Ėmilij Metner as Music Critic. Preliminary Remarks

In music histories, Emil Medtner has been overlooked almost completely, as well as the Germanophile cultural tendencies he represented. His severe criticism of “modernist” trends in music and his frankly exposed racist and anti-Semite worldview have made him a sort of bête noire for musicologists. A closer look on his writings reveals many contradictions and ambiguities in his judgements. Taking Liszt and Rachmaninov as examples, it becomes evident that Medtner's attitude towards music and his distinction between performers and composers, as compared to his own brother Nikolai, was based on culturological and ultimately racist ideologies.