Walter Niemann (composer)

This article is about the German composer, music critic, and musicologist. For the American football player, see Walter Niemann (American football).

Walter Rudolph Niemann (10 October 1876, Hamburg – 17 June 1953, Leipzig) was a German composer, arranger, and music critic.

Life

Born in Hamburg, Niemann was the son of composer and virtuoso pianist Rudolph Niemann (1838–1898). His uncle, Gustav Adolph Niemann (1843–1881) was a violinist and important musical figure in Helsinki. Walter Niemann studied with Engelbert Humperdinck as a youth in Leipzig. He then entered the Leipzig Conservatory where he was a pupil of Carl Reinecke. He pursued doctoral studies in musicology at the University of Leipzig under Hugo Riemann and Hermann Kretzschmar, earning a doctorate in 1901. His dissertation was on early ligatures and mensural music.

Niemann first worked as a teacher in Hamburg then served as the editor of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik in Leipzig from 1904 to 1906. From 1907 through 1917 he was a writer and critic for the Neueste Nachrichten in Leipzig. He also taught during those years on the faculty of the Hamburg Conservatory. In 1927, H. Abert in the Illustriertes Musiklexikon styled Niemann "The most important composer for piano today, who understands how to make music both fine and colored, although he often strays into the salon."

Work

Niemann's compositions include 189 opus numbers of which more than 150 are works for solo piano, chiefly of character pieces. He also composed violin sonata, several orchestral works, and some chamber music. Niemann was one of the very few German composers to explore Impressionist music. His works are characterized by color and exoticism, and the titles reflect interests in the past ("From Watteau's time", "Sanssouci" "Meissen porcelain"), and exotic subject matter on poetic titles ("Old China, Op. 62," "The Orchid Garden, Op. 67", "The Exotic Pavillon").

His book, "Masters of the Piano: past and present," published in 1919 is considered a classic. He also wrote popular biographies of composers; his biography of Brahms emphasized that composer's north German roots at the expense of his Viennese retirement and liberalism. As a reviewer he was outspoken in his criticism of "pathological" and "sensuous" composers like Richard Strauss, Mahler, and Arnold Schoenberg, and was threatened in 1910 with a libel suit by composer Max Reger. He praised nationalists and folk-influenced composers like Hans Pfitzner, Sibelius, and Edward MacDowell, and was influential in popularizing Scandinavian composers in Germany. Following the second world war, Niemann's artistic viewpoint and consequently his work fell out of favor.

Compositions

Opus Year Title Notes
6 1908 Meissner Porzellan
46 1926 Im Kinderland: 19 ganz leichte Klavierstücke
59 Masken: 20 Charakterstücke
60 1919 Piano Sonata No. 1 "Romantic" A-minor
62 1919 Alt China: 5 Traumdichtungen 1. Die Glocken der Pagode/2.Chinesiche Nacthtigall, etc.
73 Präeludium, Intermezzo und Fugue
80 Die Jahreszieten. 21 Charakterstücke nach Hermann Bang
81 4 Balladen F-minor, E-minor, Eb-Major, G-minor
98 2 kleine Sonaten d-minor, e-minor
102 1925 Kleine Suite "Suite miniature"
106 Introduction und Toccata
107 1926 Hamburg. 13 Charakterstücke 1. Haften/2. Spuk/3.Elternhaus/4. Disput /5. Matrosen/6. AD 1600/7. Brahms/8. Alter Michel/9. Drehorgel/10. Laterne/11. St. Pauli/12. Mondnacht/13. Hymnus
108 Pavane und Gavotte
109 Galante Musik: 6 Stücke 1. Präludium/2.Sarabande/3.Gavotte/4. Gigue/5. Menuett/6. Rigaudon
111 Menuett und Bourreé
118 1930 Variationen
146 1936 Kleine Variationen über eine alt-irische Volksweise

Writings (selected)

Sources

External links