Leonid Kreutzer

Leonid Dawidowitsch Kreutzer ( Russian Леонид Давидович Крейцер ; born March 13, 1884 in St. Petersburg , † October 30, 1953 in Tokyo ) was a Russian piano virtuoso and piano teacher of German - Jewish descent.

Life

Initially a pupil of Alexander Glasunow and thus the grandchildren of Nikolai Rimski-Korsakow , he was later taught by Anna Jessipowa at the St. Petersburg Conservatory .

Leonid Kreutzer then lived as a teacher and pianist in Leipzig before moving to Berlin in 1908 , where he became professor for piano at the University of Music in 1921. In addition to Władysław Szpilman , his students in Berlin included Hans-Erich Riebensahm , Karl-Ulrich Schnabel , Franz Osborn , Ignace Strasfogel and Grete Sultan . He gave musically and technically demanding piano recitals, which were often dedicated to certain composers or topics. Together with Frieda Loebenstein , he was on the black list of Rosenberg's " Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur ". Kreutzer was a member of the Honorary Presidium of the Jewish Cultural Association when it was founded in the summer of 1933 and performed here several times himself until the end of 1933. In 1933 he did not emigrate to the USA, as erroneously reported, but directly to Japan, where he worked as a respected pianist and piano teacher for another twenty years. Leonid Kreutzer died in Tokyo in 1953.

He wrote one of the first works on the systematic use of the pedal when playing the piano (“The normal piano pedal from the acoustic and aesthetic standpoint”, 1915), which places particular emphasis on the representation and use of the so-called syncopated pedal. He was also responsible for the publication of Chopin's works at Ullstein Verlag as editor. This edition is particularly instructive because, in addition to exact fingerings, it also shows complete pedaling in line with modern piano construction, which often deviates from Chopin's information.

literature

• Moritz von Bredow: rebellious pianist. The life of Grete Sultan between Berlin and New York. Biography of the Kreutzer student Grete Sultan with references to Kreutzer and Berlin's musical life. Contains a photograph by Leonid Kreuzer. Schott Music , Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-7957-0800-9 .
• Dietmar Schenk: The Berlin University of Music. Prussia's Conservatory between Romantic Classicism and New Music, 1869-1932 / 33. Steiner, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-515-08328-6 (also dissertation. Humboldt University Berlin 2001).
• Wolfgang Rathert , Dietmar Schenk (ed.): Pianists in Berlin. Piano playing and piano training since the 19th century. Berlin University of the Arts, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-89462-068-4 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Leonid Kreutzer in the catalog of the German National Library