Leonard Hokanson was an American pianist who achieved prominence in Europe as a soloist and chamber musician. Born in Vinalhaven, Maine

Vinalhaven, Maine

Vinalhaven is a town located in the Fox Islands in Knox County, Maine, United States. The population was 1,235 at the 2000 census. It is home to a thriving lobster fishery and hosts a summer colony...

, he attended Clark University

Clark University

Clark University is a private research university and liberal arts college in Worcester, Massachusetts.Founded in 1887, it is the oldest educational institution founded as an all-graduate university. Clark now also educates undergraduates...

 in Worcester, Massachusetts and Bennington College in Vermont, where he received a master of arts degree with a major in music. He made his concert debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra

Philadelphia Orchestra

The Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900...

 at the age of eighteen. Drafted into the U.S. Army after graduate school, he was posted to Augsburg, Germany. He achieved early recognition as a performer in Europe, serving as a soloist with such orchestras as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, and the Vienna Symphony. He was awarded the Steinway Prize of Boston and was a prizewinner at the Busoni International Piano Competition

Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition

The Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition is a music competition for young pianists that takes place in Bolzano, Italy.-History: The first Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition was organized by Cesare Nordio in 1949 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the death of pianist and...

 in Bolzano, Italy. His numerous international music festival appearances included Aldeburgh, Berlin, Echternach

Echternach Music Festival

The Echternach Music Festival is an international event which has been held in May and June every year since 1975 at Echternach in the east of Luxembourg. In addition to classical music, modern compositions are performed in the 18th century basilica of St Willibrord and in the church of St Peter...

, Lucerne, Prague, Ravinia, Salzburg

Salzburg Festival

The Salzburg Festival is a prominent festival of music and drama established in 1920. It is held each summer within the Austrian town of Salzburg, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart...

, Schleswig-Holstein, Tanglewood

Tanglewood Music Festival

The Tanglewood Music Festival is a music festival held every summer on the Tanglewood estate in Lenox, Massachusetts in the Berkshire Hills in western Massachusetts....

, and Vienna.

One of the last pupils of Artur Schnabel

Artur Schnabel

Artur Schnabel was an Austrian classical pianist, who also composed and taught. Schnabel was known for his intellectual seriousness as a musician, avoiding pure technical bravura...

, Hokanson also studied with Karl-Ulrich Schnabel, Claude Frank, and Julian DeGray. He was professor of piano at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts

Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts

The Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts is a state Hochschule for Music, Theater and Dance in Frankfurt and is the only one of its kind in the Federal State of Hesse. It was founded in 1938....

 for ten years before taking a position as professor of piano at the Indiana University

Indiana University

Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...

 Jacobs School of Music

Jacobs School of Music

The Jacobs School of Music of Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, is a music conservatory established in 1921. Until 2005, it was known as the Indiana University School of Music...

 in Bloomington

Bloomington, Indiana

Bloomington is a city in and the county seat of Monroe County in the southern region of the U.S. state of Indiana. The population was 80,405 at the 2010 census....

 in 1986. He was also a permanent guest professor at the Tokyo College of Music

Tokyo College of Music

was founded as in Kanda, Tokyo in 1907. It is the oldest private music school in Japan.- History :The founder , Yonejirō Suzuki, introduced European classical music into the Empire of Japan....

.

He was a founding member of the Odeon Trio and as a chamber musician performed with such ensembles as the Vermeer Quartet

Vermeer Quartet

The Vermeer Quartet was a string quartet founded in 1969 at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont and active until 2007.With performances in practically every major city in North and South America, Europe, the Far East, and Australia, the Vermeer Quartet achieved an international stature as one of...

, the St. Lawrence Quartet

St. Lawrence Quartet

The St. Lawrence Quartet is a Canadian string quartet, and one of Canada's premiere chamber ensembles. It was founded in 1989 and has served residencies at the Juilliard School, Yale University, the University of Toronto, the Hartt School, and Stanford University...

, the Ensemble Villa Musica, and the Wind Soloists of the Berlin Philharmonic and frequently performed duo recitals with the violinist Miriam Fried, the clarinetist James Campbell

James Campbell (clarinetist)

James Campbell is a Canadian/American clarinetist. James Campbell has followed his muse to five television specials, more than 40 recordings, over 30 works commissioned, a Juno Award , a Roy Thomson Hall Award, Canada's Artist of the Year and the Order of Canada...

, and the horn player Hermann Baumann. As a pianist for song recitals, he played with numerous singers, including Martina Arroyo

Martina Arroyo

Martina Arroyo is an operatic soprano of Puerto Rican and African-American descent who had a major international opera career during the 1960s through the 1980s...

, Grace Bumbry

Grace Bumbry

Grace Bumbry , an American opera singer, is considered one of the leading mezzo-sopranos of her generation, as well as a major soprano for many years...

, Melanie Diener, Edith Mathis

Edith Mathis

Edith Mathis is a renowned Swiss soprano and a leading exponent of the works of Mozart. She studied in Lucerne and debuted there in 1956 in The Magic Flute...

, Edda Moser

Edda Moser

Edda Moser is a German soprano. She was particularly well-known for her interpretations of music by Mozart. Her 1973 recital LP "Virtuoso Arias by W. A...

, and Hermann Prey

Hermann Prey

Hermann Prey was a German lyric baritone. He is most famous for lieder and for light comic baritone roles in opera.-Biography:...

. His collaboration with Prey extended over 25 years. He was also resident pianist with Bay Chamber Concerts

Bay Chamber Concerts

Bay Chamber Concerts is a non-profit organization located in downtown Rockport, Maine. Bay Chamber Concerts plays a principal role in bringing music, particularly classical music, to the Mid Coast area...

 in Rockport, Maine. .

Hokanson's many recordings include the complete piano works of Walter Piston

Walter Piston

Walter Hamor Piston Jr., , was an American composer of classical music, music theorist and professor of music at Harvard University whose students included Leroy Anderson, Leonard Bernstein, and Elliott Carter....

, Haydn sonatas, Mozart concertos, and Brahms intermezzi, as well as Schubert's complete works for violin and piano with Edith Peinemann, Brahms’ sonatas for clarinet and piano with James Campbell, Beethoven's complete songs with Hermann Prey and Pamela Coburn, the complete piano trios of Brahms, Dvořák

Antonín Dvorák

Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...

, and Schubert (Odeon Trio), previously unrecorded early piano works of Schubert, and Norbert Burgmüller

Norbert Burgmüller

Norbert Burgmüller was a German composer.-Life:Burgmüller was born in Düsseldorf, the youngest son in a musical family. His father, August Burgmüller, was the director of a theatre. His mother, Therese von Zandt, was a singer and piano teacher. He had two brothers, Franz and Friedrich, who was...

's Concerto for Piano and Orchestra.

In 2001 Hokanson became professor emeritus at Indiana University but continued teaching solo piano, chamber music, and a German art song class at the school until his death from pancreatic cancer on March 21, 2003.

Discography

Harpsichord:

Bach

• Brandenburg Concerto Nr. 5 (Philips)
• Musical Offering (Erato, Musical Heritage)
• Orchestra Suites (Classette)
• Concertos for Oboe/Oboe and Violin (Erato)

Telemann

• Fantasies for Harpsichord (Philips)
• St. Mark Passion (Philips)
• St. Matthew Passion (Philips)

Baroque Airs and Adagios (Philips)

Il Canone di Pachelbel, Telemann, Vivaldi, etc. (Erato)

Solo Piano:

Beethoven/Liszt

• Symphony Nr. 8 (transcribed for piano) (Deutsche Grammophon Archiv)

Brahms

• Intermezzi Op. 117, 118, 119; Scherzo Op. 4 (Bayer)

Burgmüller

• Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (MDG)

Haydn

• Piano Sonatas (Bayer)

Mozart

• Piano Concerto in E-flat, K.271 (Bayer)
• Piano Concertos in E-flat, K.271 and G, K.453 (Capriccio, Pilz)

Piston

• Complete Works for Piano (Northeastern)

Schubert

• Sonata in A, Op.Posth. (RCA)
• "Grazer" Fantasy (Bärenreiter)
• The Young Schubert (Northeastern)

Chamber Music:

Bach

• Sonatas for Cello and Piano (Angelica May) (Musicaphon)

David Baker

• Sonata for Clarinet and Piano (James Campbell) (Cala)

Beethoven

• Sonata for Piano and Cello, Op.102/1; Variations for Piano and Cello (Angelica May) (Musicaphon)
• Works for Flute and Piano (Kurt Redel) (Pierre Verany)
• Piano Trios Op.70/1 and 2 (Odeon Trio) (Musicaphon)
• Piano Trios (Salzburg Mozart Trio/Fortepiano) (Harmonia Mundi, Musical Heritage)

Beethoven, Czerny, Kruft, Strauss

• Works for Horn and Piano (Hermann Baumann) (Philips)

Brahms

• Complete Sonatas for Violin and Piano (Jenny Abel) (Harmonia Mundi)
• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio and Rainer Moog) (RCA, Quintessence, Musical Heritage, Capriccio)

Brahms, Franck

• Sonatas for Cello and Piano (Angelica May) (Musicaphon)

Brahms, Genzmer

• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (Impression)

Brahms, Jenner

• Sonatas for Clarinet and Piano (James Campbell) (Marquis Classics)

Brahms, Shostakovich

• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (Impression)

Chopin, Martinu

• Sonatas for Cello and Piano (Angelica May) (Musicaphon)

Dvořák

• Piano Trios and Quartets (Odeon Trio and Rainer Moog) (RCA, Pro Arte)

Bernhard Heiden

• Sonata for Piano, Four Hands (Cordula Hacke) (Cadenza)

Mozart

• 6 Piano Trios (Salzburg Mozart Trio/Fortepiano) (Harmonia Mundi, Musical Heritage)
• Early Piano Trios, K.10-15 (Salzburg Mozart Trio/Fortepiano) (Musical Heritage)
• Piano Quartets (Salzburg Mozart Trio and Jürgen Geise/Fortepiano) (Musicaphon, Musical Heritage)

Pflüger

• Impeto (Hermann Baumann) (Bayer)

Piston

• Piano Quintet (Portland String Quartet) (Northeastern)

Saint-Saëns

• Chamber Music for Winds (Ensemble Villa Musica) (MDG)

Schubert

• Chamber Music for Violin (Edith Peinemann) (Bayer)
• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (RCA, Pro Arte, Capriccio)
• Trout Quintet; Nottorno (Ensemble Villa Musica) (Naxos)
• Schubertiade 1977-Vienna (Odeon Trio, Hermann Prey) (ATW)

Schumann

• Sonatas, Op. 105 and 121; Romances No. 1-3, Op. 94 (Charles Neidich) (Sony)

Spohr, Volkmann

• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (Impression)

Strauss

• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (Capriccio)

Tanejev, Tcherepnin

• Piano Trios (Odeon Trio) (RCA, Pro Arte)

Weber

• Grand Duo Concertant, Op. 48, 7 Variations op. 33 (James Campbell) (Marquis Classics)

Music in the Salzburg Mozart House
(Eberhard Finke, Rudolf Klepač/Fortepiano) (Amadeo)

Lieder:

Beethoven

• Complete Songs (Hermann Prey, Pamela Coburn) (Capriccio)

Cornelius

• Christmas Songs, Vaterunser (Hermann Prey) (Deutsche Grammophon)

Mendelssohn, Liszt, Franz, Wagner

• Romantic Songs (Hermann Prey) (Philips)

Schubert

• Die Schöne Müllerin (Hermann Prey) (Philips)
• Schwanengesang (Hermann Prey) (Deutsche Grammophon)
• Schubertiade Hohenems 1977 (Vocal Ensembles) (Deutsche Grammophon)
• Songs (Edda Moser) (EMI)

Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, etc.

• Love Songs (Hermann Prey) (Denon)

Schubert, Schumann, Brahms

• Songs (Grace Bumbry) (EMI)

Schubert, Schumann

• Songs, Dichterliebe (Hermann Prey) (Philips)

Schumann

• Dichterliebe; Liederkreis, Op.24 (Hermann Prey) (Denon)
• Liederkreis, Op.39; Kerner-Lieder (Hermann Prey) (Denon)
• Songs (Hermann Prey) (Philips)

Silcher

• Songs (Hermann Prey) (Deutsche Grammophon)

Strauss, Debussy

• Songs (Roberta Peters) (MPS)

Weber

• Songs (Hermann Prey) (EMI)

Wolf

• Songs (Hermann Prey) (Philips)

Die liebe Seligkeit - Folksongs (Hermann Prey) (Deutsche Grammophon)

Baroque Songs and Arias (Hermann Prey, Eduard Melkus) (Philips)

Viennese Songs from Schubert's Time (Hermann Prey) (Deutsche Grammophon)