Oskar Adler (4 June 187515 May 1955) was an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

ist,

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

and esoteric savant. He was the brother of the political theorist Max Adler and a key early influence on his contemporary

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (, ; ; 13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian-American composer, music theorist, teacher, writer, and painter. He is widely considered one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. He was as ...

. His friend and student

Hans Keller Hans (Heinrich) Keller (11 March 19196 November 1985) was an Austrian-born British musician and writer, who made significant contributions to musicology and music criticism, as well as being a commentator on such disparate fields as psychoana ...

called him "one of our century's supreme (if largely private) instrumentalists".

Life and career

Adler was a close friend of Arnold Schoenberg from their schooldays, Adler taught Schoenberg the rudiments of music, gave him his first grounding in philosophy, and played chamber music with him. Though self-taught, Adler for many years led a string quartet whose regular cellist was another composer-friend, Franz Schmidt.MacDonald, Malcolm. ''Schoenberg'' (2008), p.32-3
/ref> Adler also played in Schoenberg's

Society for Private Musical Performances The Society for Private Musical Performances (in German, the ) was an organization founded in Vienna in the Autumn of 1918 by Arnold Schoenberg with the intention of making carefully rehearsed and comprehensible performances of newly composed mus ...

, lectured on music and philosophy, as well as giving musical and spiritual advice to, and casting horoscopes for, many of Vienna's leading creative artists. In 1935 the violinist

Louis Krasner Louis Krasner (4 May 1995) was a Russian Empire-born American classical violinist who premiered the violin concertos of Alban Berg and Arnold Schoenberg. Biography Louis Krasner was born in Cherkasy, Russian Empire. He arrived in the United Stat ...

consulted Adler (as well as

Carl Flesch Carl Flesch (born Károly Flesch, 9 October 1873 – 14 November 1944) was a Hungarian violinist and teacher. Flesch’s compendium ''Scale System'' is a staple of violin pedagogy. Life and career Flesch was born in Moson (now part of Mosonmagy ...

) about the solo part of

Alban Berg Alban Maria Johannes Berg ( , ; 9 February 1885 – 24 December 1935) was an Austrian composer of the Second Viennese School. His compositional style combined Romantic lyricism with the twelve-tone technique. Although he left a relatively sma ...

Violin Concerto A violin concerto is a concerto for solo violin (occasionally, two or more violins) and instrumental ensemble (customarily orchestra). Such works have been written since the Baroque period, when the solo concerto form was first developed, up thro ...

, which Krasner had commissioned but could not, at that time, play. Around this time, Adler was also the teacher of the young Hans Keller, later a musician, writer and Schoenberg-expert resident in the UK. After the

Anschluss The (, or , ), also known as the (, en, Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the German Reich on 13 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a " Greater Germany ...

, Schoenberg tried to arrange for Adler to come to

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, but he escaped instead to the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

after his visa was secured by Hans Keller's brother-in-law Roy Franey. He settled nearby Keller's family in

Herne Hill Herne Hill is a district in South London, approximately four miles from Charing Cross and bordered by Brixton, Camberwell, Dulwich, and Tulse Hill. It sits to the north and east of Brockwell Park and straddles the boundary between the boroughs ...

until both of them were sent to the

Huyton internment camp Huyton ( ) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Knowsley, Merseyside, England. Part of the Liverpool Urban Area, it borders the Liverpool suburbs of Dovecot, Knotty Ash and Belle Vale, and the neighbouring village of Roby, with which it ...

near Liverpool. After release he and his wife Paula (Freud) Adler, a fluent pianist, joined Keller's family in the

Lake District The Lake District, also known as the Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous for its lakes, forests, and mountains (or ''fells''), and its associations with William Wordswor ...

and performed in chamber music concerts there with Keller. His last years were spent in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. Adler and Schoenberg resumed their friendship by letter in the late 1940s; some of the correspondence is published. Adler's principal books were ''Critique of Pure Music'' (1918, finally published in 2020), and ''The Testament of Astrology'' (published in 3 volumes 1935–37, many subsequent editions). ''The Testament of Astrology'' was translated into English by his pupil Zdenka Orenstein and edited by Amy Shapiro. A biography by Shapiro includes letters, stories and memoirs gathered across twenty years of discovery, of people who recounted the central role that Dr. Oskar Adler played in Vienna's pre-Nazi cultural life before 1938 and while in exile.Shapiro, Amy. ''Dr. Oskar Adler: A Complete Man'', Goodreads review
/ref>

References

External Links

Portrait of Oskar Adler (circa 1949-51)
by

Milein Cosman Emilie Cosman, known as Milein Cosman, (31 March 1921 – 21 November 2017) was a German-born artist based in England. She is best known for her drawings and prints of leading cultural figures, dancers and musicians in action, such as Francis Baco ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Adler, Oskar Austrian classical violinists Male classical violinists 20th-century Austrian physicians Austrian astrologers 20th-century astrologers 1875 births 1955 deaths 19th-century Austrian Jews Jews who immigrated to the United Kingdom to escape Nazism