Henry Cowell

Henry Dixon Cowell ( born March 11, 1897 in Menlo Park, California, † 10 December 1965 Shady, New York ) was an American composer of Irish origin.

Already came early into contact with non-European music, Cowell is formed mainly self-taught as a pianist and composer. From the 1920s made ​​annual tours throughout North America and Europe, where he was in Berlin by Richard Buhlig presented in 1923 by the young pianist Grete Sultan; it began an intensive collaboration. In 1929 he attended the first American composer of the Soviet Union. From 1914 he studied at the University of California at Charles Seeger. From 1931, he completed his education by a study of comparative musicology in Berlin with Erich von Hornbostel. In 1931 he gave a concert at the Bauhaus in Dessau. On a study trip through Asia, he taught at the music academies of Tehran and Madras. After that, he was a professor at Columbia University in New York. His students included John Cage and Lou Harrison. Cowell was also a journalist and editor of the New Music Edition, a platform for new American music, works.

Cowell experimented early with clusters and worked with the piano string, with the strings of the piano are plucked directly and thus influenced the development of the Prepared Piano by John Cage. The artistic development Grete Sultan was significantly influenced by Cowell. He developed and designed together with Joseph Schillinger the rhythmicon, which was then built in 1931 by Leon Theremin and Russians made ​​it possible to automatically generate rhythms. Together with Charles Ives, Charles Ruggles, John J. Becker and Wallingford Riegger he is counted the avant-garde composer of the American Five group.

Cowell wrote 19 symphonies mainly programmatic and other symphonic works, including two concertos for koto, one for percussion and an accordion concert, a suite for piano strings and chamber orchestra, numerous chamber music, choirs and songs. In addition, he has published essays on music theory. From 1927 to 1936 he published the magazine New Music Quarterly.

Works

  • The Tides of Manaunaun, 1912
  • The Lilt of Reel, 1925
  • Piano Concerto, 1930
  • Synchrony, 1931
  • Gaelic Symphony, 1942
  • Persian Set for 12 instruments, 1957
  • Concerto for Koto and Orchestra, 1964
  • Advertisement
  • Tiger
  • The Aeolian Harp
  • The Banshee
  • Mosaic Quartet

Writings

  • New Musical Resources, 1919
  • American Composers on American Music (ed. ), 1933
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