Werner Wehrli

Werner Wehrli (born January 8, 1892 in Aarau , † June 27, 1944 in Lucerne ) was a Swiss composer . Between the two world wars he was one of the most famous Swiss composers.

Life

Wehrli had a solid musical education, which he acquired in Zurich, Berlin, Frankfurt and Basel. He completed his composition studies in Basel in 1918 with Hans Huber and Hermann Suter . In particular, the time in Frankfurt - there Wehrli studied after winning the Frankfurt Mozart Prize in 1914 as a classmate of Paul Hindemith , and there he met his future wife, the singer Irma Bartholomae - had a formative influence on his musical development. In 1918 Wehrli took up a position as a music teacher at the Aargau Teachers' Seminar (now the New Cantonal School Aarau ) and held this position until his death in 1944. He also worked as a music teacher , folk song collector, bell expert, music writer and poet. Werner Wehrli directed the Cäcilienverein Aarau from 1920 to 1929 and the Brugg women's choir from 1924 to 1939.

Since the 1920s, his reputation has grown steadily, which is expressed in performances of his song cycles and chamber music works at the annual Tonkünstler festivals, in performances of his stage works and repeated commissions for highly valued festival music. Wehrli's musical work mediates between late romanticism and modernity , and is characterized by an unusual variety of expressive attitudes. In his work there are folk elements, humorous and dreamy, but also cool and expressive. In 1954, Othmar Schoeck said of Wehrli: "Whenever a new work by Werner Wehrli was announced, you knew: now something of your own, something directed inward, nothing that was painstakingly secure, and you were never disappointed." Wehrli was active in almost all compositional areas Genera. In addition to ambitious large-format works, his oeuvre also includes numerous small pedagogical everyday items.

Discography

• It's him and as a warning , in: Mörike settings from Switzerland . Compact Disc, No. 15 & 16
• In the Bluescht I op. 2/1 ; Mis Chindli , in: Songs by Swiss Composers . Zurich, 1994, No. 7-16

literature

• Werner Wehrli . In: Andreas Kotte (Ed.): Theater Lexikon der Schweiz . Volume 3, Chronos, Zurich 2005, ISBN 3-0340-0715-9 , p. 2059.
• Kristina Ericson, Michael Schneider (Ed.): An insatiable longing. Werner Wehrli. The poetic creation . Sauerländer Verlag, Aarau 1994, ISBN 3-7941-3847-3 .
• Karl Meuli : Werner Wehrli In: Argovia, annual journal of the Historical Society of the Canton of Aargau. Vol. 65, 1953, pp. 447-454

Web links

• Regula Puskás: Werner Wehrli. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Works by and about Werner Wehrli in the catalog of the Aargau canton library
• Werner Wehrli Fund of Pro Argovia at Stapferhaus Lenzburg
• Article about Werner Wehrli on klassika.info
• Sheet music and audio files by Werner Wehrli in the International Music Score Library Project
• Werner Werli In: E-Periodica