Karl Amadeus Hartmann
composer
Karl Amadeus Hartmann was one of the pioneers of New Music in Germany after “Stunde Null”, known in English as ‘zero hour’. As the initiator of the [musica viva] series in Munich, he supported countless young composers. He himself never received this kind of support: after initial successes in the early 1930s, performances of his works were banned by the National Socialists. Hartmann’s early death in 1963 meant that he and his work were forgotten for a time.
Amadeus Hartmann, born in 1905, dropped out of teacher training to study trombone and composition at the Staatliche Akademie der Tonkunst in Munich. Four years later, he created his first works, such as the [Profane Messe], the [Jazz Toccata and Fugue] and the “comic-fantastic chamber opera” [Wachsfigurenkabinett]. After the National Socialists took power, Hartmann withdrew into inner emigration. Here he developed a coherent musical language of anti-fascist resistance as a counter-reaction to racism and war as well as a commitment to art that had been branded “degenerate”. During this difficult time, in which Hartmann took private lessons from Anton Webern in 1942 and his wife Elisabeth and his parents-in-law essentially supported him, the composer was able to achieve some success abroad. These included the première of his symphonic poem [Miserae] at the Festival of the International Society for New Music in Prague (1935), first prize at the chamber music competition “Carillon” in Geneva (1936), the performance of his First String Quartet in London (1938) and the première of his [Concerto funebre] in St Gallen (1940). In September 1945, Hartmann took up a position as dramaturg at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich, a post he held until his death. The first [musica viva] concerts took place that autumn, although they did not bear this name until the 1947/48 season. Despite his tireless commitment to New Music, his work as a programme consultant at Bayerischer Rundfunk and as co-editor of the [Neue Zeitschrift für Musik], Hartmann left behind an extensive oeuvre of eight symphonies, concertos, the (unfinished) [Gesangsszene] on words from [Sodom und Gomorrha] by Jean Giraudoux for baritone and orchestra as well as chamber music and piano works.
