Walter Niemann

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Walter Rudolph Niemann (born October 10, 1876 in Hamburg ; † June 17, 1953 in Leipzig ) was a German composer , pianist, music writer and critic.

Life

Walter Niemann was the son of the composer Rudolph Niemann , who - himself a student a. a. von Moscheles - also taught him at first. Niemann later studied composition with Humperdinck and Reinecke in Leipzig , as well as musicology with Hugo Riemann . After receiving his doctorate in 1901, he initially worked as a music writer, wrote a. a. Biographies of Brahms and Sibelius and worked as a music critic for Leipzig newspapers. Later he devoted himself increasingly - from 1917 almost exclusively - to composition, but also worked as a pianist.

The tombstone designed by Fritz Zalisz for Walter Niemann's urn grave, which has already been abandoned, is now used as a model grave site

Compositional work

Niemann's compositional work comprises around 190 opus numbers and around 1000 piano pieces, which are almost exclusively dedicated to the piano. Starting with Brahms, he became one of the few German composers who came close to Impressionism . His colorful, often miniature piano pieces reflect on the one hand an inclination towards past epochs (see for example work titles such as Aus Watteau's time , Sanssouci , Meißner Porzellan ) and, on the other hand, an interest in exotic subjects (comparable to the Englishman Cyril Scott ) in poetic titles how Old China (op. 62), The Orchid Garden (op. 76) or The Exotic Pavilion is expressed. Furthermore, in Niemann's work there is also a deep connection to German folk tales and nature (see Pictures from Chiemsee, Ilsenburger Sonata, Die Harzreise )

The book Masters of the Piano: The Pianists of the Present and the Recent Past , first published in 1919, is still considered an exemplary standard work on pianists, which has had numerous editions and is still used and cited today.

Musical style

Niemann provided his scores with a large number of performance designations and nuances, such as sost., Marc. or ten . markings. There are also plenty of crescendo and decrescendo forks, some of which are made in one hand for each voice.

In Walter Niemann's work, an independent musical style of composition can be recognized harmoniously, which is mainly characterized by late Romantic and Impressionist tones. In his Far Eastern character pieces mainly pentatonic scales dominate, whereas in baroque suites he used the harmony sequence of the time and combined it with late romantic chords. Throughout his life, Niemann was rather conservative and stuck to the tonality, which, among other things, earned him a legal dispute with Max Reger , whom he is said to have strongly attacked through criticism. However, this attitude also ensured that his music - especially after the Second World War - did not spread widely and that it is almost completely forgotten today.

Books (selection)

  • The music of Scandinavia. Breitkopf & Härtel, Leipzig 1906; New edition BiblioBazaar, 2009
  • The music of the present and the last past up to the Romantics, Classicists and New Germans. 5th - 8th ed., Schuster & Loeffler, Berlin 1913
  • The piano book, short story d. Piano music u. their masters, d. Piano making and piano literature . With tab. Above d. Piano making ue overview of d. Piano literature. Callwey, Munich 1907, 1930 (13th edition).
  • Masters of the piano, the pianists of the present and the recent past . Schuster & Loeffler, Berlin 1919, 1921 (14th edition).
  • My life for the piano . Autobiography, edited by Gerhard Helzel, Staccato-Verlag, Düsseldorf 2008

Documents

  • Letters and autographs by Walter Niemann in the holdings of the music publishers CFPeters and AJ Benjamin / Sikorski in the Saxon State Archives in Leipzig .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Walter Niemann: Japan . Simrock GmbH, Berlin 1923, p. 29 .
  2. ^ Walter Niemann: Music for an old castle . Anton Böhm and Son, Augsburg, Vienna 1935, p. 10 .
  3. Frank Zalkow: CV. Retrieved on August 19, 2018 (German).

Web links