Matthias Schmidt (musicologist)

Matthias Schmidt (* 1966 in Cologne ) is a German musicologist .

Career

Schmidt studied musicology, German , art history and philosophy in Bonn , Berlin and Vienna . He received his doctorate from the Free University of Berlin and completed his habilitation at the University of Salzburg . Schmidt was a research fellow at the Arnold Schönberg Institute at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna , DAAD , Thyssen and ÖFG scholarship holder in Austria, Italy and several times in the USA. Many years of teaching (as a lecturer, substitute and visiting professor) at universities in Austria, Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands. In addition to his academic duties, he works as a music journalist, exhibition curator and concert dramaturge. Editor of the publication series of the International Schönberg Society and since 2006 (together with Klaus Pietschmann and Wilhelm Seidel ) of the journal Music Theory .

Since 2007 Schmidt has been a full professor in the field of modern music history at the musicological seminar at the University of Basel . He is a board member of several foundations and forums, and from 2010–2017 he was a member of the board of directors at the NCCR Eikones (Basel). In 2017 he was elected to the Austrian Academy of Sciences .

research

His work focuses on the history and aesthetics of music from the 18th to the 20th century (books on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , Johannes Brahms , Arnold Schönberg and Ernst Krenek, among others ). Schmidt is also particularly interested in people and phenomena that lie beyond canonized historiography. a. Together with students, exhibitions and publications on the composers Felix Weingartner and Evgenij Gunst as well as on the Swiss origins of the national anthem of Lesotho.

Awards

• 2017 Corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
• 2009 Credit Swiss Award for Best Teaching at the University of Basel (together with Simon Obert)
• 1996 Ernst Krenek Prize of the City of Vienna

Others

The Viennese musicologist Elisabeth Haas attempted to subject Schmidt's book Composed Childhood to a thoroughgoing criticism. In Die Musikforschung , Haas argues that Schmidt withholds widely used sources and gives up the thoughts of others for his own. But where Schmidt relied on himself, there were numerous errors in his remarks, each of which testified to insufficient knowledge of the musical texts. In the same issue of music research , however, Schmidt was able to refute the criticism and rebut the allegations it contained.

Publications (selection)

• In the gradient of time. Ernst Krenek's works for solo voice. Kassel 1998.
• Theory and practice of twelve-tone technique. Ernst Krenek and the series composition of the Vienna School. Laaber 1998.
• Johannes Brahms. An attempt on musical self-reflection. Wilhelmshaven 2000 (= pocket books on musicology, 137).
• Composed childhood. Laaber 2004. (= spectrum of music, 7).
• Schönberg and Mozart. Aspects of a reception history. Vienna 2004 (= publications of the International Schönberg Society 5).
• Matthias Schmidt, Arne Stollberg (Ed.): The pictorial and the non-pictorial. Nietzsche , Wagner and the musical drama. Fink, Paderborn 2015.
• Johannes Brahms, the songs. A musical factory guide. Munich 2015.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Elisabeth Haas, in Die Musikforschung LIX (2006), no. 4, pp. 427–429, z. BS 428: “When describing the work structures, he [Schmidt] thinks that he is giving a short analysis of this cycle [ children's game by Helmut Lachenmann ] on about half a page . The text that can be found there is almost identical to the transcript of a lecture by Lutz Felbick, given on April 18, 1999 in the Klangbrücke Aachen ( http://205.188.226.185/lfelbick/lachenm.html/  ( page no longer available , Search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Introduction of the lecture). Essentially, Schmidt keeps Felbick's formulations, he changed some words - a way of citing Schmidt often uses [...]. Despite the obvious text adaptation (the time difference between the two text sections clearly indicates Felbick's authorship), Schmidt does not name the author. Is this plagiarism? In addition, there is another serious issue, because Felbick's analysis does not refer to a children's game , but to Lachenmann's cradle music . Schmidt obviously did not notice this fact ”.  
2. ↑ Elisabeth Haas, in Die Musikforschung LIX (2006), no. 4, pp. 427–429, especially p. 428 on pitches, intervals and chords incorrectly determined by Schmidt in the piano works of Robert Schumann and Claude Debussy.
3. ^ Matthias Schmidt, in Die Musikforschung LIX (2006), no. 4, p. 452.

Web links

• Matthias Schmidt on the University of Basel website .