Józef Hofmann
Encyclopedia
Josef Casimir Hofmann was a Polish-American virtuoso
pianist
, composer
, music teacher, and inventor.
, near Cracow
(Kraków
), Austria-Hungary
, (now Poland) in 1876. His father was the composer, conductor and pianist Kazimierz Hofmann, and his mother the singer Matylda Pindelska. A child prodigy, he gave a debut recital in Warsaw at the age of 5, and a long series of concerts throughout Europe and Scandinavia, culminating in a series of concerts in America in 1887-88 that elicited comparisons with young Mozart and young Mendelssohn
.
Anton Rubinstein
took Hofmann as his only private student in 1892 and arranged the debut of his pupil in Hamburg, Germany in 1894. Hofmann toured and performed extensively over the next 50 years as one of the most celebrated pianists of the era.
In 1913, he was presented with a set of keys to the city of St. Petersburg, Russia.
As a composer, Hofmann published over one hundred works, many of those under the pseudonym Michel Dvorsky, including two piano concertos and ballet music. He made the United States his base during World War I and became a US citizen in 1926. In 1924, he became the first head of the piano department at the inception of the Curtis Institute of Music
, Philadelphia, and became the Institute's director in 1927 and remained so until 1938.
He was instrumental in recruiting illustrious musicians such as Efrem Zimbalist
, Fritz Reiner
, Marcella Sembrich
, and Leopold Auer
as Curtis faculty. Hofmann's pupils included Jean Behrend, Abram Chasins
, Abbey Simon
, Shura Cherkassky
, Ezra Rachlin, Nadia Reisenberg
(see ),
and Harry Kaufman. While not a pupil, Jorge Bolet
benefited from Hofmann's interest. In 1937, the 50th anniversary of his New York debut performance was celebrated with gala performances including a "Golden Jubilee" recital at the Metropolitan Opera
, New York
. In 1938 he was forced to leave the Curtis Institute of Music over financial and administrative disputes. In the years from 1939 to 1946, his artistic eminence deteriorated, in part due to family difficulties and alcoholism.
In 1946, he gave his last recital at Carnegie Hall
, home to his 151 appearances, and retired to private life in 1948.
He spent his last decade in Los Angeles in relative obscurity, working on inventions and keeping a steady correspondence with associates.
As an inventor, Hofmann had over 70 patents, and his invention of pneumatic shock absorbers for cars and airplanes was commercially successful from 1905 to 1928. Other inventions included a windscreen wiper, a furnace that burned crude oil, a house that revolved with the sun, a device to record dynamics
(: U.S. patent number 1614984) in reproducing piano rolls that he perfected just as the roll companies went out of business, and piano action improvements adopted by the Steinway Company
(: U.S. patent number 2263088).
Hofmann died of pneumonia on February 16, 1957. He was survived by four children. His second wife, Betty Short, had previously been one of his pupils.
The Josef Hofmann Piano Competition, co-sponsored by the American Council for Polish Culture and the University of South Carolina Aiken was established in his honor in 1994.
Anton Rubinstein
heard the seven-year old Hofmann play Beethoven's C Minor Piano Concerto in Warsaw
and declared him to be an unprecedented talent (see and
). At Rubinstein's suggestion, German impresario Hermann Wolff offered career management and to send the boy on a European tour, but Hofmann's father refused to let the boy travel until he was nine years old. At that age, Hofmann gave concerts in Germany, France, Holland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Great Britain.
In 1887, an American tour was arranged and after three months of performances that included fifty recitals, seventeen of which were at the Metropolitan Opera House
, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children stepped in, citing the boy's fragile health. However, as per the contract that had paid Hofmann $10,000, he was legally obliged to complete the tour. The contract was rendered void by Alfred Corning Clark
who donated $50,000 and, in turn, legally forbade Hofmann to perform in public until he turned 18 years old. The final segment of the tour was cancelled and the family returned to Potsdam, outside Berlin. This marked the end of Hofmann's child prodigy years.
(See
and for details.) At the age of 12, young Josef Hofmann was probably the first pianist of note to record on Edison's phonograph; Hans von Bülow
recorded a Chopin Mazurka on Edison's improved phonograph the same year, i.e., 1888.
. In 1892, Rubinstein accepted Hofmann as his only private pupil, the two meeting for 42 sessions in Dresden's Hotel d'Europe. Initial lessons, a week apart, included ten Bach
Preludes and Fugues and two Beethoven
sonatas, from memory. Hofmann was never allowed to bring the same composition twice, as Rubinstein said as a teacher he would probably forget what he told the student during the previous lesson. Rubinstein never played for Hofmann, but gave ample evidence of his pianistic outlook during many recitals the boy heard. In a three-day period Hofmann heard in Berlin's new Bechstein Hall recitals by Hans von Bülow
, Johannes Brahms
and Rubinstein, and commented on their radically different playing. Rubinstein arranged Hofmann's adult debut on March 14, 1894, in Hamburg's Symphonic Assembly Hall, the piece being Rubinstein's Piano Concerto No. 4 in D minor, with the composer conducting. After the concert, Rubinstein told Hofmann there would be no more lessons, and they never saw each other again. In later years Hofmann referred to his relationship with the titanic Russian master as the "most important event in my life.".
and a young Glenn Gould
have recounted magical impressions created on them by Hofmann's concerts in mid-and-late 1930s.
After his departure from
the Curtis institute in 1938, a combination of his drinking, marital
problems and a loss of interest in performing caused a rapid deterioration in his artistic abilities.
Commenting on Hofmann's sharp decline, Sergei Rachmaninoff
said,
"Hofmann is still sky high ... the greatest pianist alive if he is sober and in form. Otherwise, it is impossible to recognize the Hofmann of old".
Oscar Levant
wrote, "one of the terrible tragedies of music was the disintegration of Josef Hofmann
as an artist. In his latter days, he became an alcoholic. …[H]is last public concert … was an
ordeal for all of us".
Hofmann's views on technique and musicianship are explained in his book Piano Playing with Questions Answered.
He had small but exceptionally strong hands. Steinway
eventually built for him a custom keyboards with slightly narrower keys (pianist/critic Stephen Hough
has commented on how Hofmann's mechanical understanding of the Steinway piano action set him apart from all other pianists.)
His concert instruments had subtle action changes for faster repetition, two pedals rather than three (he liked the older Steinway trap work geometry), faultless regulation, and were accompanied on tours by his own recital chair, built with a short folding back and a 1½" slope from rear to front. After playing Hofmann's special concert instrument in the Steinway New York basement, Gunnar Johannsen reported that the piano had the biggest sonority of any he had ever tried.
Unlike Rubinstein, Hofmann sat quietly at the piano, striking the keys in a kneading manner. His finger staccato was at the time unequaled, as was his orchestral sonority. According to his student Nadia Reisenberg, he continuously used a combination of finger pedalling and foot pedalling. New York Times critic Harold C. Schonberg
said Hofmann had all of Leopold Godowsky
's technique, a claim approved by Godowsky himself.
By his own admission, Sergei Rachmaninoff
, in his 40s, prepared for a career as a concert pianist by practicing over 15 hours a day with the goal of attaining the level of Hofmann's technique. When pianist Ralph Berkowitz was asked if Vladimir Horowitz
had the greatest technique of all the pianists he had heard, Berkowitz replied that Horowitz indeed was the supreme master of the technical parts of performance, but one older era pianist was his equal - Hofmann.
Hofmann's approach and style can be summarized by his motto "an aristocrat never hurries".
He often stated that Rubinstein and Moriz Rosenthal
were the only pianists that influenced his art, and admired singers Mattia Battistini
and Marcella Sembrich
(see and
). He adopted a more demonstrative style in live performances but a subtle and restrained style for his studio recordings; in both cases, he mostly adhered to the printed score, occasionally doubling left-hand octaves, and shunned sentimentality.
He put spontaneity rather than structure foremost and admitted to Rachmaninoff that "I do not know how to build a composition ... occasionally, it happens to sound well". Schonberg wrote that
among Hofmann's contemporaries, only Godowsky had the finish and refinement of Hofmann but lacked Hofmann's color, fire, and "red blood", while only Ferruccio Busoni
and Rachmaninoff were ever mentioned by contemporaries as Hofmann's equals.
After hearing a performance of Chopin's B minor Sonata by Hofmann, Rachmaninoff cut that piece from his own repertoire saying "not since Anton Rubinstein have I heard such titanic playing".
Suggested examples illustrating Hofmann's style:
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
and
(dedicated to him by Sigismond Stojowski).
Much like Rubinstein's seven historic recitals of 1885, he gave 21 consecutive concerts in St. Petersburg without repeating a single piece, playing 255 different works from memory during that marathon cycle in 1912–1913. In the diary his wife kept during his 1909 Russian tour, she mentions his raising his eyebrows when he saw Brahms
' Handel Variations
on a program—a piece he had not played or even looked at for two and a half years. He played the work at the concert without hesitation.
Although a poor sight reader, he was said to possess the ability of Liszt
and Saint-Saëns
to hear a composition once and play it back correctly without seeing the printed notes. Rosina Lhévinne
recalled that Hofmann heard her husband Josef Lhévinne
play Liszt's Lorelei, a piece Hofmann had never heard but went on to play it "just like my Josef (Lhevinne)" for an encore at his concert later that day.
Maurice Aronson, who served as Leopold Godowsky
's assistant, recalled Hofmann learning Godowsky's Fledermaus transcription. Godowsky and Hofmann met in Berlin in 1900, becoming friends until Godowsky's death in 1938. Hofmann would visit Godowsky's studio and listen while Godowsky was composing Fledermaus. A week later Hofmann visited Godowsky again and played the entire transcription, and he had never seen the music. Godowsky, in fact, had not yet written it down. Schonberg has added that Godowsky's Fledermaus is one of the most resourceful and complicated stunts ever written for the piano.
In the 1940s he recorded for the Bell Telephone
Hour radio programs which include Hofmann's only filmed appearance, playing Rachmaninoff's Prelude Op. 3 No. 2. Gregor Benko
has remarked that Hofmann should not have appeared on many of the Bell Telephone Hour broadcasts since, by this time,
his pianistic control had deteriorated considerably
though the tonal palette was still immense and the phrasing provocative
(see
and ).
Hofmann's student Jeanne Behrend, after first hearing the recordings from 1940 to 1946, stated "well, it's his playing, but nothing like what we heard in the 1920's."
Cylinders recorded c. 1890 for Thomas Edison
were some of the earliest recordings of classical music and were lost during World War I. Four cylinders made in Russia in 1895–1896, with music by Mendelssohn, Louis Brassin and Rubinstein, have been recently discovered and issued on CD. He made two series of reproducing piano rolls, including in 1913 23 pieces for Welte-Mignon
but did not trust rolls as an accurate representation of his playing. Hofmann recorded acoustic discs from 1912 to 1923 for Columbia and Brunswick, but felt the representation of his chaste and prismatic tonal palette was not captured. He did experiment with short studio test recordings in 1935, and in retirement in California experimented with piano string electrical pickups and designing an additional spruce soundboard under the piano lid. At least three of his concerts in 1930's were recorded live. These concert recordings exhibit an older Hofmann (age 60-62) in public just prior to the sharp decline in his pianistic command, and include sensational readings of Chopin's G-Minor Ballade, Andante Spianato and Grand Polonaise, A-Flat Waltz (Op. 42) and F-Minor Ballade. All of these recordings have recently been published on compact discs under the auspices of Gregor Benko
and audio restorer Ward Marston
(see ).
has argued that Hofmann was the most flawless and possibly the greatest pianist of the 20th century. HMV and RCA unsuccessfully pursued recording projects with Hofmann in the 1930s. Rachmaninoff dedicated his Piano Concerto No. 3 (1909) to Hofmann although Hofmann disliked it and never played it. Older generation critics such as James Huneker
labeled Hofmann the "king of pianists", and Samuel Chotzinoff called him the "greatest pianist of our time."
Contemporaries such as Rachmaninoff, Ignaz Friedman
, Josef Lhévinne
,
and Godowsky considered Hofmann to be, overall, the greatest pianist of their generation, but the acclaim was not so universal from the next generation of pianists.
In his autobiography Arthur Rubinstein
criticized Hofmann as someone who took interest in only the mechanics of music and not in its heart or spirituality, and commented that at the end of Hofmann's career "he was left with nothing after his technique left him". Claudio Arrau
dismissed Hofmann (along with Paderewski
) as someone who only happened to be very famous and said "I didn't know what to do with him". Sviatoslav Richter
, after listening to a Hofmann RCA test pressing of the Scherzo from Beethoven's Sonata in E-flat, Op. 31, No. 3, considered the older pianist to be technically "stunning", while György Sándor
has called him the greatest of all 20th century pianists in terms of music, interpretation, and technique. Vladimir Horowitz
called Hofmann a very good pianist but a second rate musician. Hofmann's own student Shura Cherkassky
compared Horowitz favorably with Hofmann as follows: "Hofmann was possibly the greater musical mind. But, I think, Horowitz was the greater pianist, the greater virtuoso—he somehow appealed to the whole world. Hofmann could not communicate on that level".
Virtuoso
A virtuoso is an individual who possesses outstanding technical ability in the fine arts, at singing or playing a musical instrument. The plural form is either virtuosi or the Anglicisation, virtuosos, and the feminine form sometimes used is virtuosa...
pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
, composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
, music teacher, and inventor.
Biography
Josef Hofmann was born in PodgórzePodgórze
Podgórze is a district of Kraków, Poland, situated on the right bank of the Vistula River. Initially a village at the foot of Lasota Hill was granted city status by the Austrian Emperor Joseph II in 1784 and has become Royal Free City of Podgorze...
, near Cracow
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
(Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
), Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
, (now Poland) in 1876. His father was the composer, conductor and pianist Kazimierz Hofmann, and his mother the singer Matylda Pindelska. A child prodigy, he gave a debut recital in Warsaw at the age of 5, and a long series of concerts throughout Europe and Scandinavia, culminating in a series of concerts in America in 1887-88 that elicited comparisons with young Mozart and young Mendelssohn
Mendelssohn
Mendelson is a Polish/German Jewish family name, meaning "son of Mendel", Mendel being a Yiddish diminutive of the Hebrew given name Menahem, meaning "consoling" or "one who consoles".Mendelssohn is the surname of a number of people:...
.
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
took Hofmann as his only private student in 1892 and arranged the debut of his pupil in Hamburg, Germany in 1894. Hofmann toured and performed extensively over the next 50 years as one of the most celebrated pianists of the era.
In 1913, he was presented with a set of keys to the city of St. Petersburg, Russia.
As a composer, Hofmann published over one hundred works, many of those under the pseudonym Michel Dvorsky, including two piano concertos and ballet music. He made the United States his base during World War I and became a US citizen in 1926. In 1924, he became the first head of the piano department at the inception of the Curtis Institute of Music
Curtis Institute of Music
The Curtis Institute of Music is a conservatory in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that offers courses of study leading to a performance Diploma, Bachelor of Music, Master of Music in Opera, and Professional Studies Certificate in Opera. According to statistics compiled by U.S...
, Philadelphia, and became the Institute's director in 1927 and remained so until 1938.
He was instrumental in recruiting illustrious musicians such as Efrem Zimbalist
Efrem Zimbalist
Efrem Zimbalist, Sr. was one of the world's most prominent concert violinists, as well as a composer, teacher, conductor and a long-time director of the Curtis Institute of Music.-Early life:...
, Fritz Reiner
Fritz Reiner
Frederick Martin “Fritz” Reiner was a prominent conductor of opera and symphonic music in the twentieth century.-Biography:...
, Marcella Sembrich
Marcella Sembrich
Marcella Sembrich was the stage name of the Polish coloratura soprano, Prakseda Marcelina Kochańska...
, and Leopold Auer
Leopold Auer
Leopold Auer was a Hungarian violinist, teacher, conductor and composer.-Early life and career:...
as Curtis faculty. Hofmann's pupils included Jean Behrend, Abram Chasins
Abram Chasins
Abram Chasins was an American composer, pianist, piano teacher, lecturer, musicologist, music broadcaster, radio executive and author....
, Abbey Simon
Abbey Simon
-Education:Simon began lessons with David Saperton at the age of five. At the age of eight, Simon was accepted by Józef Hofmann as a scholarship student at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia where he trained with fellow classmates Jorge Bolet and Sidney Foster. Simon also took lessons...
, Shura Cherkassky
Shura Cherkassky
Shura Cherkassky was an American classical pianist known for his performances of the romantic repertoire. His playing was characterized by a virtuoso technique and singing piano tone...
, Ezra Rachlin, Nadia Reisenberg
(see ),
and Harry Kaufman. While not a pupil, Jorge Bolet
Jorge Bolet
Jorge Bolet was a Cuban-born but mostly American-resident pianist and teacher.-Life:Bolet was born in Havana, and studied at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he himself taught from 1939 to 1942...
benefited from Hofmann's interest. In 1937, the 50th anniversary of his New York debut performance was celebrated with gala performances including a "Golden Jubilee" recital at the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. In 1938 he was forced to leave the Curtis Institute of Music over financial and administrative disputes. In the years from 1939 to 1946, his artistic eminence deteriorated, in part due to family difficulties and alcoholism.
In 1946, he gave his last recital at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
, home to his 151 appearances, and retired to private life in 1948.
He spent his last decade in Los Angeles in relative obscurity, working on inventions and keeping a steady correspondence with associates.
As an inventor, Hofmann had over 70 patents, and his invention of pneumatic shock absorbers for cars and airplanes was commercially successful from 1905 to 1928. Other inventions included a windscreen wiper, a furnace that burned crude oil, a house that revolved with the sun, a device to record dynamics
(: U.S. patent number 1614984) in reproducing piano rolls that he perfected just as the roll companies went out of business, and piano action improvements adopted by the Steinway Company
(: U.S. patent number 2263088).
Hofmann died of pneumonia on February 16, 1957. He was survived by four children. His second wife, Betty Short, had previously been one of his pupils.
The Josef Hofmann Piano Competition, co-sponsored by the American Council for Polish Culture and the University of South Carolina Aiken was established in his honor in 1994.
Career as a child prodigy
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
heard the seven-year old Hofmann play Beethoven's C Minor Piano Concerto in Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
and declared him to be an unprecedented talent (see and
). At Rubinstein's suggestion, German impresario Hermann Wolff offered career management and to send the boy on a European tour, but Hofmann's father refused to let the boy travel until he was nine years old. At that age, Hofmann gave concerts in Germany, France, Holland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Great Britain.
In 1887, an American tour was arranged and after three months of performances that included fifty recitals, seventeen of which were at the Metropolitan Opera House
Metropolitan Opera House (39th St)
The Metropolitan Opera House was an opera house located at 1411 Broadway in New York City. Opened in 1883 and demolished in 1967, it was the first home of the Metropolitan Opera Company.-History:...
, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children stepped in, citing the boy's fragile health. However, as per the contract that had paid Hofmann $10,000, he was legally obliged to complete the tour. The contract was rendered void by Alfred Corning Clark
Alfred Corning Clark
-Biography:He was born on November 14, 1844 to Edward Clark, a founder of the Singer Sewing Machine Company. He married and had as his children: Edward Severin Clark, Robert Sterling Clark, Frederick Ambrose Clark and Stephen Carlton Clark, Sr....
who donated $50,000 and, in turn, legally forbade Hofmann to perform in public until he turned 18 years old. The final segment of the tour was cancelled and the family returned to Potsdam, outside Berlin. This marked the end of Hofmann's child prodigy years.
(See
and for details.) At the age of 12, young Josef Hofmann was probably the first pianist of note to record on Edison's phonograph; Hans von Bülow
Hans von Bülow
Hans Guido Freiherr von Bülow was a German conductor, virtuoso pianist, and composer of the Romantic era. He was one of the most famous conductors of the 19th century, and his activity was critical for establishing the successes of several major composers of the time, including Richard...
recorded a Chopin Mazurka on Edison's improved phonograph the same year, i.e., 1888.
Education in music
Clark's donation enabled Hofmann to continue individual study in science and mathematics, and he continued to take music lessons from Heinrich Urban (composition)and with the pianist and composer Moritz MoszkowskiMoritz Moszkowski
Moritz Moszkowski was a German Jewish composer, pianist, and teacher of Polish descent. Ignacy Paderewski said, "After Chopin, Moszkowski best understands how to write for the piano"...
. In 1892, Rubinstein accepted Hofmann as his only private pupil, the two meeting for 42 sessions in Dresden's Hotel d'Europe. Initial lessons, a week apart, included ten Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
Preludes and Fugues and two Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
sonatas, from memory. Hofmann was never allowed to bring the same composition twice, as Rubinstein said as a teacher he would probably forget what he told the student during the previous lesson. Rubinstein never played for Hofmann, but gave ample evidence of his pianistic outlook during many recitals the boy heard. In a three-day period Hofmann heard in Berlin's new Bechstein Hall recitals by Hans von Bülow
Hans von Bülow
Hans Guido Freiherr von Bülow was a German conductor, virtuoso pianist, and composer of the Romantic era. He was one of the most famous conductors of the 19th century, and his activity was critical for establishing the successes of several major composers of the time, including Richard...
, Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
and Rubinstein, and commented on their radically different playing. Rubinstein arranged Hofmann's adult debut on March 14, 1894, in Hamburg's Symphonic Assembly Hall, the piece being Rubinstein's Piano Concerto No. 4 in D minor, with the composer conducting. After the concert, Rubinstein told Hofmann there would be no more lessons, and they never saw each other again. In later years Hofmann referred to his relationship with the titanic Russian master as the "most important event in my life.".
Hofmann at the end of his career
By the early 1930s, Hofmann had become an alcoholic but he retained exceptional pianistic command throughout this decade; Rudolf SerkinRudolf Serkin
Rudolf Serkin , was a Bohemian-born pianist.-Life and early career:Serkin was born in Eger, Bohemia, Austro-Hungarian Empire to a Russian-Jewish family....
and a young Glenn Gould
Glenn Gould
Glenn Herbert Gould was a Canadian pianist who became one of the best-known and most celebrated classical pianists of the 20th century. He was particularly renowned as an interpreter of the keyboard music of Johann Sebastian Bach...
have recounted magical impressions created on them by Hofmann's concerts in mid-and-late 1930s.
After his departure from
the Curtis institute in 1938, a combination of his drinking, marital
problems and a loss of interest in performing caused a rapid deterioration in his artistic abilities.
Commenting on Hofmann's sharp decline, Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
said,
"Hofmann is still sky high ... the greatest pianist alive if he is sober and in form. Otherwise, it is impossible to recognize the Hofmann of old".
Oscar Levant
Oscar Levant
Oscar Levant was an American pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor. He was more famous for his mordant character and witticisms, on the radio and in movies and television, than for his music.-Life and career:...
wrote, "one of the terrible tragedies of music was the disintegration of Josef Hofmann
as an artist. In his latter days, he became an alcoholic. …[H]is last public concert … was an
ordeal for all of us".
Technique and style
He had small but exceptionally strong hands. Steinway
Steinway & Sons
Steinway & Sons, also known as Steinway , is an American and German manufacturer of handmade pianos, founded 1853 in Manhattan in New York City by German immigrant Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg...
eventually built for him a custom keyboards with slightly narrower keys (pianist/critic Stephen Hough
Stephen Hough
Stephen Andrew Gill Hough is a British-born classical pianist, composer and writer. He became an Australian citizen in 2005 and thus has dual nationality .-Biography:...
has commented on how Hofmann's mechanical understanding of the Steinway piano action set him apart from all other pianists.)
His concert instruments had subtle action changes for faster repetition, two pedals rather than three (he liked the older Steinway trap work geometry), faultless regulation, and were accompanied on tours by his own recital chair, built with a short folding back and a 1½" slope from rear to front. After playing Hofmann's special concert instrument in the Steinway New York basement, Gunnar Johannsen reported that the piano had the biggest sonority of any he had ever tried.
Unlike Rubinstein, Hofmann sat quietly at the piano, striking the keys in a kneading manner. His finger staccato was at the time unequaled, as was his orchestral sonority. According to his student Nadia Reisenberg, he continuously used a combination of finger pedalling and foot pedalling. New York Times critic Harold C. Schonberg
Harold C. Schonberg
Harold Charles Schonberg was an American music critic and journalist, most notably for The New York Times. He was the first music critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism...
said Hofmann had all of Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American pianist, composer, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's...
's technique, a claim approved by Godowsky himself.
By his own admission, Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
, in his 40s, prepared for a career as a concert pianist by practicing over 15 hours a day with the goal of attaining the level of Hofmann's technique. When pianist Ralph Berkowitz was asked if Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Samoylovich Horowitz was a Russian-American classical virtuoso pianist and minor composer. His technique and use of tone color and the excitement of his playing were legendary. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Life and early...
had the greatest technique of all the pianists he had heard, Berkowitz replied that Horowitz indeed was the supreme master of the technical parts of performance, but one older era pianist was his equal - Hofmann.
Hofmann's approach and style can be summarized by his motto "an aristocrat never hurries".
He often stated that Rubinstein and Moriz Rosenthal
Moriz Rosenthal
Moriz Rosenthal was a great Polish pianist. He was an outstanding pupil of Franz Liszt and a friend and colleague of some of the greatest musicians of his age, including Johannes Brahms, Johann Strauss, Anton Rubinstein, Hans von Bülow, Camille Saint-Saëns, Jules Massenet and Isaac...
were the only pianists that influenced his art, and admired singers Mattia Battistini
Mattia Battistini
Mattia Battistini was an Italian operatic baritone. He became internationally famous due to the beauty of his voice and the virtuosity of his singing technique, and he earned the sobriquet "King of Baritones".-Early life:...
and Marcella Sembrich
Marcella Sembrich
Marcella Sembrich was the stage name of the Polish coloratura soprano, Prakseda Marcelina Kochańska...
(see and
). He adopted a more demonstrative style in live performances but a subtle and restrained style for his studio recordings; in both cases, he mostly adhered to the printed score, occasionally doubling left-hand octaves, and shunned sentimentality.
He put spontaneity rather than structure foremost and admitted to Rachmaninoff that "I do not know how to build a composition ... occasionally, it happens to sound well". Schonberg wrote that
among Hofmann's contemporaries, only Godowsky had the finish and refinement of Hofmann but lacked Hofmann's color, fire, and "red blood", while only Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor.-Biography:...
and Rachmaninoff were ever mentioned by contemporaries as Hofmann's equals.
After hearing a performance of Chopin's B minor Sonata by Hofmann, Rachmaninoff cut that piece from his own repertoire saying "not since Anton Rubinstein have I heard such titanic playing".
Suggested examples illustrating Hofmann's style:
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and
(dedicated to him by Sigismond Stojowski).
Repertoire, Musical Ear, and Memory
Hofmann's repertoire was mostly confined to music written before the start of the 20th century.Much like Rubinstein's seven historic recitals of 1885, he gave 21 consecutive concerts in St. Petersburg without repeating a single piece, playing 255 different works from memory during that marathon cycle in 1912–1913. In the diary his wife kept during his 1909 Russian tour, she mentions his raising his eyebrows when he saw Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
' Handel Variations
Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel
The Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24, is a work for solo piano written by Johannes Brahms in 1861. It consists of a set of twenty-five variations and a concluding fugue, all based on a theme from George Frideric Handel's Harpsichord Suite No...
on a program—a piece he had not played or even looked at for two and a half years. He played the work at the concert without hesitation.
Although a poor sight reader, he was said to possess the ability of Liszt
Liszt
Liszt is a Hungarian surname. Notable persons with that surname include:* Franz Liszt , Hungarian composer and pianist* Adam Liszt , father of Franz Liszt* Anna Liszt , mother of Franz Liszt...
and Saint-Saëns
to hear a composition once and play it back correctly without seeing the printed notes. Rosina Lhévinne
Rosina Lhévinne
Rosina Bessie Lhévinne was a Russian American pianist and famed pedagogue....
recalled that Hofmann heard her husband Josef Lhévinne
Josef Lhévinne
Josef Lhévinne was a Russian pianist and piano teacher.Joseph Arkadievich Levin was born into a family of musicians in Oryol and studied at the Imperial Conservatory in Moscow under Vasily Safonov...
play Liszt's Lorelei, a piece Hofmann had never heard but went on to play it "just like my Josef (Lhevinne)" for an encore at his concert later that day.
Maurice Aronson, who served as Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American pianist, composer, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's...
's assistant, recalled Hofmann learning Godowsky's Fledermaus transcription. Godowsky and Hofmann met in Berlin in 1900, becoming friends until Godowsky's death in 1938. Hofmann would visit Godowsky's studio and listen while Godowsky was composing Fledermaus. A week later Hofmann visited Godowsky again and played the entire transcription, and he had never seen the music. Godowsky, in fact, had not yet written it down. Schonberg has added that Godowsky's Fledermaus is one of the most resourceful and complicated stunts ever written for the piano.
Recordings
Hofmann started recording in studio in 1880's but was never satisfied with the available technology and made only test pressings after 1923; he considered the test pressings made for HMV in November 1935 to be a worthwhile representation of his art.In the 1940s he recorded for the Bell Telephone
The Bell Telephone Hour
The Bell Telephone Hour is a long-run concert series which began April 29, 1940 on NBC Radio and was heard on NBC until June 30, 1958. Sponsored by Bell Telephone, it showcased the best in classical and Broadway music, reaching eight to nine million listeners each week. It continued on television...
Hour radio programs which include Hofmann's only filmed appearance, playing Rachmaninoff's Prelude Op. 3 No. 2. Gregor Benko
Gregor Benko
Gregor Benko is an American writer, lecturer, record producer, and collector-historian whose primary focus is classical piano performance documented on recordings from the Romantic Era...
has remarked that Hofmann should not have appeared on many of the Bell Telephone Hour broadcasts since, by this time,
his pianistic control had deteriorated considerably
though the tonal palette was still immense and the phrasing provocative
(see
and ).
Hofmann's student Jeanne Behrend, after first hearing the recordings from 1940 to 1946, stated "well, it's his playing, but nothing like what we heard in the 1920's."
Cylinders recorded c. 1890 for Thomas Edison
Thomas Edison
Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...
were some of the earliest recordings of classical music and were lost during World War I. Four cylinders made in Russia in 1895–1896, with music by Mendelssohn, Louis Brassin and Rubinstein, have been recently discovered and issued on CD. He made two series of reproducing piano rolls, including in 1913 23 pieces for Welte-Mignon
Welte-Mignon
M. Welte & Sons, Freiburg and New York was a manufacturer of orchestrions, organs and reproducing pianos, established in Vöhrenbach by Michael Welte in 1832.-Overview:...
but did not trust rolls as an accurate representation of his playing. Hofmann recorded acoustic discs from 1912 to 1923 for Columbia and Brunswick, but felt the representation of his chaste and prismatic tonal palette was not captured. He did experiment with short studio test recordings in 1935, and in retirement in California experimented with piano string electrical pickups and designing an additional spruce soundboard under the piano lid. At least three of his concerts in 1930's were recorded live. These concert recordings exhibit an older Hofmann (age 60-62) in public just prior to the sharp decline in his pianistic command, and include sensational readings of Chopin's G-Minor Ballade, Andante Spianato and Grand Polonaise, A-Flat Waltz (Op. 42) and F-Minor Ballade. All of these recordings have recently been published on compact discs under the auspices of Gregor Benko
Gregor Benko
Gregor Benko is an American writer, lecturer, record producer, and collector-historian whose primary focus is classical piano performance documented on recordings from the Romantic Era...
and audio restorer Ward Marston
(see ).
Controversial stature
Harold C. SchonbergHarold C. Schonberg
Harold Charles Schonberg was an American music critic and journalist, most notably for The New York Times. He was the first music critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism...
has argued that Hofmann was the most flawless and possibly the greatest pianist of the 20th century. HMV and RCA unsuccessfully pursued recording projects with Hofmann in the 1930s. Rachmaninoff dedicated his Piano Concerto No. 3 (1909) to Hofmann although Hofmann disliked it and never played it. Older generation critics such as James Huneker
James Huneker
James Gibbons Huneker was an American music writer and critic.Huneker was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano in Europe under Leopold Doutreleau and audited the Paris piano class of Frédéric Chopin's pupil Georges Mathias. He came to New York City in 1885 and remained there...
labeled Hofmann the "king of pianists", and Samuel Chotzinoff called him the "greatest pianist of our time."
Contemporaries such as Rachmaninoff, Ignaz Friedman
Ignaz Friedman
Ignaz Friedman Ignaz Friedman Ignaz Friedman (also spelled by languages Ignace or Ignacy; exactly Solomon (Salomon) Isaac Freudman(n), (February 13, 1882January 26, 1948) was a Polish pianist and composer. Critics (e.g. Harold C. Schonberg) and colleagues (e.g...
, Josef Lhévinne
Josef Lhévinne
Josef Lhévinne was a Russian pianist and piano teacher.Joseph Arkadievich Levin was born into a family of musicians in Oryol and studied at the Imperial Conservatory in Moscow under Vasily Safonov...
,
and Godowsky considered Hofmann to be, overall, the greatest pianist of their generation, but the acclaim was not so universal from the next generation of pianists.
In his autobiography Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein KBE was a Polish-American pianist. He received international acclaim for his performances of the music of a variety of composers...
criticized Hofmann as someone who took interest in only the mechanics of music and not in its heart or spirituality, and commented that at the end of Hofmann's career "he was left with nothing after his technique left him". Claudio Arrau
Claudio Arrau
Claudio Arrau León was a Chilean pianist known for his interpretations of a vast repertoire spanning from the baroque to 20th-century composers, especially Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Brahms and Debussy...
dismissed Hofmann (along with Paderewski
Ignacy Jan Paderewski
Ignacy Jan Paderewski GBE was a Polish pianist, composer, diplomat, politician, and the second Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland.-Biography:...
) as someone who only happened to be very famous and said "I didn't know what to do with him". Sviatoslav Richter
Sviatoslav Richter
Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter was a Soviet pianist well known for the depth of his interpretations, virtuoso technique, and vast repertoire. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Childhood:...
, after listening to a Hofmann RCA test pressing of the Scherzo from Beethoven's Sonata in E-flat, Op. 31, No. 3, considered the older pianist to be technically "stunning", while György Sándor
György Sándor
György Sándor was a Hungarian pianist, writer, student and friend of Béla Bartók, and champion of his music.- Early years :...
has called him the greatest of all 20th century pianists in terms of music, interpretation, and technique. Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Samoylovich Horowitz was a Russian-American classical virtuoso pianist and minor composer. His technique and use of tone color and the excitement of his playing were legendary. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Life and early...
called Hofmann a very good pianist but a second rate musician. Hofmann's own student Shura Cherkassky
Shura Cherkassky
Shura Cherkassky was an American classical pianist known for his performances of the romantic repertoire. His playing was characterized by a virtuoso technique and singing piano tone...
compared Horowitz favorably with Hofmann as follows: "Hofmann was possibly the greater musical mind. But, I think, Horowitz was the greater pianist, the greater virtuoso—he somehow appealed to the whole world. Hofmann could not communicate on that level".
External links
- Josef Hofmann Collection, International Piano Archives, University of Maryland
- Piano Rolls (The Reproducing Piano Roll Foundation)
- Jan Żdżarski: Józef Hofmann Geniusz zapomniany, Wydawnictwo STO, www.sto.com.pl
- Historical Marker Database Josef Hofmann Historical Marker, Aiken, SC