Josef Matthias Hauer
Encyclopedia
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n composer and music theorist. He is most famous for developing, independent of and a year or two before Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
, a method for composing with all 12 notes of the chromatic scale
Chromatic scale
The chromatic scale is a musical scale with twelve pitches, each a semitone apart. On a modern piano or other equal-tempered instrument, all the half steps are the same size...
.
Hauer "detested all art that expressed ideas, programmes or feelings," instead believing that it was "essential...to raise music to its highest...level," a, "purely spiritual, supersensual music composed according to impersonal rules," and many of his compositions reflect this in their direct, often athematic, 'cerebral' approach.
His twelve-tone music was balanced between the "obligatory rule" that each composition follow an arrangement of the total chromatic: "the 'Constellation' or "Grundgestalt' ('basic shape')," and his often emphasized concept of tropes
Trope (music)
A trope or tropus may be a variety of different things in medieval and modern music.The term trope derives from the Greek τρόπος , "a turn, a change" , related to the root of the verb τρέπειν , "to turn, to direct, to alter, to change"...
, or unordered arrangement of a pair of hexachord
Hexachord
In music, a hexachord is a collection of six pitch classes including six-note segments of a scale or tone row. The term was adopted in the Middle Ages and adapted in the twentieth-century in Milton Babbitt's serial theory.-Middle Ages:...
s
Life
Hauer was born in Wiener NeustadtWiener Neustadt
-Main sights:* The Late-Romanesque Dom, consecrated in 1279 and cathedral from 1469 to 1785. The choir and transept, in Gothic style, are from the 14th century. In the late 15th century 12 statues of the Apostles were added in the apse, while the bust of Cardinal Melchior Klesl is attributed to...
and died in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. He had an early musical training in zither
Zither
The zither is a musical string instrument, most commonly found in Slovenia, Austria, Hungary citera, northwestern Croatia, the southern regions of Germany, alpine Europe and East Asian cultures, including China...
, cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
, choral
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
conducting, and organ
Organ (music)
The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...
, and claimed to have been self-taught in theory and composition. In 1918 he published his first work on music theory (a tone-color theory based on Goethe's). In August 1919 he published his "law of the twelve tones", requiring that all twelve chromatic notes sound before any is repeated. This he developed and first articulated theoretically in Vom Wesen der Musikalischen (1920), before Schoenberg’s earliest writings on twelve-tone technique
Twelve-tone technique
Twelve-tone technique is a method of musical composition devised by Arnold Schoenberg...
.
Hauer wrote prolifically, both music and prose, until 1938, when his music was added to the touring Nazi
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
"degenerate art
Degenerate art
Degenerate art is the English translation of the German entartete Kunst, a term adopted by the Nazi regime in Germany to describe virtually all modern art. Such art was banned on the grounds that it was un-German or Jewish Bolshevist in nature, and those identified as degenerate artists were...
" (Entartete Kunst) exhibit. He stayed in Austria through the war, and, in fear, publishing nothing. Even after the war, however, he published little more, although it is thought that several hundred pieces remain in manuscript.
Musical Style
Hauer's compositional techniques are extraordinarily various, often change from one piece to the next. These range from building-block techniques to methods using a chord series that is generated out of the twelve-tone row ("Melos"). The so-called 44 "tropes" and their compositional usage ("trope-technique") are essential to Hauer's twelve-tone techniques. In contrast to a twelve-tone row that contains a fixed succession of twelve tones, a trope consists of two complementary hexachords in which there is no fixed tone sequence. The tropes are used for structural and intervallic views on the twelve-tone system. Every trope offers certain symmetries that can be used by the composer.After 1940, Hauer wrote exclusively Zwölftonspiele ("Twelve-tone Games" or "Twelve-tone Playing"), designated sometimes by number, sometimes by date. He wrote about one thousand such pieces, most of them lost.
Musical Works
- 577 Works are known (Lafite index)
- Apokalyptische Fantasie, op. 5 (1913)
- Nomos, op. 19 (1919)
- Cantata Wandlungen, op. 53 (1927) - Premiere conducted by Hermann ScherchenHermann ScherchenHermann Scherchen was a German conductor.-Life:Scherchen was originally a violist and played among the violas of the Bluthner Orchestra of Berlin while still in his teens...
- Violinkonzert mit Orchester in einem Satz, op. 54 (1928) - Premiere conducted by Hermann ScherchenHermann ScherchenHermann Scherchen was a German conductor.-Life:Scherchen was originally a violist and played among the violas of the Bluthner Orchestra of Berlin while still in his teens...
- Klavierkonzert mit Orchester in einem Satz, op. 55 (1928)
- Opera Salambo, op. 60 (1929) - Premiere conducted by Otto KlempererOtto KlempererOtto Klemperer was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century.-Biography:Otto Klemperer was born in Breslau, Silesia Province, then in Germany...
- Opera Die Schwarze Spinne, op. 62 (1932) - Premiere conducted by Michael GielenMichael Gielen-Professional career:Gielen was born in Dresden, Germany, to opera director Josef Gielen. Through his mother, Rose, he is the nephew of Eduard Steuermann and Salka Steuermann Viertel. He began his career as a pianist in Buenos Aires, where he studied with Erwin Leuchter and gave an early...
- Cantata Der Menschen Weg, op. 67 (1934)
- Various HölderlinFriedrich HölderlinJohann Christian Friedrich Hölderlin was a major German lyric poet, commonly associated with the artistic movement known as Romanticism. Hölderlin was also an important thinker in the development of German Idealism, particularly his early association with and philosophical influence on his...
-Kantaten, Der Frühling pg. 21/3; Emilie vor ihrem Brauttag pg. 58 (1928) - Fantasie für Klavier, literally, Fantasy for a piano 39 (1925)
- Charakterstücke für Salonorchester
- Zwölftonmusik für neun Soloinstrumente op. 73 (twelve-tone music for nine solo instruments) (1937)
- Zwölftonmusik für Orchester (twelve-tone music for orchestra) (1939)
- Zwölftonmusik für Orchester mit einer Zwölftonreihe, die in sechs verschiedenen Tropen steht, lit. with a twelve-tone row, in six different tropes (1945)
- Zwölftonspiel für fünf Violinen (Hermann Heiß gewidmet), lit. twelve-tone piece for five violins, dedicated to Hermann Heiß (1949)
- Zwölftonspiel für Klavier zu vier Händen. lit. twelve-tone piece for piano four hands (1956)
Theoretical Writings
- 17 Theoretical Writings (1918-1926), 33 Essays and Articles (1919-1948)
The most important writings:
- Über die Klangfarbe ("About Tone-Color", 1918)
- Vom Wesen des Musikalischen ("On the Essence of Music", 1920)
- Deutung des Melos ("Interpretation of the Melos", 1923)
- Atonale Melodienlehre ("Teachings on Atonal Melodies", manuscript, 1923)
- Vom Melos zur Pauke ("From the Melos to the Kettledrum", 1925)
- Zwölftontechnik. Die Lehre von den Tropen ("Twelve-Tone Technique: Teachings on the Tropes", 1926)
- Der Goldene Schnitt. Eine Rechtfertigung der Zwölftonmusik ("The Golden Ratio", manuscript, 1926)
- Kosmisches Testament (three "Cosmic Testaments", manuscripts, 1937, 1941, 1945)
Sources
- Hauer, Josef Matthias.
- Lichtenfeld, Monika. 2001. "Hauer, Josef Matthias". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, 29 vols., edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell, 11:134–37. London: Macmillan Publishers; New York: Grove's Dictionaires.
- Whittall, Arnold. 2008. The Cambridge Introduction to Serialism. Cambridge Introductions to Music. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521863414 (cloth) ISBN 9780521682008 (pbk.)
Further reading
- Henck, Herbert. Fürsprache für Hauer: Hermann Heiß und die Hintergründe eines Briefes von Thomas Mann an Ellie Bommersheim im Jahre 1949 ["Speech for the Defence of Hauer: Hermann Heiß and the Background of a Letter from Thomas Mann to Ellie Bommersheim in 1949"]. Deinstedt: Kompost-Verlag, 1998. ISBN 3-9802341-3-4.
- Fheodoroff, Nikolaus. Josef Matthias Hauer: Schriften, Manifeste, Dokumente ["Josef Matthias Hauer: Writings, Manifestos, Documents"]. Vienna: Edition Österreichische Musikzeit, 2003.
- Lansky, PaulPaul LanskyPaul Lansky is an American electronic-music or computer-music composer who has been producing works from the 1970s up to the present day .-Biography:...
, George PerleGeorge PerleGeorge Perle was a composer and music theorist. He was born in Bayonne, New Jersey. Perle was an alumnus of DePaul University...
, and Dave Headlam. "Twelve-note Composition". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley SadieStanley SadieStanley Sadie CBE was a leading British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , which was published as the first edition of the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.Sadie was educated at St Paul's School,...
and John TyrrellJohn Tyrrell (professor of music)John Tyrrell was born in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia in 1942. He studied at the universities of Cape Town, Oxford and Brno. In 2000 he was appointed Research Professor at Cardiff University....
. London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001. - Sengstschmid, Johann. Zwischen Trope und Zwölftonspiel: J. M. Hauers Zwölftontechnik in ausgewählten Beispielen ["Between Trope and Twelve-tone Game: J. M. Hauer's Twelve-tone Technique in Selected Examples"]. Regensburg: Gustav Bosse, 1980. ISBN 3764922192
- Shaw-Miller, Simon. Visible Deeds of Music: Art and Music from Wagner to Cage. Chapter 5, 'Out of Tune' Hauer's Legacy and the Aesthetics of Minimalism in Art and Music', pp. 163–207. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2002.
External links
- Josef Matthias Hauer page
- John Covach. "Josef Matthias Hauer" (biography).