Siegmund von Hausegger
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
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
and conductor
Conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...
.
Early life
Siegmund was born in GrazGraz
The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...
, the son of Friedrich von Hausegger (1837-1899), a lawyer and writer on music. According to Siegmund's own account, Friedrich was "one of the first in Austria to recognize the greatness of Richard Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
and to exert himself to the utmost in propagating his music and his ideas". According to one account, the young von Hausegger may have been made the vehicle of his critic-father's ideals. Siegmund studied music initially under his father, and a strong Wagnerian tinge is found in his own compositions, which included masses
Mass (music)
The Mass, a form of sacred musical composition, is a choral composition that sets the invariable portions of the Eucharistic liturgy to music...
, opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s and symphonic poem
Symphonic poem
A symphonic poem or tone poem is a piece of orchestral music in a single continuous section in which the content of a poem, a story or novel, a painting, a landscape or another source is illustrated or evoked. The term was first applied by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt to his 13 works in this vein...
s as well as many choruses and songs.
At the age of nineteen, von Hausegger composed a Mass for chorus and orchestra that he described as "my first serious composition". Originally intended to be performed at his college, the work proved too challenging for his fellow-pupils. His father helped him arrange a private performance before an invited audience. This event marked von Hausegger's debut both as a conductor and as a composer.
Reputation
He was talked of in Austria and Germany in the first years of the 20th century as one of the next great talents after Strauss and Mahler, but despite several successes before the First World War his music was progressively forgotten after it when his full-blooded post-Wagnerian style went out of fashion. In 1922 the German critic Adolf Weissmann wrote "The symphonic poetry of Siegmund von Hausegger is full of Wagner. His work originates in a resolute will to truth and honesty, but outworn theory cripples his imagination".Conducting career
Hausegger conducted orchestras in many GermanGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
and Austrian cities including Graz
Graz
The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...
; Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
, where he shared the conductorship of the Kaim Orchestra with Felix Weingartner
Felix Weingartner
Paul Felix von Weingartner, Edler von Münzberg was an Austrian conductor, composer and pianist.-Biography:...
; Frankfurt
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
(1904-6); Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
(Blüthner Orchestra
Blüthner Orchestra
The Blüthner Orchestra was a symphony orchestra based in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1908 and sponsored by the Blüthner piano company, it functioned until the 1920s.The orchestra specialised in engaging young players...
, 1910-15); and Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
(1910-20). After the First World War he served as conductor of the Scottish Orchestra in Glasgow
Glasgow
Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
and Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
before returning to Munich as conductor of the Munich Philharmonic and president of the Munich Academy of Music. In 1920 he succeeded Max von Schillings
Max von Schillings
Max von Schillings was a German conductor, composer and theatre director. He was chief conductor at the Berlin State Opera from 1919 to 1925....
as president of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein.
He was the first conductor to perform Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner was an Austrian composer known for his symphonies, masses, and motets. The first are considered emblematic of the final stage of Austro-German Romanticism because of their rich harmonic language, complex polyphony, and considerable length...
's Symphony No. 9
Symphony No. 9 (Bruckner)
Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 9 in D minor is the last Symphony upon which he worked, leaving the last movement incomplete at the time of his death in 1896. The symphony was premiered under Ferdinand Löwe in Vienna in 1903, after Bruckner's death...
in its original form. The symphony had been posthumously premiered in a version which had been substantially edited by Ferdinand Löwe
Ferdinand Löwe
Ferdinand Löwe was an Austrian conductor.- Biography :Löwe was born in Vienna, Austria where along with Munich, Germany his career was primarily centered. From 1896 Löwe conducted the Kaim Orchestra, today's Munich Philharmonic, where he returned from 1908 to 1914...
. Löwe made changes to the harmonies, dynamics and phrasing in a bid to make the symphony more acceptable to the public. 0n 2 April 1932, Hausegger presented a concert in which the symphony was performed twice by the Munich Philharmonic; first in Löwe's version then using Bruckner's original autograph. Today the symphony is almost always presented in Bruckner's original form. Hausegger assisted Robert Haas
Robert Haas
Robert Haas may refer to:*Robert Haas , Austrian musicologist*Robert Haas , American calligrapher, typographer, photographer and book designer*Robert Haas , German clergyman and ecumenist...
and Alfred Orel in preparing the edition of Symphony published as Volume 9 of Anton Bruckner: Sämtliche Werke and he also made the first commercial recording of the symphony with the Munich Philharmonic in 1938 for HMV
HMV
His Master's Voice is a trademark in the music business, and for many years was the name of a large record label. The name was coined in 1899 as the title of a painting of the dog Nipper listening to a wind-up gramophone...
, using that edition. He retired from conducting in the same year. He died in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
.
Family
Hausegger was twice married, first in 1902 to Hertha Ritter, daughter of Franziska Wagner, niece of Richard WagnerRichard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
, and Alexander Ritter
Alexander Ritter
Alexander Sascha Ritter was a German composer and violinist.He was born in Narva, Estonia. He studied in Frankfurt am Main under Joachim Raff. In 1854 he married Wagner's niece Franziska...
, the librettist of Richard Strauss's opera Feuersnot and, after her death in 1913, secondly to Helene von Bronsart.
Works (selected list)
- Helfrid, opera (1893)
- Zinnober, opera (1898)
- Dionysische Phantasie for orchestra(1898)
- Mass (1899)
- Barbarossa, symphonic poem (1900)
- Wieland der Schmied, symphonic poem (1904)
- Aufklänge, variations for orchestra (1910)
- Natursymphonie for large orchestra with final chorus to words from Goethe's poem Proömium (1911)
- Requiem