Wilhelm Kienzl (17 January 1857 – 3 October 1941
) was an Austrian composer.
Biography
Kienzl was born in the small, picturesque
Upper Austria
Upper Austria (german: Oberösterreich ; bar, Obaöstareich) is one of the nine states or of Austria. Its capital is Linz. Upper Austria borders Germany and the Czech Republic, as well as the other Austrian states of Lower Austria, Styria, an ...
n town of
Waizenkirchen. His family moved to the Styrian capital of
Graz in 1860, where he studied the violin under Ignaz Uhl, piano under Johann Buwa, and composition from 1872 under the
Chopin scholar Louis Stanislaus Mortier de Fontaine. From 1874, he studied composition under
Wilhelm Mayer (also known as W.A. Rémy), music aesthetics under
Eduard Hanslick and music history under Friedrich von Hausegger. He was subsequently sent to the music conservatorium at
Prague University to study under
Josef Krejci, the director of the conservatorium. After that he went to
Leipzig Conservatory
The University of Music and Theatre "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy" Leipzig (german: Hochschule für Musik und Theater "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy" Leipzig) is a public university in Leipzig (Saxony, Germany). Founded in 1843 by Felix Mendelssohn ...
in 1877, then to
Weimar
Weimar is a city in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It is located in Central Germany between Erfurt in the west and Jena in the east, approximately southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouri ...
to study under
Liszt
Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...
, before completing doctoral studies at the
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich hist ...
.
While Kienzl was at Prague, Krejci took him to the
Bayreuth Festival to hear the first performance of Wagner's
Ring Cycle
(''The Ring of the Nibelung''), WWV 86, is a cycle of four German-language epic music dramas composed by Richard Wagner. The works are based loosely on characters from Germanic heroic legend, namely Norse legendary sagas and the ''Nibelun ...
. It made a lasting impression on Kienzl, so much so that he founded the "Graz Richard Wagner Association" (now the "Austrian Richard Wagner Company, Graz Office") with Hausegger and with
Friedrich Hofmann Friedrich may refer to:
Names
*Friedrich (surname), people with the surname ''Friedrich''
*Friedrich (given name), people with the given name ''Friedrich''
Other
*Friedrich (board game), a board game about Frederick the Great and the Seven Years' ...
. Although he subsequently fell out with "The Wagnerites", he never lost his love for Wagner's music.
In 1879, Kienzl departed on a tour of Europe as a pianist and conductor. He became the director of the ''Deutsche Oper'' in Amsterdam during 1883, but he soon returned to Graz, where in 1886, he took over the leadership of the ''Steiermärkischen Musikvereins und Aufgaben am Konservatorium''. He was engaged by the manager
Bernhard Pollini
Bernhard Pollini, real name Baruch Pohl, (16 December 1838 – 26 November 1897) was a German operatic tenor, and opera director.
Life
Born in Cologne, Pollini came from a strictly Jewish family living in very modest circumstances and was ac ...
as ''Kapellmeister'' at the Hamburg ''Stadttheater'' for the 1890–91 season, but was dismissed in mid-January 1891 because of the hostile reviews he received (his successor was
Gustav Mahler). Later he conducted in Munich.
In 1894, he wrote his third and most famous opera, ''
Der Evangelimann
''Der Evangelimann'' (''The Evangelist'') is an opera in two acts by the Austrian composer Wilhelm Kienzl. The libretto, by the composer, is based on short story "". It was adapted in 1924 as a silent film '' The Evangelist''.
Composition hi ...
'', but was unable to match its success with ''
Don Quixote
is a Spanish epic novel by Miguel de Cervantes. Originally published in two parts, in 1605 and 1615, its full title is ''The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha'' or, in Spanish, (changing in Part 2 to ). A founding work of West ...
'' (1897). Only ''
Der Kuhreigen'' (1911) reached a similar level of popularity, and that very briefly. In 1917, Kienzl moved to Vienna, where his first wife, the Wagnerian soprano Lili Hoke, died in 1919, and he married
Henny Bauer, the librettist of his three most recent operas, in 1921.
After World War I, he composed the melody to a poem written by
Karl Renner
Karl Renner (14 December 1870 – 31 December 1950) was an Austrian politician and jurist of the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria. He is often referred to as the "Father of the Republic" because he led the first government of German ...
, ''Deutschösterreich, du herrliches Land'' (''German Austria, you wonderful country''), which became the unofficial national anthem of the first Austrian Republic until 1929. Aware of changes in the dynamics of modern music, he ceased to write large works after 1926, and abandoned composition altogether in 1936 due to bad health. As of 1933, Kienzl openly supported
Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
’s regime in
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.
[Peter Utgaard, ''Remembering and Forgetting Nazism: Education, National Identity, and the Victim Myth in Postwar Austria'' (2003), p. 39.]
Kienzl's first love was opera, then vocal music, and it was in these two genres that he made his name. For a while he was considered, along with
Hugo Wolf, one of the finest composers of
Lieder (art songs) since
Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert (; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short lifetime, Schubert left behind a vast ''oeuvre'', including more than 600 secular vocal wor ...
. His most famous work, ''Der Evangelimann'', best known for its aria ''Selig sind, die Verfolgung leiden'' (''Blessed are the persecuted''), continues to be revived occasionally. It is a folk opera which has been compared to
Humperdinck's ''
Hansel and Gretel
"Hansel and Gretel" (; german: Hänsel und Gretel ) is a German fairy tale collected by the German Brothers Grimm and published in 1812 in ''Grimm's Fairy Tales'' (KHM 15). It is also known as Little Step Brother and Little Step Sister.
Hansel ...
'', and contains elements of
verismo
In opera, ''verismo'' (, from , meaning "true") was a post-Romantic operatic tradition associated with Italian composers such as Pietro Mascagni, Ruggero Leoncavallo, Umberto Giordano, Francesco Cilea and Giacomo Puccini.
''Verismo'' as an ...
. After Humperdinck and
Siegfried Wagner
Siegfried Helferich Richard Wagner (6 June 18694 August 1930) was a German composer and conductor, the son of Richard Wagner. He was an opera composer and the artistic director of the Bayreuth Festival from 1908 to 1930.
Life
Siegfried Wagner ...
, the composers of fairy-tale operas, Kienzl is the most important opera composer of the romantic post-Wagner era. However, Kienzl's strengths actually lie in the depiction of everyday scenes. In his last years, his ample corpus of songs achieved prominence, though it has largely been neglected since then.
Despite the fact that opera came first in his life, Kienzl by no means ignored instrumental music. He wrote three string quartets and a piano trio.
Political views
Kienzl was an outspoken Nazi supporter. He praised Hitler before Austria's Anschluss in 1938 as an "imposing" and "impressive" character who is "entitled to command the peoples of the world".
Death
Kienzl died in Vienna and is buried in a
grave of honor at the
Vienna Central Cemetery
The Vienna Central Cemetery (german: Wiener Zentralfriedhof) is one of the largest cemeteries in the world by number of interred, and is the most well-known cemetery among Vienna's nearly 50 cemeteries. The cemetery's name is descriptive of its ...
. His death during the Nazi period explains his grave of honour, yet the honour has not been critically questioned since, in more than 70 years of democracy in Austria. Far from it, in 2007 the Republic of Austria issued a commemorative stamp in Kienzl's honour on the occasion of his 150th birthday.
See also
*
List of compositions by Wilhelm Kienzl
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kienzl, Wilhelm
1857 births
1941 deaths
19th-century male musicians
20th-century male musicians
Austrian male classical composers
Austrian opera composers
Austrian Romantic composers
Burials at the Vienna Central Cemetery
Composers from Graz
Male opera composers
People from Grieskirchen District
Prague Conservatory alumni
Pupils of Wilhelm Mayer (composer)
University of Music and Theatre Leipzig alumni
University of Vienna alumni