Irma Wolpe Rademacher

Irma Wolpe Rademacher , b. Schoenberg, (born March 15, 1902 in Galați , Romania ; † January 6, 1984 in New York ) was an American Jewish pianist and piano teacher .

Life

Irma Wolpe Rademacher came from a middle-class Jewish family from West Moldova . The parents were active Zionists in Iași , Romania , where the family had lived since 1910. The mother, Rachel Schoenberg (1879–1943), b. Segall, essayist and poet , was a member of the World Organization of Zionist Women and a sought-after speaker at congresses in Europe. The father, Jacob Schoenberg (1864–1930), was Vice President of Banca Moldova in Iași. The parents were extremely active in the social life of the city's Jewish community and were in close contact with the President of the World Zionist Organization, Chaim Weizmann . The four Schoenberg children enjoyed an excellent education. The eldest son, Harry (later Henry Ray), obtained his architecture diploma at the Technical University in Munich and emigrated to the USA in 1939 . Daughter Elsa studied in Dresden at the art school and married in 1926 Menahem Ussishkins son, Samuel, with whom she henceforth in Jerusalem lived. The youngest son, Isaac (Iso) Jacob Schoenberg , later known for his fundamental work on splines , studied mathematics in Iași, Göttingen and Berlin and, after his marriage to Dolli Landau, settled in 1930, daughter of mathematician Edmund Landau and granddaughter of Paul Ehrlich , settled in the United States .

Irma Wolpe Rademacher obtained her piano diploma in 1920 with Enrico Mezzetti at the Conservatory of her hometown (today: Universitatea Națională de Arte "George Enescu" ) and then completed a year-long study with Hermann Vetter at the Royal Conservatory for Music and Theater (today: Carl Maria Academy of Music von Webern ) in Dresden . From 1921 to 1924 she was the piano student of Leonid Kreutzer and Elsa Rompe in Berlin and attended the courses for rhythmic gymnastics at the Dalcroze School at the same time . From 1924 to 1926 she studied piano with Alfred Cortot and improvisation and rhythm at the eurythmy seminar of Émile Jaques-Dalcroze in Paris . She received her diploma as a rhythmist in 1927 at the Jaques Dalcroze Institute in Geneva . During her stay in Bucharest (1930-1931) she directed her private rhythm school there. In the years from 1927 to 1933 she returned to Berlin again and again, where she taught, with interruptions, at Elsa Rompe's private school and Anna Epping and Marie Adama van Scheltema's private school for rhythm, music and physical formation and programs in new artistic circles such as B. in the November group , helped shape. During this time she also got to know the German-Jewish composer Stefan Wolpe and began to play his piano works.

Before 1932 she performed mainly in Romania and Palestine, where she also met Mark Chagall . This helped her to make a debut in Paris in 1932 , in the Salle Pleyel . This concert also premiered three of Stefan Wolpe's “ Cinque marches caractéristiques ” (1928–1934). After the National Socialists came to power, she helped Wolpe to flee Berlin. Via Czechoslovakia , Switzerland , Austria and Romania both managed to escape to Palestine in 1934, where they married in 1935. Irma Wolpe Rademacher gave concerts and taught at the Palestine Conservatoire (today: Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance ) until 1938, when the couple decided to emigrate to the USA . Her permanent residence remained in New York City until the end of her life , where she also taught at the Settlement Music School and at Swarthmore College in Philadelphia. She played in chamber music concerts with Josef Tal , Josef Marx , Emil Hauser, Thelma Yellin-Bentwich, with the Jerusalem String Quartet, Anne Hirsch-Fellheimer, Elli Friedman, Sascha Parnes, Hanoch Jacoby, Joachim Stutschewsky , Herbert Brün , Eduard Steuermann , Jani Szántó, Anneliese von Molnar, Alfred Swan, Arline Carmen, Rudolph Benetsky, Abraham Mishkind, Nora Post u. a.

Her marriage to Stefan Wolpe was divorced in 1949 and she married the mathematician Hans Rademacher . During a stay in Bombay , India (1954–1955), where Hans Rademacher was visiting professor at the Tata Institute for Fundamental Research , she not only played solo concerts and chamber music with Mehli Mehta and his quartet, but also improvised with the sitar virtuoso Vilayat Khan .

After Rademacher's death she decided to teach more intensively again. She was appointed to the New England Conservatory , Boston . Here she concluded her pianistic career with two important concerts: a recital with works by Arnold Schönberg (1973) and at the age of 73 (1975), as a homage to her first husband and lifelong soulmate friend, the first ever concert with exclusively works by Stefan Wolpe . Irma Wolpe Rademacher was the most important interpreter of Wolpe's piano works. In over 100 concert performances, she mastered a very broad repertoire with a focus on 20th century music.

As a teacher and mentor, she inspired and promoted the careers of numerous musicians such as: Leonard Battipaglia, Louise Costigan-Kerns, Lily Friedman, Anezia Garcia, Laura Gigante Sharpe, Suzan Kagan, Peter Jona Korn , Jerome Lowenthal , Jacob Maxin, Garrick Ohlsson , Benjamin Oren , Zaidee Parkinson, Donald Pirone, Elizabeth Rich, Sonia Rubinsky, Krista Seddon, Peter Serkin , Russell Sherman, Thomas Stumpf, David Tudor , Meira Warshauer, Konrad Wolff u. a.

Publications

• Irma Wolpe Rademacher: Comments on L'Art de toucher le piano , in: Piano Journal, EPTA, London, 1981, pp. 15-20.

Recordings

Radio Bucharest; Palestine Broadcasting Service (Kol Yerushalayim), Jerusalem; Radio Bombay, India; New England Conservatory, Boston.

literature

• Austin Clarkson: Essays in Actionism: Wolpe's Pieces for Three Pianists . In: Perspectives of New Music . Volume 40, No. 2, 2002, pp. 115-133, JSTOR : 25164489.
• Austin Clarkson: David Tudor's Apprenticeship: The Years with Irma and Stefan Wolpe . In: Leonardo Music Journal . Volume 14, December 2004, pp. 5-10, doi : 10.1162 / 0961121043067325.
• Austin Clarkson (ed.): On the Music of Stefan Wolpe. Essays and Recollections . In: Dimension and Diversity. Vol. 6, Hillsdale, Pendragon, 2003.
• Nora Born: Irma Wolpe Rademacher (1902–1984) . In: Ulrich Tadday (ed.): Stefan Wolpe ( music concepts 152/153 ). 1st edition. Vol. 2. edition text + kritik, Munich, 2011, pp. 46–60, ISBN 978-3-86916-104-4 .
• Nora Born (ed.): The law of harmonic or dis-harmonic correspondences. Irma and Stefan Wolpe - correspondence 1933–1972 . edition text + kritik, Munich, 2016, ISBN 978-3-86916-500-4 .
• Ina Henning: Stefan Wolpe , in: Contemporary composers , edition text + kritik, Munich 2018.
• Barbara von der Lühe: The Emigration of German-Speaking Musicians to the British Mandate Palestine. Your contribution to the development of Israeli radio, opera and music education since 1933, Lang, Frankfurt am Main, 1999.
• Josef Tal : The rabbi's son. A way from Berlin to Jerusalem , Quadriga Verlag, 1985.
• Horst Weber, Stefan Drees (ed.): Sources for the history of emigrated musicians 1933-1950 / Sources Relating to the History of Emigré Musicians 1933-1950 , Vol. 2, Saur Verlag, New York, Munich, 2005.

Web links

• Nora Born - Irma Wolpe Rademacher : Lexicon of persecuted musicians of the Nazi era (LexM)
• Nora Born - Stefan Wolpe : Lexicon of Persecuted Musicians of the Nazi Era (LexM)