Ernstalbrecht Stiebler (29 March 1934 – 7 June 2024) was a German composer of mostly

chamber Chamber or the chamber may refer to: In government and organizations *Chamber of commerce, an organization of business owners to promote commercial interests *Legislative chamber, in politics *Debate chamber, the space or room that houses deliber ...

choral A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

, piano, and

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

works in minimalist or

reductionist Reductionism is any of several related philosophical ideas regarding the associations between phenomena which can be described in terms of other simpler or more fundamental phenomena. It is also described as an intellectual and philosophical pos ...

style. His work has "three principal concerns: sonority, rhythm, and duration" leading "to a large and varied body of work".Jurek, Thom. "Three in One" Allmusic.

Biography

Stiebler was born in Berlin on 29 March 1934. He studied composition with Ernst Klussmann and piano at the Musikhochschule Hamburg, but had more important lessons at

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it th ...

between 1958 and 1961, where he studied with Karlheinz Stockhausen in 1959 and where he first encountered the music of LaMonte Young. From Young he took on sustained sounds and gradually unfolding forms, developing a style based on minimalist structures and repetitions. His other primary influences are indicated by the music of other composers he promoted while a music producer at broadcaster Hessischer Rundfunk, where he stayed for 25 years: Morton Feldman,

John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading fi ...

Alvin Lucier Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr. (May 14, 1931 – December 1, 2021) was an American composer of experimental music and sound installations that explore acoustic phenomena and auditory perception. A long-time music professor at Wesleyan University in Mi ...

Giacinto Scelsi Giacinto Francesco Maria Scelsi (; 8 January 1905 – 9 August 1988, sometimes cited as 8 August 1988) was an Italian composer who also wrote surrealist poetry in French. He is best known for having composed music based around only one pitch, ...

, Earle Brown and Christian Wolff. Steibler's form of minimalism comes more from visual art than from mainstream minimalist music. He famously said: “Music is too important to burden it with emotions.” His music ranges from solo instrumental music to chamber ensembles (such as ''Trio 89'' for cello, piano and percussion, and ''Three in One'' (1992) for bass flute and tape), choral pieces, and also full scale orchestral works such as ''Unisono Diviso'' ('Divided Unison', 1999) and ''Zwischen Den Tönen'' ('Slow Motion', 2003). He died on 7 June 2024, at the age of 90.Akademie der Künste trauert um Ernstalbrecht Stiebler (1934–2024)

References

External links

in German

* *
''Zwischen Den Tönen'', YouTube
1934 births 2024 deaths 20th-century German composers 20th-century German male musicians 21st-century German composers 21st-century German male musicians Composers from Berlin Experimental composers German classical composers German male classical composers Hessischer Rundfunk people Members of the Academy of Arts, Berlin {{Germany-composer-stub