Christoph Caskel (12 January 1932 – 19 February 2023) was a German percussionist and teacher.

Life and career

Born in

Greifswald Greifswald (), officially the University and Hanseatic City of Greifswald (, Low German: ''Griepswoold'') is the fourth-largest city in the German state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania after Rostock, Schwerin and Neubrandenburg. In 2021 it surpa ...

, Caskel began learning percussion at an early age, taking lessons at the age of five with a military musician and as a schoolboy with a percussionist from the

Berlin State Opera The Staatsoper Unter den Linden ( State Opera under the Lime Trees), also known as the Berlin State Opera (), is a listed building on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of Berlin, Germany. The opera house was built by order of P ...

. He studied percussion formally from 1949 to 1953 with Wenzel Pricha at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Cologne. During these years, he began taking an interest in contemporary music under the influence of another lecturer at the Hochschule, the cellist Maurits Frank. After completing his conservatory training, he studied musicology from 1953 to 1955 at the

University of Cologne The University of Cologne () is a university in Cologne, Germany. It was established in 1388. It closed in 1798 before being re-established in 1919. It is now one of the largest universities in Germany with around 45,187 students. The Universit ...

. By the beginning of the 1960s Caskel had become known internationally as a performer of chamber music and solo works by contemporary composers, taking part in the premieres of important works such as

Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groun ...

's ''

Zyklus ''Zyklus für einen Schlagzeuger'' (English: Cycle for a Percussionist) is a composition by Karlheinz Stockhausen, assigned Number 9 in the composer's catalog of works. It was composed in 1959 at the request of Wolfgang Steinecke as a test piece ...

'' (1959) and '' Kontakte'' (1960),

Helmut Lachenmann Helmut Friedrich Lachenmann (; born 27 November 1935) is a German composer of contemporary classical music and pianist. Associated with the "instrumental musique concrète" style, Lachenmann is alongside Wolfgang Rihm as among the leading Germa ...

’s ''Intérieur'' (1966), and Mauricio Kagel’s ''Transición II'' (1958–59), all of which he also recorded. He has also taken an interest in historical percussion instruments, serving as timpanist in the early music orchestra Capella Coloniensis. In 1964 he joined the Stockhausen Ensemble. He also performed and recorded (twice, in 1963 and 1977)

Béla Bartók Béla Viktor János Bartók (; ; 25 March 1881 – 26 September 1945) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and ethnomusicologist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century; he and Franz Liszt are regarded as Hunga ...

's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion with Aloys and Alfons Kontarsky. In 1963 he was appointed to the faculty of the in Cologne, and in the same year formed a duo with the harpsichordist Franzpeter Goebels. In 1973 he became professor of timpani and percussion at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln. Amongst his notable students are Manos Tsangaris, , Paul Lovens, , , , and Cornel Țăranu. In addition, he has devoted himself to the instruction of beginning percussionists, publishing a book for complete beginners, ''Snare Drum... step by step.... '', in 2005. He has published articles on percussion in '' Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', as well as an article on percussion notation in the ''Darmstädter Beiträge zur neuen Musik'' (1965). Caskel died on 19 February 2023, at the age of 91.

Awards

In 1963 he received the .

Bibliography

*Caskel, Christoph. 1965. "Notation für Schlagzeug". In ''Notation neuer Musik'', edited by Ernst Thomas, 110–116. Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik 9. Mainz: Schott. English edition, as "Notation for Percussion Instruments", translated by Vernon Martin. ''Percussionist'' 8, no. 3 (March 1971): 80–84. *Caskel, Christoph. 2005. ''Snare drum ... step by step ... : Trommel-Schule für Einsteiger von 8 bis 80 Jahren''. Bergisch-Gladbach: Leu-Verlag.

References

Works cited

* *

External links

* 1932 births 2023 deaths German percussionists People from Greifswald Deutsche Grammophon artists Academic staff of the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln 20th-century German classical musicians {{Germany-music-bio-stub