German composer Giselher KLEBE dies
DETMOLD - Yesterday German composer Giselher KLEBE (1925-2009) died.
Giselher Klebe got his first musical education from his mother, de violinist Gertrud Klebe, and her sister, Melanie Michaelis. After his parents divorced he moved with his mother to Berlin. Aged 15 he started studying violin, viola and composition with Kurt von Wolfurt at the Städtisches Konservatorium. After the war he took a job at the recording archive of the Berliner Rundfunk. At the same time he continued his composition study with Josef Rufer and Boris Blacher.
In 1951 composing became his profession. Six years later he succeeded Wolfgang Fortner as a composition teacher at the Nordwestdeutsche Musikakademie in Detmold, to become professor in 1962. Among his former pupils are Theo Brandmüller, Peter Michael Braun and Matthias Pintscher.
In the 60's and 70's Klebe became a well-known opera composer, taking advantage of his thorough study of Verdi's works. His voluminous oeuvre - nearly 150 opuses - contains 14 of these stage works. Musicologist and contemporary Arno Forchert described Klebe's musical style as follows: "In Klebe’s works there are neither sudden breaks nor abrupt changes of direction, but an unmistakably steady development towards a forever greater concentration on what he feels to be the most important aspect of his composing: that the message of his music, which results as an expression of certain concepts, moods or feelings, can be understood more and more easily, effortlessly and directly. When asked which composers he feels realized this ideal in its purest form, he mentions Mozart and Verdi.
In his best works, his striving for an Apollonian aesthetic ideal, for brightness, clarity and well-balanced proportions, is accompanied by a perhaps typically German predilection for profundity, seriousness and thoroughness. And there is no doubt that it is partly the tension between these two highly contrasting spheres that infuses his music with its specific quality."
Laatste aanpassing op Tuesday 6 October 2009
