OT on Music Theory Print

Otakar Jeremiáš

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otakar Jeremiáš (17 October 1892 – 5 March 1962) was a Czech composer, conductor and teacher. He was the son of composer Bohuslav Jeremiáš and the brother of composer Jaroslav Jeremiáš. Life Jeremiáš was born in Písek. An accomplished cellist and pianist, he studied at the Prague Conservatory of Music. He lived in České Budějovice, where he directed a local music school until February 1929, when he was appointed head conductor of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra. When he succeeded Charvat as conductor of the Radiojournal Orchestra in 1929, there were only 27 players, but he managed to increase its size to 45 by 1931 and by 1936 there were 70, achieved by much negotiation, good salaries for the players, as well as his own charisma. In 1945 Jeremiáš left the Radio Symphony Orchestra to become president of the Prague National Theatre Opera. From 1949 he was chairman of the Federation of Czechoslovak Composers (Svaz československých skadatelů). He died in Prague. Jeremiáš’s view of conducting was set out in an article in 1943 where he wrote “My ideal is a creative orchestra, whose members, in accord with the efforts of the conductor, creatively collaborate during their performance”.

Otakar Ostrčil

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otakar Ostrčil (25 February 1879 in Prague – 20 August 1935 in Prague) was a Czech composer and conductor. He is noted for symphonic works Impromptu, Suite in C Minor, and Symfonietta, and in his opera compositions Poupě and Honzovo království. Compositional career Ostrčil was born, and spent his entire life, in Prague, the center of the Czech musical community of his generation. He studied philosophy at Charles University, attending the classes of Otakar Hostinský, and simultaneously studied composition and music theory privately under Zdeněk Fibich. From his early student days he was a close friend of Zdeněk Nejedlý, whose outspoken voice in musicology formed Ostrčil’s greatest critical support. He worked as a conductor at the Vinohrady Theater (1914–1919) and later at the National Theatre (Prague) (1920–1935), which was one of the most influential positions in Czech musical life. He also worked as a pedagogue at the Prague Conservatory, teaching conducting. Ostrčil wrote six operas: Jan Zhořelecký (written as a student under Fibich, 1898, unperformed), Vlasty skon (Vlasta’s passing, premiered 1904, to a libretto previously considered by Smetana and Fibich), Kunálovy oči (Kunál’s

Otakar Zich

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otakar Zich (25 March 1879 – 9 July 1934) was a Czech composer and aesthetician. Biography Zich was born on 25 March 1879 in Městec Králové. In his music education he studied as a self-taught man. Years later, he became a pupil of the prominent nineteenth-century Czech aesthetician Otakar Hostinský, and a protégé of the iconoclastic musicologist and critic Zdeněk Nejedlý. In the years 1903–1906 he taught physics and mathematics at the High School in Domažlice. In the years leading up to the First World War Zich lived in Prague, actively participating in musical life as a critic. In this capacity he supported the efforts of Nejedlý’s pro-Smetana faction against the intellectual descendants of Antonín Dvořák, especially during the so-called Dvořák Affair of 1911–1914, when he called into question the artistic integrity of Dvořák’s compositional language. These activities firmly allied Zich with Nejedlý’s academic circle at Charles University, where, in 1924, he was appointed professor of Aesthetics. He held this position until his death. He died on 9 July 1934 in Ouběnice (today part of Bystřice). Style As a composer, Zich was largely self-taught, although he can be said to belong to

Otar Taktakishvili

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otar Vasilisdze Taktakishvili (; ; 27 July 1924 – 21 February 1989) was a prominent Georgian composer, teacher, conductor, and musicologist of the Soviet period. Although in the West Taktakishvili is perhaps best known for his 1968 Sonata for Flute and Piano, his works include two symphonies, four piano concertos, two violin concertos, two cello concertos, and operas (Mindia, First Love, The Abduction of the Moon, Mususi, Three Tales). He also wrote several symphonic poems and oratorios, as well as adaptations of Georgian folk songs and a multitude of compositions for instruments and voice. While still a student at the Tbilisi State Conservatory, Taktakishvili composed the Anthem of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic. By 1949 he became a Professor of the Conservatory, as well as the conductor and artistic director of the Georgian State Chorus. In 1951, he received his first Stalin Prize (USSR State Prize) for his First Symphony. In 1962, Taktakishvili became Chairman of the Georgian Composers’ Union; and in 1965, the Minister for Culture of the Georgian Republic, until 1983. He was awarded the title of People’s Artist of the USSR in 1974, the Lenin Prize in 1982, and the USSR S

Othmar Schoeck

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Othmar Schoeck (1 September 1886 – 8 March 1957) was a Swiss Romantic composer and conductor. He was known for his considerable output of art songs and song cycles but also wrote operas, notably the one-act Penthesilea, premiered in Dresden in 1927, and instrumental works, including two string quartets and concertos for violin (for Stefi Geyer), cello and horn. Biography Early life and career Schoeck was born in Brunnen, studied briefly at the Leipzig Conservatory with Max Reger in 1907/08, but otherwise spent his whole career in Zürich. His father, Alfred Schoeck was a landscape painter, and as a young man, Othmar seriously considered following in his father’s footsteps and attended classes at an art school in Zürich before dropping out to go to the Zürich Conservatory. During World War I Schoeck earned his living in Zurich initially as a chorus director and as a freelance accompanist and conductor. An annuity given him by the Winterthur industrialist Werner Reinhart from 1916 onwards, coupled with the income from his appointment as conductor of the St. Gall Symphony orchestra in 1917 (with special permission to remain resident in Zürich), allowed Schoeck to give up choral conduct

Othmar Steinbauer

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Othmar Steinbauer (6 November 1895 – 5 September 1962) was an Austrian composer and music theorist. He progressed developments in twelve-tone composition (). His own teachers included Joseph Marx, Anton Webern, Arnold Schoenberg and Josef Matthias Hauer. Life Othmar Steinbauer was born in Vienna. His father was a bank employee, originally from Styria. Steinbauer attended teacher training college on the northwest side of Vienna. On passing his exams here he volunteered for military service in 1915. propounded by Othmar Spann, of whose teachings Steinbauer was an enthusiastic adherent between 1925 and 1930. In February 1928 Steinbauer set up a chamber orchestra, the “Wiener Kammer Konzert Vereinigung” which performed successfully under his direction for the next three years in Germany and Austria. Hauer was able to instruct Steinbauer on the basis of his Divertimento for smnall orchestra Op.61 which he dedicated to him. and said to be particularly suitable for making music in the home. From 1952 Steinbauer taught the violin at the Vienna Music Academy (today the University for the Music and Presentational Arts). Between 1959 and his retirement in 1961 he also provided special courses

Otilie Suková

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otilie Suková, also known as Otilie Suková-Dvořáková (née Otilie Dvořáková; 6 June 1878 – 5 July 1905), was a Czech pianist and composer. She was the daughter of composer Antonín Dvořák and the wife of violinist and Dvořák’s pupil Josef Suk the Elder. Life Youth Otilie Dvořáková was born on 6 June 1878 in New Town quarter of Prague, into the Dvořák family: Antonín Dvořák and his wife Anna Dvořáková, a musician and Dvořák’s former pupil. She had siblings Otakar and Magdalena, a talented opera singer. Already in her childhood, she was an excellent pianist with her father’s support, and she graduated from a girls’ high school in Prague. She also attended his family’s stays in the United States and England from 1892 to 1894, growing up in an exceptionally rich cultural and artistic environment of her time. She also composed several short piano pieces. Marriage to Josef Suk After returning to Bohemia, she met and eventually developed a deep emotional relationship with one of her father’s students, Josef Suk, whom she married in Prague on 17 November 1898. He dedicated several of his compositions to her and she also inspired him to create the scenic fairy tale Radúz and Mahulena to a lib

Otis Bardwell Boise

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Otis Bardwell Boise (August 13, 1844 – December 2, 1912) was an American composer and music educator. Biography Boise was born in Oberlin, Ohio. When he was a child, his family moved to 19th-century American male composers Cleveland, Ohio. He showed his musical talent early on and became organist at St Paul’s Church in 1858. From May 1863 until September 1865 he studied at the Leipzig Conservatory. His teachers include Ignaz Moscheles, Ernst Ferdinand Wenzel, Ernst Friedrich Richter, Moritz Hauptmann, as well as Ferdinand David and Carl Reinecke. For a short time he taught in Berlin at the academy of Theodor Kullak. From 1865 to 1870 he was an organist and music teacher in Cleveland. In 1869 he married his wife Anastasia Virginia (1846–1937), who translated many German songs into English, in Cleveland. From 1870 to 1876 Boise worked as a teacher for harmony and composition at the Conservatory of Music and as organist of the Presbyterian church in New York City. Between 1876 and 1878 he lived in Weimar and Wiesbaden in Germany. Boise often visited Franz Liszt, with whom he discussed composition and American music education, and played through manuscripts. He also spend time with Joa

Otis René

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Otis Joseph René Jr. was an American songwriter and record label owner. As a songwriter, he is notable as the co-author of “When It’s Sleepy Time Down South”, which became a signature song for Louis Armstrong. Biography Otis René was born in New Orleans. Prior to devoting his full-time efforts to music, Otis René was a pharmacist in New Orleans. He moved to Los Angeles and married in 1930. He is best known as the co-author of the 1931 song “When It’s Sleepy Time Down South”, co-written with his brother Leon René, and Clarence Muse. Other songs co-written by Otis René include “Someone’s Rocking My Dreamboat”, included by Murray Head on his 1975 album Say It Ain’t So and “That’s My Home”, included by Tony Bennett on his 2002 album, A Wonderful World. During the 1940s, with his brother, Leon René, Otis René established and ran the independent rhythm and blues labels Exclusive Records and Excelsior Records. Otis was responsible for and publicly identified with Excelsior Records, In support of their record labels, Otis René and Leon René purchased their own record plant, but when the format changed from 78 rpm to 45rpm, they could not press the new speed. Otis René’s Excelsior label exi

Otomar Kvěch

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otomar Kvěch (25 May 1950 – 16 March 2018) was a Czech music composer and teacher. Biography Kvěch was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia. His father was a sound engineer with Czechoslovak Radio, and later held technical jobs in various industrial companies. Kvěch’s mother was a shop-assistant. In 1955, he had his first lessons in piano. He prepared for three years for his entry exam to the Prague Conservatory, and graduated after studying composition with Jan Zdeněk Bartoš and organ with Joseph Kuban. After 1969, he studied composition at the Prague Academy of Performing Arts with Jiří Pauer, as well as one semester with Emil Hlobil. After graduation, he worked as an accompanist at the Opera National Theatre. In 1972, he married Miluška Wagnerová, a fellow-student from his organ class, and had daughters Eva (b. 1974) and Martina (b. 1977). In 1990, political and social changes in his country forced Kvěch to return to a job at Czechoslovak Radio as programme manager and music editor. At the same time, he began teaching music theory and composition at Prague Conservatory. In 2000, Kvěch’s wife died, and three years later he married Jana Smékalová, long-time programme manager of Suprapho

Ottalie Mark

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ottalie Mark (born Thilla Mark, October 3, 1896 - November 13, 1979) was an American musicologist, copyright consultant, composer, and music editor. Early life and education Ottalie Mark was born on October 3, 1896, the daughter of Hyman David and Rose (née Glass) Mark, who immigrated to the United States from Lithuania in the 1880s. The family lived at 76 Chrystie Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and her father worked in the garment industry. She was the eighth of nine children, four brothers and five sisters. She was brought up in an Orthodox Jewish household. Mark was educated at Washington Irving Art School (a branch of the Wadleigh High School for Girls), and NY Prep School. She got her undergraduate degree from NYU in Pre-Law. She studied music with conductor Sunia Samuels and violinist Michael Sciapiro. Career Mark’s first job after military service was as secretary to Martha Wilchinski, Head of Publicity at Roxy Rothafel’s Capitol Theatre, in the early 1920s. She was also a cueing assistant to Ernö Rapée, the Capitol Theatre’s Music Director. A “cueing assistant” is a person who works with an orchestra in a silent film theater, instructing the musicians on which

Ottmar Gerster

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ottmar Gerster (29 June 1897 – 31 August 1969) was a German viola player, conductor and composer who in 1948 became rector of the Liszt Music Academy in Weimar. Life Ottmar Gerster was born some 50 km (30 miles) north of Frankfurt during the closing years of the nineteenth century. His father was a neurologist and his mother was a pianist. He attended an Academic secondary school (“Gymnasium”) and entered, in 1913, the Dr Hoch Music Conservatory where his teachers included Bernhard Sekles (improvisation) and Adolf Rebner (violin). It was at the Hoch Conservatory that Gerster also got to know Paul Hindemith who was a near contemporary. setting a text by Baldur von Schirach. In 1936 there was a popular song entitled “The stranger bride” and a choral song “German airmen”. Gerster’s Opera “The Witches of Passau” had its first performance in Düsseldorf in 1941. Further productions quickly followed in Bremen, Magdeburg, Essen und Liegnitz, and in the same year the city of Düsseldorf awarded him its version of the Robert Schumann Prize for the work. In 1943 the National Office for Music Production (die Reichsstelle für Musikbearbeitung) gave him a 50,000 Mark contract to compose his opera

Otto (composer)

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Otto (first name unknown, sometimes referred to as Luigi Otto or Johann Otto; fl. 18th century) was a composer of the early classical period. Life and work The composer Otto is known for his trumpet concerto in E-flat Major, which is dated about 1770. The original performing parts are indicated dell Sign e Otto on the title page. The only surviving copy of the composition is held in the Fürst zu Bentheimsche Musikaliensammlung Burgsteinfurt, now in the custody of the Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Münster. It is documented that the copies were acquired on behalf of Count Louis of Bentheim and Steinfurt by the court chapel’s trumpeter named Preger. Together with another trumpet concerto from a likewise unknown composer named Signor Laue, the sheet music arrived in December 1803 from Gotha. However, as Preger left the chapel already in 1804, and the parts are in an almost untouched condition, it seems possible that both concertos may have never been performed in the concert hall of the Steinfurter Bagno. he is referred to as Luigi Otto in most releases, although there seems to exist no source for the first name. The Répertoire International des Sources Musicales (RISM) associates

Otto Abel

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Otto Abel (October 24, 1905 – September 21, 1977) was a German organist, cantor, composer, editor, and Protestant . Life Born in Berlin, from 1930 to 1970, Abel was Kantor and organist at the Immanuelkirche in Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg. From 1959, he also served as the Regional Church Music Director for the Eastern Region of the Evangelical Church in Berlin, Brandenburg, and Silesian Upper Lusatia. From 1956 onwards, he was the Church Music Editor at the Evangelische Verlagsanstalt in East Berlin. Abel composed several church pieces for the organ. He died on a journey in Tettnang, Baden-Württemberg. Compositions * Angels We Have Heard on High (translation from French) (EG 54, 418) * Von guten Mächten treu und still umgeben (Melody and movement 1959, texte by Dietrich Bonhoeffer 1944) (EG 65, Gesangbuch der Evangelisch-reformierten Kirchen der deutschsprachigen Schweiz 353, Katholisches Gesangbuch der deutschsprachigen Schweiz 554) * O Heiland, reiß die Himmel auf; Little Advent cantata for soprano, three-part mixed choir with flute, oboe, and organ with cello ad libitum; published by Evangelische Verlagsanstalt in Berlin; 1956 * Sei Lob und Ehr dem höchsten Gut; Cantata for mixed choi

Otto Albert Tichý

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Otto Albert Tichý (14 August 1890 – 21 October 1973) was a Czech composer, teacher and organist. Early life and education Otto Albert Tichý was born in Martínkov, Moravia, in a Catholic family of a provincial teacher. He studied different instruments and played the organ from an early age. He began composing as a boy. He became a devoted student of Vítězslav Novák at the Prague Conservatory. However, he interrupted his study to work nine years at the most spiritual publisher of this time, Josef Florian, solely for room and board. In 1919 he resumed his study as a pupil of French composer and teacher Vincent d’Indy at the Schola Cantorum. Tichý initially studied organ, Gregorian chant and composition, then contrapuntalism and concord. At Schola Cantorum he got the opportunity to experience music from the 16th to the 18th centuries in vocal polyphony. Career After he successfully finished his study, he lived as a private music teacher and organist. He spent six years in France and after his marriage moved to Lausanne with his family, where he worked as organist in cathedral Notre Dame and as professor of music at Dominican gymnasium. In 1936 he returned to Czechoslovakia. After ten y

Otto Ebel von Sosen

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Otto Ebel von Sosen (26 March 1899 – 6 February 1974 ) was a German musician, conductor and composer. Life Born in Rendsburg, Sosen studied at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich. From 1920, he worked as Kapellmeister at several small German Opera houses before he was called to Hanover on 1 April 1926 to work at the , which since its commissioning on 20 November 1924 was accommodated in the attic of the administrative building of Hanomag. On 16 December of the same year, and from there he was already active as conductor and as the first director of the institution. As such, Sosen began to build up a Radio orchestra with initially only three, in 1927 already with 17 musicians. In the following year 1928, he founded and directed, at first under the name “Niedersächsisches Landesorchester”, the later Niedersächsisches Symphonie-Orchester. Still at the time of the Weimar Republic, he had the orchestra from 1931 to broadcast over the radio on Mondays for more than a decade, initially from the Leineschloss. Holzminden: Weserlandverlag, 1953 * Femmes compositeurs de musique. Dictionnaire biographique. Paris, Rosier 1910 (?) See also * Gottbegnadeten list. Further reading *

Otto Floersheim

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Otto Floersheim last name pronounced Flairs-hime (born in Aix-la-Chapelle, 2 March 1853; died 30 November 1917) was an American composer, critic and editor. Career He received his musical education under Ferdinand Hiller in Cologne, and emigrated to the United States in 1875. There he became an editor of the Musical Courier in 1880. From 1894 to 1904, he was in charge of its Berlin bureau. James Huneker describes him as “fat, rather pompous, good-humoured and perspiring.” He is remembered for a damning review of an early performance of Richard Strauss’s A Hero’s Life: “… alleged symphony … revolutionary in every sense of the word. The climax of everything that is ugly, cacophonous, blatant and erratic, the most perverse music I ever heard in all my life, is reached in the chapter ‘The Hero’s Battlefield.’ The man who wrote this outrageously hideous noise, no longer deserving of the word music, is either a lunatic, or he is rapidly approaching idiocy.” (Musical Courier, April 19, 1899) Works His orchestral compositions include a “Prelude and Fugue,” which was played in New York City under the direction of Theodore Thomas; “Alla Marcia,” which was produced under Frank van der Stu

Otto Frickhoeffer

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Otto Frickhoeffer (29 March 1892 – 9 April 1968) was a German composer and conductor. Life Born in Bad Schwalbach as the son of a medical officer, Frickhoeffer wanted to become a musician. Since the father insisted on studying medicine, Frickhoeffer enrolled at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. In the summer semester of 1911 he became active in the Corps Brunsviga Munich. As he changed to the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg. Only when he had passed the there did his parents agree to a career as a pianist. The First World War interrupted the hopeful beginning. Not fully fit for service at the Western Front, he was used during his medical training to take care of wounded transports. When the war ended, his hands were no longer suitable for playing the piano. One way out was to study musical composition and conducting. From 1918 Frickhoeffer lived in Berlin as a singing teacher and composer. Ernst Klee quotes from the Nazi reference work Das Deutsche Führerlexikon as having been involved in Frickhoeffer’s political activities with the Alldeutscher Verband and the Citizens’ Defense after the First World War and was later a member of the Nazi Party. In addition, he was h

Otto Goldschmidt

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Otto Moritz David Goldschmidt (21 August 1829 – 24 February 1907) was a pianist, composer, conductor and educator, whose works included a piano concerto and other piano pieces, and an oratorio, Ruth, on a biblical theme, written for the Three Choirs Festival. From a prosperous mercantile family in Hamburg, he studied under Felix Mendelssohn at the Leipzig Conservatoire and quickly established himself as a pianist. Among the singers whom he accompanied was the soprano Jenny Lind, known as “the Swedish Nightingale”. They toured together in 1851 and married in 1852, after which she insisted on being billed as “Madame Lind-Goldschmidt”. Although Goldschmidt’s compositions were regarded as conventional, his work as a teacher and member of the boards of music institutions made him an important figure in British musical life in the latter part of the 19th century. He took British citizenship in 1861. He outlived his wife by twenty years, dying in London aged 77. Life Early years Goldschmidt was born on 21 August 1829 in Hamburg (now part of Germany, but then an independent city-state). His parents were Moritz David Goldschmidt and his wife Johanna, née Schwabe. Moritz was a prosperous mer

Otto Joachim (composer)

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Otto Joachim (October 13, 1910 – July 30, 2010) was a German-born Canadian violist and composer of electronic music. Early life and education Joachim was born in Düsseldorf, Joachim to Jewish parents. His father was an opera singer. He trained as a violinist at Düsseldorf and at the Rheinische Musikschule in Cologne. Career In 1934 Joachim left Nazi Germany (as did many Jewish composers of his time). He played in Singapore and Shanghai during the war years, opened a radio shop, and experimented with electronic instruments and accessories. He also performed occasionally in the Shanghai Municipal Symphony Orchestra and organized an orchestra to perform Jewish and other Western music. Joachim left Shanghai at the time of the Communist takeover of China, and settled permanently in Montreal in 1949. For the next 15 years Joachim worked as a player, teacher, instrument builder and composer. He played in the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, and beginning in 1956 taught violin and viola at both the McGill Conservatory and at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal. In the 1950s Joachim experimented with twelve-tone music, and in 1956 composed String Quartet, an instrumental piece whi

Otto Lindblad

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Otto Jonas Lindblad (31 March 1809 – 26 January 1864), was a Swedish composer. He is most famous for the musical score of Kungssången, the Swedish royal anthem. Otto Lindblad was the son of a clergyman. He was born in Karlstorp and attended gymnasium in Växjö. In 1829 he began academic studies at the University of Lund where he was a pupil of Mathias Lundholm. In Lund, he formed a group with A. E. Christernin and J. Meurling, together with whom he played and sang a type of three part music pieces. The group became known as the “musical trefoil band”. In 1836 he ended his studies and fully devoted his time to music. Two years later he formed the Lund Student Singers Association. On 5 December 1844 he presented the Royal Anthem for the first time, at a celebration for King Oscar I. In 1846 Lindblad undertook a national tour with the noted Lund Quartet. The tour’s revenue was to have been used for student housing in Lund, but the profit was too small and they only managed to bring home 1500 Riksdaler. In the spring of 1847 he took up the position of parish clerk and organist in Mellby. He married Emma Andersson in 1855. Their only child, a daughter, died as an infant. Otto Lindblad di

Otto Luening

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Otto Clarence Luening (June 15, 1900 – September 2, 1996) was a German-American composer and conductor, and flutist. He was an early pioneer of tape music and electronic music. Biography Luening was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to German parents, Eugene Luening, a conductor and composer, and Emma (nee Jacobs), an amateur singer. When he was 12, his family moved to Munich, where he studied music at the State Academy of Music. At age 17, he moved to Switzerland and attended the Municipal Conservatory of Music in Zürich and University of Zurich, where he studied with Ferruccio Busoni and Philipp Jarnach, and was also an actor and stage manager for James Joyce’s English Players Company. He returned to the United States in 1924, and appeared mainly as a conductor of operas, in Chicago and the Eastman School of Music. His conducting premieres included Virgil Thomson’s The Mother of Us All, Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium, and his own Evangeline. Luening’s tape music, including A Poem in Cycles & Bells, Gargoyles for Violin & Synthesized Sound, and Sounds of New Music demonstrated the early potential of synthesizers and special editing techniques for electronic music. An October 28, 1952

Otto Mahler

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Otto Mahler (18 June 1873 – 6 February 1895) was a Bohemian-Austrian musician and composer who died by suicide at the age of 21. Otto was the younger brother of Gustav Mahler, a fellow musician. Otto was orphaned in 1889 with the death of both his parents, and Gustav became financially responsible for him. By that time, Otto had already begun attending the Vienna Conservatory. Though he was initially considered a talented student, his academic performance was increasingly poor. In April 1892, Otto left the Conservatory without a diploma. He was able to secure work in minor musical posts, but he tended to drift from job to job. On 6 February 1895, Otto shot himself with a revolver while in the house of his and Mahler’s friend Nina Hoffmann-Matscheko; a lock of his mother’s hair was found in his pocket. According to Gustav’s widow Alma, Otto’s suicide note stated that life no longer pleased him, so he ‘handed back his ticket’. Otto’s known work as a composer included two completed symphonies, an incomplete third symphony, and some lieder with orchestra and piano. His music remains unpublished and is apparently uncatalogued. No recent performances are known; and some of his music may

Otto Malling

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Otto Valdemar Malling (1 June 1848 – 5 October 1915) was a Danish composer, from 1900 the cathedral organist in Copenhagen and from 1889 professor, then from 1899 Director of the Royal Danish Academy of Music, Copenhagen. Otto Malling was born in Copenhagen. He became a pupil of Niels Wilhelm Gade and Johan Peter Emilius Hartmann; in his later career he mainly composed organ works and vocal music, but he also wrote a Fantasia for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 20, an appealing Schumannesque piano trio (in A minor, opus 36, 1889), piano quartet (in C minor, opus 80), and a Brahmsian piano concerto in C minor (opus 43, 1890), all of which are recorded and infrequently heard in concert. His output also contains among other substantial works a cantata Det hellige Land, opus 46, (published in 1897), a symphony in D minor, opus 17 (published in 1884), and an octet for strings, opus 50 (published in or before 1907). Malling wrote the first Danish textbook in orchestration, along French conservatory lines. He taught musical theory to Knudåge Riisager in 1915. He was also a music editor, creating piano reductions and vocal scores of works by Johan Peter Emilius Hartmann, Niels Wilhelm Gade and C

Otto Mortensen

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Otto Hübertz Mortensen (18 August 1907 – 30 August 1986) was a Danish composer and conductor. He also played the organ and piano. For a number of years he worked at the Royal Danish Theatre as a rehearser for the opera, and later worked at Aarhus University. As a composer, Mortensen composed both vocal works and instrumental music. He is most famous for arranging countless choral works and for writing the melodies for a number of Danish songs, e.g. Septembers himmel, Min skat, Sommervise (Du danske sommer jeg elsker dig…), and the Norwegian Kringsatt av fiender (lyrics by Nordahl Grieg). In the years leading up to his death, he worked on new melodies to a number of psalms, e.g. At sige verden ret farvel. The melody for the poem by Helge Rode, Du gav os de blomster, som lyste imod os, was selected by the Danish Ministry of Culture in 2006 as one of 12 songs to be a part of the Canon of Culture (Danish: Kulturministeriets Kulturkanon) in the category musical scores. List of compositions The following works do not make a complete listing. * Quintette pour Flûte, Hautbois, Clarinette, Cor et Basson (1944) * Sonata for oboe and piano * Four Songs (1945) * Songs (7 songs, undated), for v

Otto Neitzel

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Otto Neitzel (6 July 1852 – 10 March 1920) was a German composer, pianist, writer on music, and lecturer. Neitzel was born in the town of Falkenburg in Farther Pomerania (modern Złocieniec, Poland). His father, Gottfried Neitzel was a teacher and his mother, Louise (née Messerschmidt), was a housewife. Biography At the age of 8, Neitzel toured his neighbourhood and cities, giving performances. This “Wonderkid” was praised for his ability to play the piano and move people’s ears. Famous people promoted him for his abilities, mainly:- * Carl Loewe in Stettin * Eduard Grell in Berlin * Violinist Hubert Ries * Wilhelm Taubert (composer) His parents could not afford to pay for music lessons, but Bernhard Lösener, astonished by his music talent, sponsored him to finish his musical education. In 1865, he left home and joined the Joachimsthaler Gymnasium in Berlin. While there, he continued to study music at the Neue Akademia der Tonkust by Theodore Kullak. From 1873 to 1875, he was a student of Franz Liszt. In 1875, he wrote his dissertation “Die ästhetische Grenze der Programmmusik” (The Aesthetic Limit of Programme Music). Later, he went on a tour with Pauline Lucca (a soprano singer) a

Otto Nicolai

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Carl Otto Ehrenfried Nicolai (9 June 1810 – 11 May 1849) was a German composer, conductor, and one of the founders of the Vienna Philharmonic. Nicolai is best known for his operatic version of Shakespeare’s comedy The Merry Wives of Windsor as . In addition to five operas, Nicolai composed lieder, works for orchestra, chorus, ensemble, and solo instruments. Biography Nicolai, a child prodigy, was born in Königsberg, Prussia. He received his first musical education from his father, Carl Ernst Daniel Nicolai, who was also a composer and musical director. During his childhood his parents divorced, and while still a youth, early in June 1826, Nicolai ran away from his parents’ “loveless” home, taking refuge in Stargard with a senior legal official called August Adler who treated the musical prodigy like a son and, when Nicolai was seventeen, sent him to Berlin to study with Carl Friedrich Zelter. After initial successes in Germany, including his first symphony (1831) and public concerts, he became musician to the Prussian embassy in Rome. When Verdi declined the libretto of Il proscritto by the proprietors of La Scala in Milan, it was offered instead to Nicolai. Later, Nicolai refused

Otto Nitze

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Nitze (20 September 1924 – 8 May 1988) was a German musician and composer, who also published essential compositions under the pseudonym ‘Tom Dawitt’. Life Born in Artern, Nitze came from an old family of musicians. At the age of five he received his first violin lessons from his father, from the age of seven from the 1st concertmaster of the Städtische Bühnen zu Erfurt, at the age of nine he became a pupil of the director of the Musikhochschule zu Sondershausen, Professor Carl Corbach, at the age of ten Nitze was admitted to the conservatory after being granted special permission (“Lex Nitze”). He then attended the Musisches Gymnasium Frankfurt, In 1957, Nitze was the main initiator for the foundation of the youth harmony orchestra of the Musikverein 1861 Idar-Oberstein, which also played a leading role in the foundation of other youth orchestras. In November 1961, he moved to Schramberg/Black Forest as Municipal Music Director and teacher at the University Institute of Music in Trossingen. In 1965, Nitze returned to Idar-Oberstein to rebuild and revive musical youth work. In 1967, Nitze founded the Municipal Young Brass School, followed in 1968 by the founding of the Birkenf

Otto Olsson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Emanuel Olsson (19 December 1879 – 1 September 1964) was a Swedish organist and classical music composer. Life and career Olsson, a native of Stockholm, was one of the most renowned organ virtuosos of his time. He studied organ with August Lagergren (1848−1908) and composition with Joseph Dente (1838−1905), both teachers having been employed at the Royal Swedish Academy of Music. Later Olsson himself joined the faculty there, becoming teacher of harmony (1908–24) and then organ (1924–45). Meanwhile he was also the organist at the Gustaf Vasa Church in Stockholm. He became a member of the Swedish Royal Academy of Music in 1915. Olsson used his strong background in counterpoint, combined with an affinity for French organ music, to develop his late Romantic style of composition. He also had an interest in early music and, though not a Catholic but a Lutheran, used the plainchant techniques of Gregorian chant in his Gregorianska melodier. At times he explored polytonality in his output, an advancement not found in other Swedish compositions of the time. In addition to many fine pieces for the organ, he produced various choral works, the most often performed of which is his setting

Otto Schwarz

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Schwarz (10 August 1876 – 1961) was a German travelling musician. He was the leader, or Kapellmeister, of a small band of mixed instruments and sometimes vocalists called the Bavarian String Band, which performed in England in the summer months between 1897 and 1914. The band performed mainly outdoors, and primarily in Harrogate, North Riding of Yorkshire, besides other towns. It played Victorian and Edwardian parlour music, as well as extracts from symphonies and operas. At certain charity events, Schwarz would donate the band’s collection of the day to local causes, such as hospitals. At the onset of the First World War, Schwarz and his players were interned and transported to the Isle of Man. Schwarz died in Hinzweiler in 1961. Background Otto Schwarz was born on 10 August 1876 in Hinzweiler, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Before borders changed, Hinzweiler was in Bavaria, Germany. He was the son of bandleader Daniel Schwarz and Katharina Zink. On 20 November 1900 Schwarz married Amalia Merker, whom he had known from childhood in Hinzweiler. They had three children: Wilhelm, Berthold and Marianne. Career Schwarz was a wandermusikant, bandleader, composer, church organist, a

Otto Singer

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Singer (July 26, 1833 – January 3, 1894) was a German musician also active in the USA. He is best known for his piano transcriptions of orchestral works, including symphonies by Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, Mozart and Tchaikovsky. Life Singer was born in Sora, Saxony. He was educated in Dresden, and later in Leipzig until 1865, and after a short residence in Weimar with Franz Liszt went to New York in 1869. In 1873 he went to Cincinnati as assistant musical director, under Theodore Thomas, of the first May Musical Festival, in that year. He composed the cantata The Pilgrim Fathers for the festival of 1876, and Festival Ode for the opening of the music-hall in 1878. He also wrote a Rhapsodie for Piano and Orchestra in C major (1881) dedicated to Hans von Bülow. He remained with the Cincinnati College of Music until 1892, when he returned to New York, where he died. He was an earnest and aggressive disciple of Liszt and Richard Wagner both in his compositions and piano performances. He conducted various singing societies, and in addition to the cantata mentioned he composed some piano sonatas and a piano concerto. Otto Singer Jr., his son (September 14, 1863 – January 8, 1931),

Otto Sutro

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Sutro (1833 – January 19, 1896) was a German-born American organist, conductor, minor composer, publisher and music store owner, and a leading figure in the musical life of Baltimore, Maryland. Biography Sutro was born to a Jewish family in Aachen, Germany. He has six brothers and three sisters. His brother Adolph Sutro became the first Jewish Mayor of San Francisco and built the Sutro Baths. His brother Theodore Sutro, husband of Florence Sutro, was seminal in the building and financing the Sutro Tunnel first proposed by his brother Adolph. They had two daughters, Rose and Ottilie Sutro, who were the first recognised piano-duo team. Sutro sat for portrait artist David Dalhoff Neal in 1889 (see image). Rapheal Tuck & Son created a litho art card Character Otto Sutro. References

Otto von Botenlauben

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto von Botenlauben or Botenlouben (1177, Henneberg – before 1245, near Bad Kissingen), the Count of Henneberg from 1206, was a German minnesinger, Crusader and monastic founder. Otto von Botenlauben was the fourth son of Count Poppo VI von Henneberg and his wife Sophia, countess of Andechs and margravine of Istria. In the oldest records (from 1196 and 1197), he still called himself Count von Henneberg. In 1206, he pronounced himself Count von Botenlauben, after Botenlauben Castle near Bad Kissingen, the ruins of which remain to this day. Otto’s existence is first recorded at the court of Emperor Henry VI in 1197, when he took part in the Emperors’ campaign to Italy. After that, Otto travelled to the Holy Land and made a career in the kingdom of Jerusalem, where he gained good standing, prosperity and married Beatrix de Courtenay, the daughter of the royal seneschal Joscelin III of Edessa, in 1205. In 1220, he sold his hereditary lands (iure uxoris), the seigneurie de Joscelin, to the Teutonic Knights and returned to Germany, where he would attend the royal court often in the years that followed. His sons, Otto and Henry, as well as his grandson Albert, joined the clergy and so Ot

Otto Wartisch

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Alexander Hermann Wartisch (18 November 1893 – 29 April 1969) was a German composer, conductor, and cultural figure in Nazi Germany. Life Born in Magdeburg, Wartisch received his doctorate from Erlangen with a dissertation titled Studien zur Harmonik des musikalischen Impressionismus in 1928, which was published in 1930. Also in 1930, he became a member of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (membership number 400.618). After the Nazi seizure of power, he succeeded Carl Corbach as SA-Standartenführer from 1934 to 1939, and acted as Kapellmeister of the Hofkapelle and the conductors of the Loh-Orchester Sondershausen. During the Second World War, he became the SA-Oberführer Intendant of the Katowice opera house. Wartisch organised, in cooperation with the Auschwitz concentration camp, “troop support events” for the concentration camp personnel there, such as performances of the farces Gitta hat einen Vogel on 5 April 1943 and Gestörte Hochzeitsnacht on 2 October 1943. Wartisch died in Wolfratshausen at age 75. Work * Kaukasische Komödie One-act opera, premiered 8 March 1933 in Nuremberg * Jahrmarktsballade ‘heitere Funkoper’, first broadcast on 17 February 1950 b

Otto Zykan

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Otto Matthäus Zykan (29 April 1935, Vienna – 25 May 2006, Sachsendorf, Burgschleinitz-Kühnring) was an Austrian composer and pianist. Education The son of composer Otto Zykan (1902–1989), Otto M Zykan received his first piano lessons from his father, and from 1940 he was taught by his paternal grandmother, who had been a student of Theodor Leschetizky. He joined the Vienna Boys Choir and studied at the Vienna Music Academy where his teachers included Karl Schiske (composition), Bruno Seidlhofer and Josef Dichler (piano). He also attended the Darmstadt summer courses (1958, 1964–1966), winning the Kranichstein Music Prize of the international piano competition on his first visit. Music theatre In 1967, working with H.K. Gruber and Kurt Schwertsik, Zykan co-founded the Salonkonzerte Group and associated ensembles such as MOB art & tone ART (sometimes termed the ‘Third Viennese School’) to further his ideas about ‘instrumental theatre’, music that aimed for closer links between performance, music and language. These ’total art productions’, influenced by Dadaism and analogous to the music theatre productions of Mauricio Kagel, were often composed in the form of sketch-like drafts. Dep

Ottokar Nováček

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ottokar Eugen Nováček (13 May 1866 – 3 February 1900) was an Austro-Hungarian violinist, violist and composer of Czech descent. He is perhaps best known for his work Perpetuum Mobile (Perpetual Motion), written in 1895. Life Nováček was born at Weißkirchen (, ), southern Austrian Empire (today Serbia). He studied successfully with his father Martin Joseph Nováček, with Jakob Dont in Vienna (1880–83), and with Henry Schradieck and Brodsky at the Leipzig Conservatory, where he won the Mendelssohn Prize in 1885. He played in the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra and in the Brodsky Quartet, originally as second violin and later as viola. He subsequently immigrated to the United States, where he was a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Arthur Nikisch (1891) and was appointed principal viola in the Damrosch Orchestra, New York (189293). He also played in the re-formed Brodsky Quartet. In 1899, after a heart condition forced him to retire from playing, he devoted himself to composition. His works include a piano concerto (1894, dedicated to, and first performed by, Ferruccio Busoni), Perpetuum mobile (Perpetual Motion) for violin and orchestra (1895), three string quartets (publishe

Ottorino Respighi

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ottorino Respighi ( , ; ; 9 July 187918 April 1936) was an Italian composer, violinist, teacher, and musicologist and one of the leading Italian composers of the early 20th century. His compositions range over operas, ballets, orchestral suites, choral songs, chamber music, and transcriptions of Italian compositions of the 16th–18th centuries, but his best known and most performed works are his three orchestral tone poems which brought him international fame: Fountains of Rome (1916), Pines of Rome (1924), and Roman Festivals (1928). Respighi was born in Bologna to a musical and artistic family. He was encouraged by his father to pursue music at a young age, and took formal tuition in the violin and piano. In 1891, he enrolled at the Liceo Musicale di Bologna, where he studied the violin, viola, and composition, was principal violinist at the Russian Imperial Theatre, and studied briefly with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. He relocated to Rome in 1913 to become professor of composition at the Liceo Musicale di Santa Cecilia. During this period he married his pupil, singer Elsa Olivieri-Sangiacomo. In 1923, Respighi quit his professorship to dedicate time to tour and compose, but continue