Peter Jona Korn

Peter Jona Korn (born March 30, 1922 in Berlin ; † January 12, 1998 in Munich ) was a German musician and composer .

Life

Peter Jona Korn came to music early on through his mother, who sings and plays the violin. At the age of eight he wrote down his first compositions, at the age of 10 he took part in radio programs on the piano and harpsichord, he sang the second line-up as a boy soprano in the Paris premiere of Bertolt Brechts and Kurt Weill's Der Jasager and received his first composition lessons in the gifted class of Berliners University of Music . In 1933 he emigrated to London, where he took lessons at the Beltane School from Edmund Rubbra , who introduced him to contemporary music and from whom he a. a. got to know the music of his future great role model Ralph Vaughan Williams . After a brief visit to Berlin in 1936, which was politically possible because of the Olympic Games, he went to Palestine and continued his education there at the Jerusalem Conservatory (now the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance ), where Stefan Wolpe became his teacher and fatherly friend. Korn came to Los Angeles in 1941 with his mother and sister (their father died in 1940), where he studied at the University of California at Los Angeles and the University of Southern California in the following years . His teachers here included personalities such as Arnold Schönberg , Ernst Toch , Hanns Eisler and Miklós Rózsa, who were forced to emigrate before the Nazi regime that had meanwhile ruled in Germany and Austria . In 1948 Korn founded The New Orchestra of Los Angeles, as its conductor he a. a. 1955 premiered Anton Bruckner's 6th Symphony and conducted his own works. In 1951 he married the pianist Barbara Sheldon, their daughter Heidi was born in 1952 and their son Anthony in 1960.

After a brief visit to Berlin in 1953, Korn returned to Europe as a conductor in 1957, receiving a grant from the Beebe Foundation. He gave lectures, lived for a short time in Switzerland and Austria and in 1960 took over a composition class at the Trapp Conservatory of Music in Munich. After a recent stay in the USA and a visiting professorship at the University of California, he moved back to Germany in 1965, where he has now settled for almost three decades. From 1967 to 1987 he was director of the Richard Strauss Conservatory in Munich. On his initiative, the conservatory was established in the Gasteig cultural center so that the students could take part in cultural events in a practical way. In 1994 Korn relocated temporarily to the USA, where he settled with his daughter in Oregon.

Korn worked in numerous public functions, such as chairman of the Association of Münchner Tonkünstler, as vice-president of the German composers' association , on the television council of ZDF, on the supervisory board of GEMA and as deputy chairman of the Richard Strauss Society and the Orff Schulwerk Society. In recognition of his work, he received the City of Munich Music Prize (1968) and the Bavarian Order of Merit (1984). In later years he was an honorary member of GEMA, the German Association of Composers and the Association of Münchner Tonkünstler.

Works (selection)

• Last Greeting for string orchestra or op. (1945)
• Symphony No. 1 op.3 (1941–46; rev. 1977)
• Idyllic wilderness . Overture for orchestra op.4 (1947; rev. 1957)
• Sonata for oboe and piano op.7 (1949)
• Tom Paine Overture for orchestra op.9 (1949/50; rev. 1985)
• String Quartet No. 1 op.10 (1949/50)
• Symphony No. 2 op.13 (1950; rev. 1983)
• Rhapsody for oboe and string orchestra op.14 (1951)
• In medias res . Overture for orchestra op.21 (1953)
• Piano Sonata op.25 (1954)
• Variations on a song from the Beggar Opera for orchestra op.26 (1954/55)
• Three Scottish Epitaphs based on poems by Robert Burns for mixed choir a cappella op.27 (1955)
• Symphony No. 3 Op. 30 (1956; rev. 1969)
• Concerto for alto saxophone and orchestra op.31 (1956; rev. 1982)
• Serenade for four horns op.33 (1957)
• Berolina Suite . (An attempt at modern light music) for small orchestra op.34 (1959)
• Heidi in Frankfurt . Opera in three acts after Johanna Spyri op. 35 (1961–63)
• String Quartet No. 2 op.36 (1963)
• Three Songs of Autumn based on poems by Basil Swift for mixed choir a cappella op.38 (1964)
• Concerto for violin and orchestra op.39 (1964/65)
• Toccata for orchestra op.42a (1966)
• Exorcism of a Liszt Fragment for Orchestra op.44 (1966–68)
• Heralds of autumn . Three songs based on poems by Arnold Krieger op.47
• Turandot Variations on a Theme by Carl Maria von Weber for piano op.53 (1973)
• Morning music for trumpet and string orchestra op.54 (1973)
• Piano Trio op.56 (1975)
• Wind octet op.58 (1976)
• At night in the village the watchman called . Rhapsody based on a poem by Eduard Mörike for oboe, horn and string orchestra op.63a (1977; rev. 1988)
• Beckmesser Variations on themes from Richard Wagner's "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg" for orchestra op. 64
• Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra, op.67 (1979)
• Munich - A tribute to the princely city . Cantata after Hans Sachs for soloists, choir and orchestra op.68 (1979)
• Salute to the Lone Wolves . Symphony for wind orchestra op.69 (1980)
• The psalm of courage . Cantata after Lion Feuchtwanger for baritone, choir and orchestra op.75 (1983)
• Tribute to trois pères . Symphony for Organ op.79 (1986)
• Kleiner Tiergarten based on poems by Christian Morgenstern for mixed choir a cappella Op. 80 (1985)
• Rhapsody for organ op.82 (1986)
• Romanza concertante on a theme by Michael Haydn for oboe and small orchestra op.84 (1987)
• Concerto classico for harpsichord and orchestra op.85 or accordion and orchestra op.85 (1988)
• Symphony No. 4 Ahasver op.91 (1989/90)
• Five Piano Pieces op.94 (1992)
• Trio for clarinet, violoncello and piano op.96 (1993)
• We are the last . Four songs based on poems by Hans Sahl op.98 (1994)

Web links

• Peter Jona Korn Website about the composer and his work
• Peter Jona Korn at the Merseburger publishing house
• Literature by and about Peter Jona Korn in the catalog of the German National Library
• The estate is in the Bavarian State Library.