Spa and hotel orchestra in the Engadin
A research project at the University of Basel is investigating the multifaceted history of spa and hotel orchestras in the Engadin. An exhibition and a conference in June will give anyone interested the opportunity to find out more about this fascinating phenomenon
Helen Gebhart - Walks through forests and over frozen lakes, ladies and gentlemen in elegant dresses sipping tea in the Grand Hotel or watching winter sports enthusiasts dashing across the ice rinks. This is how one could imagine a scene in the Engadin in the 19th and early 20th centuries. From the 1860s onwards, another phenomenon was added to this picture: the various spa and hotel orchestras that provided a musical backdrop to the numerous activities of the guests. These orchestras, often associated with one or more hotels or a spa association, consisted mainly of musicians who came to the Engadin from Italy and Eastern Europe for the season.
The occasions and places where music was played were varied and unusual: music was played in the hotels at balls and for tea, at symphonic concerts, but also outside in the forest, next to the ice rinks and on the ski jump. The spa and hotel orchestras therefore had to be astonishingly flexible: The orchestras often played for eight hours a day in different line-ups and had to transport their instruments and boxes of music paper back and forth between the hotels, the ice rinks or even to the mineral springs before playing all night for the dance. When the guests were wrapped up warmly around the bobsleigh tracks or watching the ski jumpers, the musicians literally ventured onto the ice with their instruments and provided the musical backdrop with clammy fingers.
The repertoire played changed over the course of time. In the late 19th century, you could often hear arrangements of operettas and arias, but also polkas and virtuoso works. From the end of the First World War, fashionable dances and jazz music were added, and the repertoire was also varied depending on the taste of the guests. The tradition of spa orchestras in the Engadin remains unbroken to this day: In the Taiswald near Pontresina you can find the Camerata Pontresina or listen to the sounds of the Salonorchester St. Moritz in St. Moritz.
The history of these orchestras is still little documented in the literature. The research project at the University of Basel, led by Matthias Schmidt and Mathias Gredig, is bringing this multifaceted history to light. The project was commissioned and supported by the Institute for Cultural Research Graubünden. Just like the diversity of the repertoire and instrumentation of the salon orchestras, the source material is also very varied. Mathias Gredig, partly with the help of students from the University of Basel, has spent hours in the archives of hotels, clubs and communities, sifting through boxes of minutes, documents and contracts to get as accurate a picture as possible of this phenomenon. Musical references can be found everywhere and all theses are derived from the extensive archive material and documents, he says enthusiastically about his work. As part of the research project, an exhibition in Pontresina and a conference in St. Moritz and Pontresina will be held in June.
Exhibition and conference
The exhibition entitled "Höhen-musik. Orchestras of the Hotels and Spa Clubs in the Engadin" will take place from June 6 to October 22, 2022 and December 19, 2022 to April 15, 2023 at the Museum Alpin in Pontresina. It presents the history of the Engadin spa and hotel orchestras from a variety of perspectives using numerous text and image documents from the archives. Students from the University of Basel worked on the exhibition and conducted film interviews with current members of the spa orchestras, among others. Two backdrops were painted especially for the exhibition by a theater painter, showing the Engadine landscape and the locations of the orchestras. Another film about the ice concerts, an audio station with sound samples and a sonorous model are also available to visitors.
The international conference "Salon Orchestras of the Alps" from June 24 to 26 at the Hotel Reine Victoria St. Moritz, the Taiswald, the Hotel Saratz and the Museum Alpin in Pontresina can be divided into two methodological blocks. Some of the contributions are based on textual and numerical documents, such as protocols and contracts with musicians, and deal with topics such as labor migration, balneology, economics, dances and sleigh rides.
Another part is based on sheet music documents and discusses topics such as exoticisms, genre transfers, new music or sound colors in salon music.
Formations of the Engadine salon orchestras also perform regularly during the conference.
Exhibition Museum Alpin Pontresina
6.6 until 22.10.2022 and 19. 12.2022 until 15.04.2023
> www.pontresina.ch/museumalpin
Salon orchestra conference
June 24-26, Hotel Reine Victoria in St. Moritz and Taiswald, Hotel Saratz, Museum Alpin in Pontresina
Info and registration:
