as the principal conductor of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra with an illustrious reputation, he nevertheless viewed these miniatures as mere trifles meant "for the ladies to play"—hardly worthy of standing alongside his monumental symphonies and oratorios on the public stage.
141 years later, in 1980, Melodiya—the state record company under the Soviet Ministry of Culture—recorded all 48 pieces of these Songs Without Words without missing a single note. Pressed onto a 3-LP box set, the cycle was performed by pianist Viktoria Postnikova (1944–).
It stands as the only complete recording of Mendelssohn’s 48 Songs Without Words produced throughout the entire Soviet era. Back then, Mendelssohn hardly took these pieces seriously; yet a Soviet state label treated them as a musical encyclopedia. The contrast between these two perspectives is where the true story of this record begins.
Music Tucked Inside Travel Letters: The True Genesis of Songs Without Words
To truly understand why Mendelssohn claimed these pieces would "bring pleasure to no one," one must first uncover how they came into being.
The earliest pieces were never conceived for publication. Instead, they were written directly into letters Mendelssohn sent home to his family while traveling. In 1830, writing from Munich to his sister, Fanny Mendelssohn (1805–1847), he noted:
"I wish I could be with you—but since that is impossible, I have written a song for you to express my wishes and my thoughts."
At the end of the letter, he appended a sixteen-measure melody—a genuine "song without words." Later that same year in Venice, he sent home another letter containing the piece that would later become the famed Venetian Gondola Song.
In other words, the original purpose of Songs Without Words was not the concert hall; it was epistolary correspondence. Mendelssohn used music to sketch unfamiliar foreign landscapes and convey his innermost feelings of the moment—entrusting to melody what words failed to articulate.
This became a lifelong conviction. When friends suggested adding lyrics to clarify the "meaning" of these pieces, he flatly refused, arguing that music expressed thoughts not too indefinite for words, but too definite.
Spanning nearly two decades—from his early twenties until just before his death—these 48 pieces, when arranged chronologically, form a personal "musical diary." Each book captures a snapshot of his inner life at a specific time.
Seen in this light, his reluctance toward Simrock in 1839 reflects more than self-doubt; it reads like an instinctive resistance to turning private letters into commercial commodities. He was not worried that the music lacked quality, but rather that sharing intimate thoughts originally meant for loved ones with total strangers—the "people of Hamburg"—might dilute their authentic truth.
More Than a Composer: A Titan of 19th-Century Music Education
Yet Mendelssohn did publish them in the end. That decision was intimately tied to another vital facet of his life: beyond being a composer and conductor, he was one of the 19th century’s most influential figures in music education and public outreach.
In 1829, at the age of twenty, Mendelssohn conducted Bach’s St. Matthew Passion in Berlin—the first public performance since Bach’s death nearly eighty years earlier—igniting the 19th-century Bach Revival. In 1835, he took helm of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, elevating it to the highest European standard while defining the blueprint for the modern conductor standing before the orchestra with a baton. By 1843, he founded the Leipzig Conservatory—Germany's first higher-education music institution—transforming musical training from workshop apprenticeships into a structured, modern curriculum.
The Songs Without Words fit seamlessly into this broader mission. In the early 19th century, the piano became a staple in middle-class European households, yet very few works managed to balance accessibility for amateurs with genuine artistic depth. Songs Without Words accomplished both: technically approachable enough for daughters and homemakers to play at home, yet uncompromising in musical substance.
Translating an intimate epistolary experience into music that anyone could play and feel in their living room was, in a sense, the most direct and successful manifestation of his lifelong ambition: placing serious art directly into the hands of the people.
Here lies the paradox: while these miniatures are among the most unguarded, private pieces Mendelssohn ever composed, they became the very works that reached the broadest audience in his public educational crusade.
Why Did the USSR Record a Complete Cycle of "Salon Miniatures"?
At their core, Mendelssohn’s Songs Without Words are intimate salon pieces—technically modest, emotionally introverted, designed for private enjoyment at the home keyboard. Yet their integrity as a "musical diary" was precisely what was most vulnerable to being lost over time.
In 1834, when visiting theorist Moritz Hauptmann (1792–1868) in Kassel, Mendelssohn reluctantly declined a request to play them, feeling they were not suitable for presentation. True to form, most modern record labels treated them simply as pleasant miniatures, cherry-picking a few popular favorites for a "best-of" compilation.
Within the context of the Cold War-era Soviet Union, this recording project seems even more unconventional. Official Soviet aesthetics favored heroic scope, collective narratives, and monumental forms; Mendelssohn's private, almost "bourgeois" salon music hardly fit the mold of standard propaganda. Releasing all 48 pieces across eight books in chronological sequence—preserving the complete musical diary—was rare in recording history, let alone under a planned-economy publishing system centered on "typical" and "monumental" masterworks.
Yet Melodiya chose wholeness. Recorded in Moscow in 1978 and pressed in 1980 by the Aprelevka Order of Lenin Record Plant, this 3-LP set gathered Op. 19, 30, 38, 53, 62, 67, 85, and 102 in full chronological order, engineered by I. Veprintsev and edited by E. Slepnev. This was an uncompromised encyclopedic endeavor, not a crowd-pleasing highlights album.
Notably, this recording was also licensed and issued in West Germany as a 2-LP set under the Eurodisc/Melodiya imprint—confirming it was recognized as a definitive, internationally significant complete edition rather than a mere archival release for domestic consumption. However, it was this domestic Soviet Red Label 3-LP edition that faithfully preserved the entire scope in its original historical breadth.
The Pianist Who Chose the Whole Picture
To understand why this set exists, one must understand Viktoria Postnikova.
Born into a musical family in Moscow in 1944, she entered the Central Music School at age six and performed a Mozart concerto publicly at seven. Her mother had been the very first student accepted by Yakov Flier (1912–1977); years later, Postnikova completed her postgraduate studies under Flier as well—two generations studying under the same master. Flier traced his lineage back to Konstantin Igumnov (1873–1948), representing one of the twin pillars of the Russian piano school alongside Heinrich Neuhaus (1888–1964)—a tradition defined by scrupulous fidelity to the original score and an understated, profound musical logic.
Yet what truly makes this recording make sense is Postnikova's defining artistic trait: she never settled for "highlights." Her solo recitals often dedicated entire evenings to a single composer—an evening of Domenico Scarlatti (1685–1757) sonatas, the complete eight books of Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words, or monographic programs of Frédéric Chopin (1810–1849) or Dmitri Shostakovich (1906–1975). At other times, she presented entire regional journeys: rarely performed Russian works by Sergei Taneyev (1856–1915) and Anton Arensky (1861–1906), Nordic pairings of Edvard Grieg (1843–1907) and Jean Sibelius (1865–1957), or Czech masterpieces by Antonín Dvořák (1841–1904) and Bedřich Smetana (1824–1884). Where others selected hits, she embraced the complete landscape.
Recording all 48 Songs Without Words was no isolated decision; it was the natural expression of her lifelong artistic character.
And this devotion to the complete canvas was a quality shared by her partner in life.
A Couple Unmoved by Popularity
In 1969, Postnikova married conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky (1931–2018). It was her second marriage; her first had been to violinist and conductor Vladimir Spivakov (1944–), whose son was later adopted by Rozhdestvensky and also became a professional violinist.
Within Soviet musical circles, Rozhdestvensky was renowned for his disregard of whether a piece was "crowd-pleasing." He was celebrated as a champion of demanding, eclectic repertoire—tirelessly performing and recording works by composers like Alfred Schnittke (1934–1998) and Sofia Gubaidulina (1931–2025) even during eras when the Soviet establishment frowned upon their music. Over his career, he conducted and recorded nearly 800 works, spanning standard concert repertoire and long-neglected rarities alike; between 1974 and 1985, he led the Moscow Chamber Musical Theatre Orchestra, dedicating himself to rare and unconventional instrumentations.
Together, they were a couple who, each in their own way, held fast to the same conviction: never give the audience merely the few pieces they expect to hear—give them the whole, no matter how obscure, intimate, or easily overlooked parts of that whole might be.
Postnikova’s recording of all 48 Songs Without Words and Rozhdestvensky’s commitment to forgotten scores were two manifestations of the exact same artistic ethic. That is why the album's liner notes make special mention of their four-hand piano partnerships: their marriage itself was a living extension of the spirit behind this recording.