Eugen Meier (composer)

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Eugene Meier

Eugen Meier (born June 18, 1934 in Würenlingen ) is a Swiss composer and conductor .

Life

After completing primary school teacher training at the Wettingen teacher training college , Meier taught from 1954 to 1960 as a primary school teacher in the municipality of Kaisten, where he also worked as a choir director. He founded and directed the Aargau Singing Circle. His musical training includes the organ teaching diploma (1960) at the Zurich Music Academy with Hans Gutmann , the solo singing diploma as tenor (1962) with Julius Patzak and Augustin Kubizek, the choir director diploma with Reinhold Schmid and finally the Kapellmeister diploma with Hans Swarowsky at the Academy for Music and Performing Art in Vienna .

From 1962 to 1999 Eugen Meier was music director in Visp (Canton Wallis). As musical director, he led the local and regional music-making associations: the Visp Male Choir, the St. Martin Choir Visp, the Visp Orchestra Association, the Visper Spatzen, the Oberwalliser Sinfonieorchester (1980–1990), the Walliser Kammerchor (1963–1993) and the Music Society "Vispe" in Visp (1962–1972). He also taught singing at the primary and orientation schools in Visp. From 1964 to 1990 he gave courses in conducting , choir conducting and voice training at the church music school in Upper Valais . Meier said goodbye to the music-making associations in Visp in 1999 with a concert in the La Poste Visp culture and congress center.

From 1982 to 1994 Eugen Meier was a member of the culture council of the canton of Valais . He was a board member of the Swiss Catholic Church Music Association (SKMV) from 1988 to 1992.

Eugen Meier is married to Ruth Meier-Schnidrig and has two daughters.

Musical creation

Meier was a co-founder of the Valais Chamber Choir, the Oberwalliser Symphony Orchestra, the General Music School Oberwallis (AMO), the Church Music School Oberwallis and the Association of Organists and Choir Directors. In 1978 he founded the Visper Spatzen children's choir.

Operetta "Gräfin Mariza" at Gräfibiel in Visp, conductor Eugen Meier
Operetta Countess Mariza am Graefibiel in Visp, Kapellmeister Eugen Meier

Meier conducted the St. Martinschor (church choir) at church services on Sundays and holidays. In keeping with the liturgical events of the church year, this choir sang masses and religious works under his direction. In addition, Meier has also performed instrumental concerts, recitals, oratorios (Handel, Haydn, Mendelssohn, Honegger) and choral works, as well as secular and sacred music in concerts. In addition to the local choirs and orchestras, local and foreign vocal soloists also took part. Occasionally the orchestral part of the oratorios was played by orchestras outside of Germany. Meier worked with the Bern and Biel symphony orchestras, the Basel Symphony Orchestra , and the conductor Tibor Varga .

Eugen Meier continued the operetta and opera tradition that had existed in Visp since 1936. Together with music lovers he founded the Visper open-air operetta tradition. With the participation of the musical associations and volunteers he directed, a total of five operettas (Strauss, Benatzky, Zeller, Kálmán) were performed as an open-air play at the Graefibiel between 1969 and 1986. As a result, two operas (Weber, Nicolai) were performed (1991 and 1997) under the baton of Eugen Meier in the then newly opened La Poste culture and congress center in Visp.

Compositional creation

Excerpt from the men's Wednesday cantata

As music director, Meier composed mainly for his choirs and occasionally for the orchestra. In his compositional oeuvre, however, the vocal compositions come first. He created choral works for mixed choir, male choir and children's choir and various instrumental compositions. Cantile melodies are always at the center of his work. He wrote his first larger composition, The Mannenmittwoch-Cantata , in 1976 based on a text by Pastor Eduard Imhof.

Since his retirement in 1999, Eugen Meier found time to devote himself to composing. Several commissioned compositions were created for institutions, choirs, orchestras and musicians. In his tone creations he developed a sensitive, spontaneous, thoroughly harmoniously modern, independent style that interprets the text in the vocal works. He draws on the tonal language of the classical and romantic periods. His compositions arise from an almost inexhaustible wealth of musical ideas. Meier writes sophisticated, modern music that is free from any showmanship. He was particularly successful in cultivating the genre of the cantata and the song. In 1965 Meier also wrote an incidental music for Hugo von Hofmannsthal's Jedermann . The cycle Lieder us um Tal (1981) based on Valais German texts by Hannes Taugwalder for voice and piano shows his special inclination and love for the art of singing. In 2003 the composer arranged some of these songs for four-part choir, including the song Weischus dü? which has meanwhile become a real Swiss folk song. At the 1994 Cantonal Singing Festival in Martinach, his cantata And Wing Takes Who Can Fly (Text: Josef von Eichendorff) was performed for mixed choir, male choir, solos and orchestra.

For the Cantonal Singing Festival in Naters in 1998, Meier composed the cantata St. Jodern-Kufe (text: Rev. Eduard Imhof) for solos, choir and orchestra. For the 100th anniversary of the Simplon Tunnel in 2006, he wrote the cantata Berg zur Welt (text by Stefan König). For the 1500th anniversary of the St. Maurice Abbey in 2015, he composed the work Lob und Preis ohn 'Unterlass for symphony orchestra, and in the same year for the 200th anniversary of the canton of Valais joining the Swiss Confederation, he contributed three musical works -Opèra 13 constellations from the Valais . In 2016 he created parts of Abklang , a work for church bells, speaker, choir and orchestra for the Carillon plus association . With a specially composed orchestral work Kleine Festmusik , he congratulates the Visp Orchestra Association (OVV) on its 100th anniversary (performance in autumn 2017). For the Christian Catholic Choir Days in Zurich in May 2018, he composes choral works based on texts by Brother Klaus and Franz von Assisi.

Eugen Meier created several choral works especially for the Oberwalliser Vocal Ensemble (OVE) ( Sehnsucht and Nachtgruss based on texts by Joseph von Eichendorff) and an arrangement of five folk songs from Switzerland. The Oberwalliser Vocal Ensemble (OVE) has performed at international choir competitions with the aforementioned works and other compositions by Eugen Meier. Eugen Meier has also distinguished himself by adapting works by others and adapting them to the possibilities of the choirs he conducts. He wrote 4-part sentences and piano or orchestral accompaniments to songs.

Catalog raisonné

Book delivery for the 80th birthday

The Festschrift Wer die Musik erkiest ... , which was written by Alois Grichting for the composer's 80th birthday and designed by his daughter Sara, contains a detailed catalog of works on Eugen Meier's compositional work.

The Swiss Choir Composers Manual (Musikverlag Hug) also lists a detailed catalog of works by the composer Eugen Meiers.

Some larger compositions are mentioned here:

  • Drama music for everyone , text Hugo von Hofmannsthal, acc. SSATB choir, small orchestra, 1965
  • The men's Wednesday cantata , text Rev. Eduard Imhof, gem. Choir and male choir SSATB, large orchestra, 1976
  • Under stars , text Gottfried Keller, gem. SATB choir and SSA children's choir, solo baritone, large orchestra, 1980
  • And those who can fly take wings , text Joseph von Eichendorff, acc. Choir and male choir SSATB u. TTBB, solo soprano a. Solo baritone, large orchestra, 1993
  • St. Jodern-Kufe , text Rev. Eduard Imhof, acc. Choir, solos, large orchestra, 1998
  • Mountain to the world , text by Stefan König, acc. Choir, solos, large orchestra, 2006
  • Concertino for English horn , 2009;
  • Praise and price without omission , for symphony orchestra, 2015, for the 1500th anniversary of the St. Maurice Abbey (Canton of Valais)
  • 13 constellations from Valais , 4 parts of the musical, commissioned for the 200th anniversary of Valais joining the Swiss Confederation, 2015
  • Finishing , 5 parts for a carillon project in the parish church of Glis, 2016
  • Small festival music , for orchestra, 2017 for the 100th anniversary of the Visp Orchestra Association (OVV)
  • Brother Klaus ' prayer , according to Choir a-cappella, 2017
  • Lord, make me an instrument of your peace , according to Choir, solos, chamber orchestra and organ, 2017

Awards

Excerpt from Weischus dü?

Eugen Meier has received first prizes for his compositions at various composition competitions for his lied and choral music. In 1988 he received the first prize of the city of Aarau for his song composed especially for the Aargauer Maienzug. In 2003 he won 4 songs for mixed choir (texts by Hannes Taugwalder), including the song Weischus dü? , 1st prize at the composition competition of the Swiss Choir Association (SCV), the European Youth Choir Festival in Basel (EJCF) and the Europa Cantat Federation (SFEC) and in 2012 the 1st prize at the 3rd Alpine Choir Festival in Brig with the work Sonnet 18 (text by William Shakespeare in a Valais German translation by Markus Marti).

Honors

In 1987 Eugen Meier received the Culture Prize of the municipality of Visp in recognition of his overall musical work. The congregation honored its music director for his music-pedagogical work in the congregation and parish. The associations he heads appointed their conductor as honorary member or conductor in recognition of the work he has done.

Artistic work

Watercolor by Eugen Meier

During his time as music director of Visp, but especially since his retirement, he used his free time for artistic creation. So he created watercolors and some sculptures. Eugen Meier loves the light, fleeting watercolor. The main motifs of his painterly work are butterflies, flowers and occasionally landscapes. Meier created the sculptures from soft stone. The main object is the human body, which he mostly carves out extremely finely as a torso from the amorphous stone mass.

Sound carrier

CD songs around the valley based on poems in Valais dialect by Hannes Taugwalder; Lisette Steiner, soprano; Norbert Carlen, baritone; Rachel Eisenhut, piano

literature

Kneeling sculpture made of soft stone
  • Who kicks music ... Eugen Meier on his 80th birthday - his musical work. Texts by Alois Grichting, design: werbstatt Sara Meier, Mediathek Wallis, RERO no .: R008503503.
  • Music history of Switzerland Angelo Garovi, Stämpfli Verlag, p. 129, ISBN 978-3-727-21448-6 .
  • Swiss choir composers biographies, catalog raisonnés with discography and bibliography, Hug Musikverlage, pp. 245–248, ISBN 3-906415-70-8 .
  • Visp, a portrait in variations, Christian Fux , Rotten Verlags AG Visp, ISBN 3-907624-90-4 , page 239-250.
  • Festschrift In June 1987 the municipality of Visp awarded the culture prize to music director Eugen Meier , Mengis Druck und Verlag, Visp
  • Festschrift 100 years of Visp men's choir, 1909 - 2009 , Valais media library, RERO no .: R005456801.
  • Festschrift 40 years amo (General Music School Oberwallis) 1964 - 2004 , nbv Druck AG, Visp, Mediathek Wallis, RERO no .: R003732299.
  • Compositions from 2015 to 2019 , Eugen Meier for his 85th birthday - addendum to the festive publication for his 80th birthday, by Rachel Eisenhut-Meier

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Anyone who loves music ... by Alois Grichting, Mediathek Wallis
  2. ↑ In June 1987 the municipality of Visp awarded the culture prize to music director Eugen Meier, Festschrift, Mediathek Wallis
  3. ↑ Overview of the listed operas and operettas in collaboration with the Visp Orchestra Association , on orchesterverein-visp.ch.
  4. ^ Walliser Bote of May 4, 2015, p. 10, article by Andreas Zurbriggen
  5. ↑ Walliser Bote from 10 September 2015, page 11, article by Alois Grichting
  6. ↑ Walliser Bote of September 15, 2015, page 16, article by Alois Grichting
  7. ↑ Walliser Bote of July 2, 2014, p. 11, article by Alois Grichting
  8. ^ Walliser Bote of March 27, 2004, page 15, article by Alois Grichting
  9. ↑ AlpenChorfestival Brig-Glis 2012. The winners of the 3rd ACF composition competition. In: AlpenChorFestival. 2013, archived from the original on June 24, 2013 ; accessed on March 26, 2020 (ranking list of the composition competition).
  10. ^ Walliser Bote from June 19, 1987, article by Alois Grichting
  11. ↑ In June 1987 the municipality of Visp awarded the culture prize to music director Eugen Meier, Festschrift, Mediathek Wallis
  12. ↑ Festschrift 100 years of Visp men's choir, Valais media library
  13. ^ Walliser Bote of May 10, 2004, p. 11, article by Alois Grichting
personal data
SURNAME Meier, Eugene
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss composer and conductor
DATE OF BIRTH June 18, 1934
PLACE OF BIRTH Würenlingen