Georg Katzer

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Georg Katzer (2006)

Georg Katzer (born January 10, 1935 in Habelschwerdt , Silesia ; † May 7, 2019 in Zeuthen near Berlin ) was a German composer . He was one of the pioneers of electronic new music in the GDR .

Life

Katzer was born in Lower Silesia in 1935 as the son of a pastry chef . He passed his Abitur at the boarding school Schloss Wendgräben . Between 1953 and 1959 he studied piano , music theory and composition with Rudolf Wagner-Régeny and Ruth Zechlin at the East Berlin University of Music . From 1957 to 1958 he studied with Karel Janáček at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague . From 1961 to 1963 he was a master student of Hanns Eisler , Ruth Zechlin and Leo Spies at the German Academy of the Arts in Berlin .

Since 1963 he has been a freelance composer and musician in Berlin. From 1966 to 1967 he was music dramaturge at the Erich Weinert Ensemble of the East German NVA . He worked with artists such as Johannes "Hannes" Bauer , Wolfgang Fuchs , Paul Lytton , Phil Minton , Ernst-Ludwig Petrowsky , Radu Malfatti , Phil Wachsmann and the Berlin Wind Association.

In 1976 he stayed in the studio for electronic music in Bratislava and in 1977 in Bourges / France. In 1978 he was elected a member of the Academy of Arts in East Berlin. In 1982 he founded the studio for electroacoustic music affiliated to the music department of the Akademie der Künste , of which he was artistic director until 2005.

In 1986 he was visiting professor at Michigan State University . In 1987 he was appointed professor and subsequently taught a master class for composition at the Akademie der Künste. He was a member of the Academy of Arts Berlin-Brandenburg, the Free Academy of Arts in Leipzig and the Academy for Electroacoustic Music in Bourges , France.

Until 1989 he was Vice President of the Association of Composers and Musicologists of the GDR . From 1988 to 1991 he was President of the German section of the CIME (International Association for Electroacoustic Music), in 1990 President of the GDR Music Council and from 1990 to 2001 member of the Presidium of the German Music Council . He was also a founding member and since 2009 an honorary member of the German Society for Electroacoustic Music .

Katzer's compositions include works for chamber ensembles, orchestral works, solo concerts, operas, ballets, puppet shows and oratorio works. His work also includes electro-acoustic pieces, radio play music, multimedia projects and projects with improvised music. New compositions have been published by Edition Gravis .

Katzer lived in Zeuthen near Berlin until his death . He died in May 2019 at the age of 84.

Works (selection)

  • Construction kit for orchestra , 1972.
  • The hedgehog staircase for speakers and 13 instruments. Text: Sarah Kirsch , 1973.
  • The land boom . Opera, 1973.
  • D major music machine . Orchestral work, 1973.
  • Black birds . Ballet, 1975.
  • Scene for chamber ensemble . Instrumental theater, 1975.
  • A new midsummer night's dream . Ballet, 1979.
  • Banquet or about love . Opera, libretto: Gerhard Müller , 1987.
  • Antigone or the city . Opera, libretto: Gerhard Müller, 1989.
  • My 1989 . Radio composition, 1990.
  • L'homme machine . multimedia scenic action, 2000.
  • Medea in Corinth . Oratorical scenes, libretto: Christa Wolf (after Medea: voices ). First performance September 6, 2002 , Konzerthaus Berlin .
  • String quartets: No. 1 (1965), No. 3 (1987) and No. 4 tempi fragili (2004) - first recording in 2010 by the Sonar Quartet Berlin.

Radio plays

Commissioned works

Katzer composed the following works commissioned by the Berlin Wind Association :

  • Concerto for harpsichord a. Wind quintet, "Coming and Going"
  • "La Mettrie or Notes on Machine-Man"
  • "La Mettrie or Note on the Plant Man"
  • "Il re pastore" based on texts by Frederick II .

Film music

Awards / prizes

literature

  • Gerd Belkius: Georg Katzer . In: Dietrich Brennecke, Hannelore Gerlach, Mathias Hansen (eds.): Musicians in our time. Members of the music section of the GDR Academy of the Arts . Deutscher Verlag für Musik, Leipzig 1979, p. 300 ff.
  • Katzer, Prof. Georg. In: Wilfried W. Bruchhäuser: Contemporary composers in the German Association of Composers. A manual. 4th edition, German Association of Composers, Berlin 1995, ISBN 3-555-61410-X , p. 621.
  • Georg Katzer. In: Sigrid Neef (with Hermann Neef ): German opera in the 20th century. GDR 1949–1989. Lang, Berlin 1992, ISBN 3-86032-011-4 , p. 247 ff.
  • Christiane Niklew:  Katzer, Georg . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
  • Jutta Raab: Georg Katzer . In: Contemporary Composers (KDG). Edition Text & Criticism, Munich 1996, ISBN 978-3-86916-164-8 .
  • Katzer, Georg. In: Brockhaus-Riemann Musiklexikon. CD-Rom, Directmedia Publishing, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-89853-438-3 , pp. 13021 f.
  • Antje Hinz: On the problem of acoustic art using the example of Georg Katzer's audio pieces . Master's thesis in musicology (unpublished), Hamburg 1995.

Web links

Commons : Georg Katzer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Peter Uehling, obituary for Georg Katzer , in: Berliner Zeitung , May 8, 2019
  2. ↑ Frederik Hanssen, On the death of the composer Georg Katzer , in: Der Tagesspiegel , May 7, 2019
  3. ^ Academy for Social Sciences at the Central Committee of the SED , Institute for Marxist-Leninist Culture and Art Studies (ed.), Collective of authors led by Erika Tschernig: Our culture: DDR-Zeittafel , 1945–1987. Dietz, Berlin 1989, ISBN 3-320-01132-4 , p. 424.
  4. ↑ Best list 1-2011 . PdSK , February 15, 2011, accessed September 30, 2011.
personal data
SURNAME Katzer, Georg
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer
DATE OF BIRTH January 10, 1935
PLACE OF BIRTH Habelschwerdt , Lower Silesia
DATE OF DEATH May 7, 2019
Place of death Berlin