Artur Schnabel

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Biography

Life and work

The early years

Born in Lipnik (Kunzendorf) near Bielsko|Bielitz , Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria|Galicia , Austria–Hungary|Austro-Hungarian Empire (today a part of Bielsko-Biala , Poland ),
Schnabel was the youngest of three children born to Isidor Schnabel, a textile merchant, and his wife Ernestine (née Labin). He had two sisters, Clara and Frieda. His family was Jewish. http://www.notablebiographies.com/supp/Supplement-Mi-So/Schnabel-Artur.html

Schnabel's parents moved to Vienna in 1884, when he was two. He began learning the piano at the age of four, when he took a spontaneous interest in his eldest sister Clara's piano lessons. His prodigious talent quickly became evident. At the age of six he began piano lessons under Professor Hans Schmitt of the Vienna Conservatorium (today the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna ). Only three years later he was accepted as a pupil by the redoubtable and internationally celebrated piano pedagogue Theodor Leschetizky .

The Leschetizky years

Schnabel remained under Leschetizky's tutelage for seven years, between 1891 and 1897. His co-students of Leschetizky during that period included Ossip Gabrilowitsch , Mark Hambourg and Ignaz Friedman .

Initially, for his first year under Leschetizky, he was given rigorous preparatory technical tuition from Anna Yesipova (Leschetizky’s second wife and a famous pianist in her own right) and also from Malwine Bree who was Leschetizky's assistant. From age ten, he participated in all Leschetizky's classes.

Following a failed initial approach to Anton Bruckner , Schnabel studied music theory and composition under Eusebius Mandyczewski . Mandyczewski was an assistant to Johannes Brahms , and through him Schnabel was introduced to Brahms' circle and was often in the great composer's presence. The young Schnabel once heard Brahms play in a performance of his Piano Quartet No. 1 (Brahms)|first piano quartet ; for all the missed notes, said Schnabel, it "was in the true grand manner."

Schnabel made his official concert debut in 1897, at the Bösendorfer|Bösendorfer-Saal in Vienna. Later that same year, he gave a series of concerts in Budapest , Prague and Brünn (today Brno , Czech Republic).

The Berlin years

Schnabel moved to Berlin in 1898, making his debut there with a concert at the C. Bechstein Pianofortefabrik|Bechstein-Saal . Following World War I , Schnabel also toured widely, visiting the United States, Russia and England.

He gained initial fame thanks to orchestral concerts he gave under the conductor Arthur Nikisch as well as playing in chamber music and accompanying his future wife, the alto|contralto Therese Behr , in Lied er.

In chamber music, he founded the Schnabel Trio with the violinist Alfred Wittenberg and the cellist Anton Hekking ; they played together between 1902 and 1904. In 1905, he formed a second Schnabel Trio with Carl Flesch (with whom he also played violin sonata s) and the cellist Jean Gérardy . In 1914, with the outbreak of the First World War, Gérardy (a Belgian) left the trio as he could no longer remain in Germany. He was replaced by Hugo Becker and this became the third Schnabel Trio.

Later, Schnabel also played in a quartet with violinist Bronislaw Huberman , composer/violist Paul Hindemith and the cellist Gregor Piatigorsky (with whom he also played and recorded cello sonatas). Schnabel also played with a number of other famous musicians including the violinist Joseph Szigeti and the cellists Pau Casals and Pierre Fournier .

He was friends of, and played with, the most distinguished conductors of the day, including Wilhelm Furtwängler , Bruno Walter , Otto Klemperer , George Szell , Willem Mengelberg , and Sir Adrian Boult .

From 1925 Schnabel taught at the Berlin State Academy, where his masterclasses brought him great renown. Among Schnabel's many piano pupils were Clifford Curzon , Rudolf Firkušný , Adrian Aeschbacher , Lili Kraus , Leon Fleisher , Carlo Zecchi , Claude Frank , Leonard Shure , Alan Bush , Nancy Weir , Konrad Wolff , Jascha Spivakovsky, Eunice Norton , Henry Jolles , Maria Curcio , Noel Mewton-Wood and radio personality Karl Haas .

The later years

Schnabel, a Jew , left Berlin in 1933 after the Nazi Party took control. He lived in England for a time while giving masterclasses at Tremezzo on Lake Como in Italy , before moving to the United States in 1939. In 1944, he became a naturalization|naturalized citizen of the United States. There he took a teaching post at the University of Michigan , returning to Europe at the end of World War II . Among his pupils in Michigan was composer Sam Raphling .

He continued to give concerts on both sides of the Atlantic until the end of his life, as well as composing and continuing to make records, although he was never very fond of the whole studio process. He died in Axenstein, Switzerland and was buried in Schwyz , Switzerland.

Family

Schnabel married Therese Behr in 1905. They had two sons, Karl Ulrich Schnabel (1909–2001) who also became a classical pianist and renowned piano teacher, and Stefan Schnabel (1912–99), who became a well regarded actor.

Repertoire

Schnabel was best known for his devotion to the core German composers, especially the Viennese classics of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart|Mozart , Beethoven and Schubert. He was also renowned for his playing of works by Johannes Brahms|Brahms and Robert Schumann|Schumann . He also played and recorded works by Johann Sebastian Bach|Bach .

However, his repertoire was wider than that. During his young virtuosic years in Berlin, he played works by other composers including Franz Liszt|Liszt , Frédéric Chopin|Chopin and Carl Maria von Weber|Weber . On his early American tours, he programmed works such as the Chopin Preludes (Chopin)|Preludes and Schumann's Fantasie in C (Schumann)|Fantasie in C . Among other works that he played, as recalled by those such as Claudio Arrau and Vladimir Horowitz , who had heard Schnabel in the 1920s, were Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 1 (Chopin)|E minor Piano Concerto and the Piano Sonata No. 2 (Chopin)|Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor , and Weber's Konzertstück in F minor (Weber)|Konzertstück in F minor , Piano Sonata No. 2, and Invitation to the Dance (Weber)|Invitation to the Dance .Arrau in conversation with Peter Warwick, 31 July 1976 Schnabel himself mentioned that he had played the Liszt Piano Sonata (Liszt)|Sonata in B minor "very often", as well as the Liszt Piano Concerto No. 1 (Liszt)|E-flat Piano Concerto .

It is not clear why Schnabel dropped those from his performing repertoire in the 1930s, after his final departure from Germany. He claimed that it was because he decided that he wanted to play only "music which is better than it could be performed". However, it has been suggested by some that "Schnabel, uprooted from his native heritage, may have been clinging to the great German composers in an attempt to keep his cultural origins alive".Harris Goldsmith, Artur Schnabel: Paradigm or Paradox? , Keynote 3, March 1982

Schnabel was known for championing the then-neglected sonatas of Schubert and, even more so, Beethoven, including his more challenging late works. While on a tour of Spain, Schnabel wrote to his wife saying that during a performance of Beethoven's Diabelli Variations he had begun to feel sorry for the audience. "I am the only person here who is enjoying this, and I get the money; they pay and have to suffer," he wrote. Schnabel did much to popularize Beethoven's piano music, making the first complete recording of the sonatas, completing the set for the British label HMV in 1935. This set of recordings has never been out of print, and is considered by many to be the touchstone of Beethoven sonata interpretations, though shortcomings in finger technique mar many performances of fast movements ( Sergei Rachmaninoff is supposed to have referred to him as "the great Tempo#Italian tempo markings|adagio pianist"). It has been said that he suffered greatly from nerves when recording; in a more private setting, his technique was impeccable. Claudio Arrau has said that Schnabel's live performances during the 1920s were technically "flawless." He also recorded all the Beethoven piano concerto s.

Schnabel as composer

Despite his performing repertoire being concentrated largely on the works of Beethoven, Schubert, Mozart and Brahms, almost all of his own compositions (none of which are in the active repertoire) are atonality|atonal . (It is interesting, in this regard, to note that Schnabel was a close friend of Arnold Schoenberg , his Austrian-American compatriot, who was famous as a pioneering composer of atonal and Twelve-tone technique|twelve-tone music.)

They are "difficult" yet fascinating and complex works, and are marked by genuine originality of style. Composers Ernst Krenek and Roger Sessions have commented that they show signs of undoubted genius (see biography of Schnabel by Cesar Saerchinger). Schnabel's list of compositions eventually included three symphony|symphonies , a piano concerto, a piano sonata (premiered by Eduard Erdmann at the 1925 Venice ISCM FestivalGrove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th ed., 1954, Eric Blom . ed.) and five string quartet s, amongst various smaller works.

In recent years, a number of his compositions (notably championed by the violinist, Paul Zukofsky ) have been recorded and made available on CD, including three of his string quartets, the three symphonies, a rhapsody for orchestra, and four solo piano works: his Sonata, Dance Suite, Piece in Seven Movements (1935–37) and Seven Pieces (1947).

Compositions

Chamber Works

Duodecimet , chamber orchestra

Piano Quintet

Sonata for Solo Cello

Sonata for Solo Violin

Sonata for Violin and Piano

String Quartet No. 1

String Quartet No. 2

String Quartet No. 3

String Quartet No. 4

String Quartet No. 5

String Trio

Orchestral Works

Piano Concerto (Intermezzo & Rondo)

Rhapsody for Orchestra

Symphony No. 1

Symphony No. 2

Symphony No. 3

Choral Works

Dance and Secret

Joy and Peace

Songs

Early Songs (Frühe Lieder) , medium voice and piano

Notturno , medium voice

Solo Piano

Dance Suite

Piece in Seven Movements

Seven Piano Pieces

Sonata for Piano

Three Piano Pieces

Quotations

"The notes I handle no better than many pianists. But the pauses between the notes—ah, that is where the art resides."
- Schnabel, in Chicago Daily News , June 11, 1958.

External links

Composer's Publisher and Bio

Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata performed by Artur Schnabel

contains an article about Schnabel's compositions and selected recordings

Copyright Citations

This article is licensed under the GNU License
Click here for original article: Artur Schnabel


1. Alfred Brendel 2. Wilhelm Kempff 3. Glenn Gould 4. Vladimir Horowitz 5. Hamilton Harty 6. Detroit Symphony Orchestra 7. Arnold Schoenberg

Undetermined Music Artists