Nikolaus Harnoncourt
Encyclopedia
Nikolaus Harnoncourt (born 6 December 1929) is an Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n conductor
Conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...

, particularly known for his historically informed performance
Historically informed performance
Historically informed performance is an approach in the performance of music and theater. Within this approach, the performance adheres to state-of-the-art knowledge of the aesthetic criteria of the period in which the music or theatre work was conceived...

s of music from the Classical era
Classical period (music)
The dates of the Classical Period in Western music are generally accepted as being between about 1750 and 1830. However, the term classical music is used colloquially to describe a variety of Western musical styles from the ninth century to the present, and especially from the sixteenth or...

 and earlier. Starting out as a classical cellist, he founded his own period instrument ensemble in the 1950s, and became a pioneer of the Early Music movement. Around 1970, Harnoncourt started to conduct opera and concert performances, soon leading renowned international symphony orchestras, and appearing at leading concert halls, operatic venues and festivals. His repertoire has since widened to include composers of the 19th and 20th century. In 2001 and 2003, he conducted the Vienna New Year's Concert
Vienna New Year's Concert
The New Year's Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic is a concert of classical music that takes place each year in the morning of January 1 in Vienna, Austria...

. Harnoncourt is also the author of several books, mostly on questions of performance history and musical aesthetics.

Biography

Harnoncourt was born in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. He was raised in Graz
Graz
The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...

, Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

 and studied music in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

. His mother, Ladislaja Gräfin von Meran, Freiin von Brandhoven, was the granddaughter of the Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...

 Archduke Johann, the 13th child of the Emperor Leopold II. He is thus descended from various Holy Roman Emperor
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor is a term used by historians to denote a medieval ruler who, as German King, had also received the title of "Emperor of the Romans" from the Pope...

s and other European royalty. His father, Eberhard de la Fontaine Graf d'Harnoncourt-Unverzagt, was an engineer working in Berlin who had two children from a previous marriage. Two years after Nikolaus's birth, his brother Philipp was born. The family eventually moved to Graz, where Eberhard had obtained a post in the state-government (Landesregierung) of Styria.

Career

Harnoncourt was a cellist
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

 with the Vienna Symphony from 1952 to 1969. In 1953, he founded the period-instrument ensemble Concentus Musicus Wien
Concentus Musicus Wien
Concentus Musicus Wien is a baroque music ensemble founded by Nikolaus and Alice Harnoncourt in 1953. It generated the now well-established movement in performance and recordings to play early music on period instruments....

 with his wife, Alice Hoffelner
Alice Harnoncourt
Alice Harnoncourt is a violinist. She is noted for her playing of the Baroque violin, viol, and other stringed instruments...

. The Concentus Musicus Wien is dedicated to performances on period instruments, and by the 1970s his work with it had made him quite well known. He played the viola da gamba at this time, as well as the cello. For the Telefunken
Telefunken
Telefunken is a German radio and television apparatus company, founded in Berlin in 1903, as a joint venture of Siemens & Halske and the Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft...

 (later Teldec
Teldec
The Teldec is a German record label in Hamburg, Germany. Today the label is a property of Warner Music Group.-History:...

) label, Harnoncourt recorded a wide variety of the Baroque repertoire, beginning with the viol music of Henry Purcell
Henry Purcell
Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...

, and extending to works including:
  • Johann Sebastian 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...

    's The Musical Offering
    The Musical Offering
    The Musical Offering , BWV 1079, is a collection of canons and fugues and other pieces of music by Johann Sebastian Bach, all based on a single musical theme given to him by Frederick II of Prussia , to whom they are dedicated...

  • Claudio Monteverdi
    Claudio Monteverdi
    Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...

    's L'incoronazione di Poppea
    L'incoronazione di Poppea
    L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...

  • Jean-Philippe Rameau
    Jean-Philippe Rameau
    Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...

    's Castor et Pollux
    Castor et Pollux
    Castor et Pollux is an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau, first performed on 24 October 1737 at the Académie royale de musique in Paris. The librettist was Pierre-Joseph-Justin Bernard, whose reputation as a salon poet it made. This was the third opera by Rameau and his second in the form of the...



One reason that Harnoncourt left the Vienna Symphony was to become a conductor. He made his conducting debut at La Scala
La Scala
La Scala , is a world renowned opera house in Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as the New Royal-Ducal Theatre at La Scala...

, Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

 in 1970, in a production of Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria is an opera in a prologue and five acts , set by Claudio Monteverdi to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season...

.

In 1971, Harnoncourt started a joint project with conductor Gustav Leonhardt
Gustav Leonhardt
Gustav Leonhardt is a highly renowned Dutch keyboard player, conductor, musicologist, teacher and editor. Leonhardt has been a leading figure in the movement to perform music on period instruments...

 to record all of J.S. Bach's cantatas
Bach cantata
Bach cantata became a term for a cantata of the German Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach who was a prolific writer of the genre. Although many of his works are lost, around 200 cantatas survived....

. The project was eventually completed in 1990, and (barring a couple of cantatas, nos. 51 and 199) was the only cantata cycle to utilise an all-male choir and soloist roster. In 2001 a critically acclaimed and Grammy Award
Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

 winning recording of Bach's St Matthew Passion conducted by Harnoncourt was released, which included the entire score of the piece in Bach's own hand on a CD-ROM
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....

 (this is his third recording of the work).

Harnoncourt subsequently performed with many other orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...

s using modern instruments, but still with an eye on historical authenticity in terms of tempi
Tempo
In musical terminology, tempo is the speed or pace of a given piece. Tempo is a crucial element of any musical composition, as it can affect the mood and difficulty of a piece.-Measuring tempo:...

 and dynamics
Dynamics (music)
In music, dynamics normally refers to the volume of a sound or note, but can also refer to every aspect of the execution of a given piece, either stylistic or functional . The term is also applied to the written or printed musical notation used to indicate dynamics...

, among other things. He also expanded his repertoire, continuing to play the baroque
Baroque music
Baroque music describes a style of Western Classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1760. This era follows the Renaissance and was followed in turn by the Classical era...

 works which had made him famous, but also championing the Viennese
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...

 repertoire. In recent years, he has made a benchmark recording of the 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...

 symphonies
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...

 with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Chamber Orchestra of Europe
The Chamber Orchestra of Europe , established in 1981, is administratively based in London. The orchestra comprises about 60 members coming from across Europe. The players pursue parallel careers as international soloists, members of eminent chamber groups, and as tutors and professors of music...

 (COE), and recorded the Beethoven piano concerti
Piano concerto
A piano concerto is a concerto written for piano and orchestra.See also harpsichord concerto; some of these works are occasionally played on piano...

 with Pierre-Laurent Aimard
Pierre-Laurent Aimard
Pierre-Laurent Aimard is a French pianist. He was born in Lyon, where he entered the conservatory. Later he studied with Yvonne Loriod and with Maria Curcio....

 and the COE.

In addition, Harnoncourt is a guest conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic and has made several recordings with the orchestra. Between 1987 and 1991, he conducted four new productions of Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...

 operas at the Vienna State Opera
Vienna State Opera
The Vienna State Opera is an opera house – and opera company – with a history dating back to the mid-19th century. It is located in the centre of Vienna, Austria. It was originally called the Vienna Court Opera . In 1920, with the replacement of the Habsburg Monarchy by the First Austrian...

 (1987-91: Idomeneo
Idomeneo
Idomeneo, re di Creta ossia Ilia e Idamante is an Italian language opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto was adapted by Giambattista Varesco from a French text by Antoine Danchet, which had been set to music by André Campra as Idoménée in 1712...

; 1988-90: Die Zauberflöte
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....

; 1989: Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail is an opera Singspiel in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The German libretto is by Christoph Friedrich Bretzner with adaptations by Gottlieb Stephanie...

; 1989-91 Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....

). He directed the Vienna Philharmonic's New Year's Day concerts in 2001 and 2003.

In 1992, Harnoncourt debuted at the Salzburg Festival
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...

 conducting a concert with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Chamber Orchestra of Europe
The Chamber Orchestra of Europe , established in 1981, is administratively based in London. The orchestra comprises about 60 members coming from across Europe. The players pursue parallel careers as international soloists, members of eminent chamber groups, and as tutors and professors of music...

. In the following years, he led several concerts with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Vienna Philharmonic and the Concentus Musicus. Harnoncourt also served as the conductor for major opera productions of the Festival: L'incoronazione di Poppea (1993), Le nozze di Figaro (1995 and 2006), Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...

(2002, marking also Anna Netrebko
Anna Netrebko
Anna Yuryevna Netrebko is an Russian operatic soprano. She now holds dual Russian and Austrian citizenship and currently resides in Vienna. She has been nicknamed "La Bellissima" by fans.-Biography:...

's international breakthrough as Donna Anna, and 2003), La clemenza di Tito
La clemenza di Tito
La clemenza di Tito , K. 621, is an opera seria in two acts composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Caterino Mazzolà, after Metastasio...

(2003 and 2006), King Arthur
King Arthur (opera)
King Arthur or, The British Worthy , is a semi-opera in five acts with music by Henry Purcell and alibretto by John Dryden. It was first performed at the Queen's Theatre, Dorset Garden, London, in late May or early June 1691....

(2004). In 2012, Harnoncourt is scheduled to conduct a new Magic Flute, staged by Tobias Moretti
Tobias Moretti
Tobias Moretti is an Austrian actor.-Biography:Born in Gries am Brenner, Tyrol, Moretti is the eldest of four brothers. His brothers are named Tomas, Cristoph and Gregor. Since 1997 he has been married to Julia Moretti , an oboist...

.

In 2002 he recorded Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner was an Austrian composer known for his symphonies, masses, and motets. The first are considered emblematic of the final stage of Austro-German Romanticism because of their rich harmonic language, complex polyphony, and considerable length...

's Symphony No. 9
Symphony No. 9 (Bruckner)
Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 9 in D minor is the last Symphony upon which he worked, leaving the last movement incomplete at the time of his death in 1896. The symphony was premiered under Ferdinand Löwe in Vienna in 1903, after Bruckner's death...

 with the Vienna Philharmonic, with an accompanying second CD containing a lecture by Harnoncourt about the symphony with musical examples, including the rarely heard fragments from the unfinished finale.

Harnoncourt made his guest-conducting debut with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, Amsterdam
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra is a symphony orchestra of the Netherlands, based at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. In 1988, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands conferred the "Royal" title upon the orchestra...

 in 1975. He has continued as a guest conductor with the orchestra, including in several opera productions and recordings. In October 2000, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra named him their Honorair gastdirigent (Honorary Guest Conductor).

In 2009, Harnoncourt recorded Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess is an opera, first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It was based on DuBose Heyward's novel Porgy and subsequent play of the same title, which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward...

by George Gershwin
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...

.

Harnoncourt and his wife Alice have raised four children. Their daughter is the mezzo-soprano Elisabeth von Magnus
Elisabeth von Magnus
Elisabeth von Magnus is an Austrian classical mezzo-soprano.- Family :...

. Their two surviving sons are Philipp and Franz. Their third son Eberhard, a violin maker, died in 1990 in an automobile accident.

Awards

  • Sonning Award (1993, Denmark)
  • Polar Music Prize
    Polar Music Prize
    The Polar Music Prize is a Swedish international music award founded in 1989 by Stig Anderson, possibly best known to be the manager of the Swedish pop group ABBA, with a donation to the Royal Swedish Academy of Music....

     (1994, Sweden)
  • Hans von Bülow Medal
    Hans von Bülow Medal
    The Hans von Bülow Medal is awarded by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra to outstanding musicians close to the orchestra. The medal is named after its first Chief Conductor, Hans von Bülow.* Mariss Jansons, conductor. 2003...

     (1999, Berlin)
  • Ernst von Siemens Music Prize
    Ernst von Siemens Music Prize
    The international Ernst von Siemens Music Prize is an annual music prize given by the Bayerische Akademie der Schönen Künste on behalf of the Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung , established in 1972. The foundation was established by Ernst von Siemens...

     (2002)
  • Kyoto Prize
    Kyoto Prize
    The has been awarded annually since 1985 by the Inamori Foundation, founded by Kazuo Inamori. The prize is a Japanese award similar in intent to the Nobel Prize, as it recognizes outstanding works in the fields of philosophy, arts, science and technology...

     (2005, Japan)
  • Leipzig Bach medal (2007, Leipzig
    Leipzig
    Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

    )
  • Honorary doctor (2008, Mozarteum University of Salzburg, Austria)

External links

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