Werner Egk (, 17 May 1901 – 10 July 1983), born Werner Joseph Mayer, was a German

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

Early career

He was born in the

Swabia Swabia ; , colloquially ''Schwabenland'' or ''Ländle''; archaic English also Suabia or Svebia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany. The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of Swabia, one of ...

n town of Auchsesheim, today part of

Donauwörth Donauwörth (; ) is a town and the capital of the Donau-Ries district in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany. It is said to have been founded by two fishermen where the rivers Danube (Donau) and Wörnitz meet. The city is part of the scenic route called "R ...

, Germany. His family, of Catholic peasant stock, moved to

Augsburg Augsburg ( , ; ; ) is a city in the Bavaria, Bavarian part of Swabia, Germany, around west of the Bavarian capital Munich. It is a College town, university town and the regional seat of the Swabia (administrative region), Swabia with a well ...

when Egk was six. He studied at a

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

Gymnasium (academic high school) and entered the municipal conservatory. Egk demonstrated talents as a composer, graphic artist, and writer, and he moved first to Frankfurt to improve his piano talents and then, in 1921, to Munich. There, working as a theater composer and playing in the pit, he married Elizabeth Karl, a violinist. He derived his

pen name A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...

"Egk" from his wife's initials: ''Elisabeth, Karl'' (Elisabeth,

née The birth name is the name of the person given upon their birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name or to the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a births registe ...

Karl). His only son, Titus, was born in 1924. Egk moved to Berlin in 1928, meeting composers

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian and American composer, music theorist, teacher and writer. He was among the first Modernism (music), modernists who transformed the practice of harmony in 20th-centu ...

and

Hanns Eisler Hanns Eisler (6 July 1898 – 6 September 1962) was a German-Austrian composer. He is best known for composing the national anthem of East Germany, for his long artistic association with Bertolt Brecht, and for the scores he wrote for films. The ...

. He intended to become a cinema composer and accompanied silent films. When radio broadcasting became available to the public, Egk immediately realised its importance as a mass medium and developed

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

s and

radio play Radio drama (or audio drama, audio play, radio play, radio theatre, or audio theatre) is a dramatised, purely acoustic performance. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine ...

s. He was introduced to Hans Fleisch, an important radio executive (also

Paul Hindemith Paul Hindemith ( ; ; 16 November 189528 December 1963) was a German and American composer, music theorist, teacher, violist and conductor. He founded the Amar Quartet in 1921, touring extensively in Europe. As a composer, he became a major advo ...

's brother-in-law and a Jew), by composer

Kurt Weill Kurt Julian Weill (; ; March 2, 1900April 3, 1950) was a German-born American composer active from the 1920s in his native country, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for hi ...

. He received his first commission for broadcasting from Fleisch's company. He returned to Munich in 1929 to work for the local radio station and settled in Lochham, a suburb. He became associated with musicians

Fritz Büchtger Fritz Büchtger (14 February 1903 – 26 December 1978) was a German composer. Life Born in Munich, Büchtger studied at the Music Academie of Munich with , Hermann Wolfgang von Waltershausen and Anton Beer-Walbrunn. In March 1927, together wi ...

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

, and especially,

Carl Orff Carl Heinrich Maria Orff (; 10 July 1895 – 29 March 1982) was a German composer and music educator, who composed the cantata ''Carmina Burana (Orff), Carmina Burana'' (1937). The concepts of his Orff Schulwerk, Schulwerk were influential for ...

, whom he had met in 1921. His music of the period shows a debt to the compositional style of

Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ( – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer and conductor with French citizenship (from 1934) and American citizenship (from 1945). He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century c ...

. He also became friends with new-music conductor

Hermann Scherchen Hermann Scherchen (21 June 1891 – 12 June 1966) was a German conductor, who was principal conductor of the city orchestra of Winterthur from 1922 to 1950. He promoted contemporary music, beginning with Schoenberg's '' Pierrot Lunaire'', follow ...

and the owners of the music publisher,

Schott Music Schott Music () is one of the oldest German music publishers. It is also one of the largest music publishing houses in Europe, and is the second-oldest music publisher after Breitkopf & Härtel. The company headquarters of Schott Music were foun ...

in Mainz. His career as a composer took off with the premiere of his

radio opera Radio opera (German: 'Funkoper' or 'Radiooper') is a genre of opera. It refers to operas which were specifically composed to be performed on the radio and is not to be confused with broadcasts of operas which were originally written for the stage. ...

, ''Columbus'', in July 1933 (staged in April 1934).

Nazi era

Any composer working in Germany at the time had to deal with the

Nazi regime Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

coming to power in 1933. Michael H. Kater, professor of German studies at

York University York University (), also known as YorkU or simply YU), is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's third-largest university, and it has approximately 53,500 students, 7,000 faculty and staff, ...

labels Egk "The Enigmatic Opportunist" in his portrait of ''Eight German Composers of the Nazi Era'', and by far the most extensive evaluation of the composer's wartime connections in English. As a German of Catholic heritage, Egk was in no danger of falling into disfavor with the regime's racial policies; rather, the professional hardships for Jewish composers and others created opportunities for him. Egk's contact with Scherchen soon lapsed, and the composer developed a complicated relationship as well as a professional rivalry with Orff, whose works ultimately found more lasting success. Initially, Munich's cultural administrators had doubts about the compatibility of Egk's Stravinskian style with a Nazi audience, and he encountered difficulty with Munich's representative for

Alfred Rosenberg Alfred Ernst Rosenberg ( – 16 October 1946) was a Baltic German Nazi theorist and ideologue. Rosenberg was first introduced to Adolf Hitler by Dietrich Eckart and he held several important posts in the Nazi government. He was the head o ...

's ''Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur'' (

Militant League for German Culture The Militant League for German Culture (German: ''Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur'', ''KfdK''), was a nationalistic anti-Semitic political society during the Weimar Republic and the Nazi era. It was founded in 1928 as the ''Nationalsozialistische Ge ...

), Paul Ehlers. In 1935, he premiered his first opera ''Die Zaubergeige'' (''The Magic Violin'') in Frankfurt am Main. The work channeled Bavarian folksong and a

diatonic Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are used to characterize scales. The terms are also applied to musical instruments, intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair ...

idiom far less

modernist Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

than his earlier, more angular ''Columbus''. This opera therefore matched Nazi artistic guidelines prescribing folk elements as being close to the people. Swiss composer

Heinrich Sutermeister Heinrich Sutermeister (12 August 1910 – 16 March 1995) was a Swiss composer, most famous for his opera '' Romeo und Julia''. Life and career Sutermeister was born in Feuerthalen. During the early 1930s he was a student at the Akademie der To ...

saw the stylistic change as "opportunistic." The success of the work led to a commission for ballet music related to the

1936 Summer Olympics The 1936 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XI Olympiad () and officially branded as Berlin 1936, were an international multi-sport event held from 1 to 16 August 1936 in Berlin, then capital of Nazi Germany. Berlin won the bid to ...

(for which he received a gold medal in the Art Competition) and his appointment as conductor of 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 ...

– a position he held until 1941. Egk's protector in Berlin was

Heinz Tietjen Heinz Tietjen (24 June 1881 – 30 November 1967) was a German conductor and music producer born in Tangier, Morocco. Biography Tietjen was born in Tangier, Morocco. At age twenty-three, he held the producer position at the Opera House in Tri ...

, director of the Prussian state theaters and artistic director of the

Bayreuth Festival The Bayreuth Festival () is a music festival held annually in Bayreuth, Germany, at which performances of stage works by the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner are presented. Wagner himself conceived and promoted the idea of a special ...

. November 1938 saw the première of his opera ''

Peer Gynt ''Peer Gynt'' (, ) is a five-Act (drama), act play in verse written in 1867 by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen. It is one of Ibsen's best known and most widely performed plays. ''Peer Gynt'' chronicles the journey of its title character fr ...

'' based on

Henrik Ibsen Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright, poet and actor. Ibsen is considered the world's pre-eminent dramatist of the 19th century and is often referred to as "the father of modern drama." He pioneered ...

play Play most commonly refers to: * Play (activity), an activity done for enjoyment * Play (theatre), a work of drama Play may refer also to: Computers and technology * Google Play, a digital content service * Play Framework, a Java framework * P ...

. Propaganda minister

Joseph Goebbels Paul Joseph Goebbels (; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German Nazism, Nazi politician and philologist who was the ''Gauleiter'' (district leader) of Berlin, chief Propaganda in Nazi Germany, propagandist for the Nazi Party, and ...

wrote in his diary on 1 February 1939: "I am very enthusiastic and so is the Führer. A new discovery for the both of us". Oddly enough, Egk had returned to his more Stravinskian style in the work. More conservative critics found elements in the plot threatening to Nazi ideals of martial grandeur, and they also had difficulties with the reworking of the Nordic plot. One possible interpretation of the event lies in an argument Hitler had with his lieutenant Göring, who had warned Hitler not to go to the opera, "because none of your favorite singers were in it." It has been credibly suggested that Hitler and Goebbels decided to "like" the opera as a "taunt" to Göring for having the audacity to tell Hitler what he could and could not see. As the thirties wore on, Egk was asked, or perhaps commanded, to make official pronouncements about German music, and he received a large commission (never fulfilled) for a large scale opera on Nazi themes. His next major work was the ballet ''Joan von Zarissa'' in 1940. In the following decade, it was common to pair the work with Orff's ''

Carmina Burana ''Carmina Burana'' (, Latin for "Songs from Benediktbeuern" 'Buria'' in Latin is a manuscript of 254 poems and dramatic texts mostly from the 11th or 12th century, although some are from the 13th century. The pieces are mostly bawdy, irreveren ...

''. In general, Egk's music found much more success in Berlin, and Orff lost to Egk in the prize surrounding the Olympic games composition. Unlike Egk, who enjoyed regular income from his artistic directorship, Orff was also self-employed and much impoverished. This exposed Egk to attack from Orff's partisans, though Egk and his wife continued to see Orff socially. These rivalries impinged on the credibility of witnesses in Egk's trial after the war. From 1941 to 1945 Egk was the leader of the Composer division ("") in the State-Approved Society for the Exploitation of Musical Performing Rights (German: ; STAGMA) which was then under the control of the Nazi

Reichsmusikkammer The Reich Chamber of Music (''Reichsmusikkammer'', abbreviated as RMK) was a government agency which operated as a statutory corporation controlled by the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda that regulated the music industry in Nazi G ...

(Reich Music Chamber). Egk never joined the Nazi party and was exonerated in

denazification Denazification () was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of the Nazi ideology following the Second World War. It was carried out by removing those who had been Nazi Par ...

tribunals held in 1947, but the trials were fraught with inaccuracies, including accounts of involvement with the Austrian resistance movement that were highly dubious. Among Egk's defenders were

Gottfried von Einem Gottfried von Einem (24 January 1918 – 12 July 1996) was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ. Bio ...

and composer

Boris Blacher Boris Blacher (30 January 1975) was a German composer and librettist. Life Blacher was born when his parents (of German-Estonian and Russian backgrounds) were living within a Russian-speaking community in the Manchurian town of Niuzhuang () (h ...

. Initially his Nazi affiliations were held against him, though only briefly. There are various interpretations regarding the extent of his collaboration: * Egk was never a Nazi, or * Egk was never interested in unfair advantage for himself, or * Egk was barely tolerated by the regime; or, * Egk was an official musician of the Third Reich, who identified himself and his music with the ideals of the Nazis. According to historian Michael Hans Kater, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

Post-war

His major career began after the war. In Germany, Egk has been dubbed "Komponist des Wiederaufbaus" ("composer of the reconstruction", which followed World War II). Besides being a conductor and composer, he was head of the Berlin Musikhochschule (1950–1952) and important figure of the GEMA since 1950; he was also the first German president of the

Confédération Internationale des Sociétés d'Auteurs et Compositeurs The International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (, ''CISAC'') is an international non-governmental, not-for-profit organisation that aims to protect the rights and promote the interests of creators worldwide. It advocates for ...

(CISAC). In 1954 he became conductor of the

Bavarian State Opera The Bavarian State Opera () is a German opera company based in Munich. Its main venue is the Nationaltheater München, and its orchestra the Bavarian State Orchestra. History The parent ensemble of the company was founded in 1653, under El ...

with a 20-year contract. His later years saw a constant string of premieres at major European festivals, beginning with ''Irische Legende'' in 1955, conducted by

George Szell George Szell (; June 7, 1897 – July 30, 1970), originally György Széll, György Endre Szél, or Georg Szell, was a Hungarian-born American conductor, composer and pianist. Considered one of the twentieth century's greatest conductors ...

and featuring

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (; 28 May 1925 – 18 May 2012) was a German lyric baritone and conductor of classical music. One of the most famous Lieder (art song) performers of the post-war period, he is best known as a singer of Franz Schubert's ...

. His opera ''Die Verlobung in San Domingo'' opened the

National Theatre Munich The National Theatre () on Max-Joseph-Platz in Munich, Germany, is a historic opera house, home of the Bavarian State Opera, Bavarian State Orchestra and the Bavarian State Ballet. With 2,101 seats, the theatre is the country's largest op ...

in 1963 and features a

libretto A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to th ...

Heinrich von Kleist Bernd Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist (; 18 October 177721 November 1811) was a German poet, dramatist, novelist, short story writer and journalist. His best known works are the theatre plays ''The Prince of Homburg'', '' Das Käthchen von Heilbronn'' ...

, pleading for racial tolerance. His late works, however, were almost exclusively instrumental. Exceptional among them are works for winds, including the Divertissement for Ten Wind Instruments (1974) and the Five Pieces for Wind Quintet (1975). Egk died on 10 July 1983 in

Inning am Ammersee Inning is a municipality in Bavaria, Germany, in the district of Starnberg, in the Regierungsbezirk of Oberbayern. It lies on the shores of lake Ammersee Ammersee (; English: Lake Ammer) is a '' Zungenbecken'' lake in Upper Bavaria, Germany ...

and is buried in

Selected works

Operas

* '' Columbus (opera)''. Radio Opera (1933) Revised (1942) * '' Die Zaubergeige'' (after

Count Franz Pocci Count Franz Graf von Pocci (7 March 1807 – 7 May 1876) was a significant official in the court of King Ludwig the First of Bavaria, best known as the founding director of the Munich Marionette Theatre where he was a shadow puppeteer and wrot ...

, libretto by

Ludwig Strecker Ludwig Philipp Carl Wilhelm Strecker (16 March 1853 – 19 December 1943) was a German businessman who owned the London-based music publishing house, Schott and Co., Limited. Career Strecker was born to Ludwig Theodor Strecker, a lawyer, and ...

) (1935; Revised 1954) * ''

'' after

(1938) * '' Circe (opera)'' after

Pedro Calderón de la Barca Pedro Calderón de la Barca y Barreda González de Henao Ruiz de Blasco y Riaño (17 January 160025 May 1681) (, ; ) was a Spanish dramatist, poet, and writer. He is known as one of the most distinguished Spanish Baroque literature, poets and ...

(1945, Premiered 1948; Reworked as an ''Opera semibuffa'' as '' 17 Tage und 4 Minuten'', 1966) * '' Irische Legende'' after

W. B. Yeats William Butler Yeats (, 13 June 186528 January 1939), popularly known as W. B. Yeats, was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer, and literary critic who was one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the ...

(1955; Revised 1975) * '' Der Revisor'' after

Nikolai Gogol Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol; ; (; () was a Russian novelist, short story writer, and playwright of Ukrainian origin. Gogol used the Grotesque#In literature, grotesque in his writings, for example, in his works "The Nose (Gogol short story), ...

(1957) * '' Die Verlobung in San Domingo'' after

(1963)

Ballets

* ''Joan von Zarissa'' for narrator, mixed chorus, soprano, baritone, and orchestra (1940) ** two suites for orchestra, the second titled ''Triptych.'' ** 3 chansons (Charles d'Orléans) for 10-part chorus * ''

Abraxas Abraxas (, variant form romanized: ) is a word of mystic meaning in the system of the Gnostic Basilides, being there applied to the "Great Archon" (), the princeps of the 365 spheres (). The word is found in Gnostic texts such as the '' Holy ...

''. Faust-ballet after

Heinrich Heine Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; ; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was an outstanding poet, writer, and literary criticism, literary critic of 19th-century German Romanticism. He is best known outside Germany for his ...

(1948){{{cite book, chapter=Abraxas, title=The Oxford Dictionary of Dance (2 ed.), author=Debra Craine, author2=Judith Mackrell, publisher= Oxford University Press, isbn= 9780199563449 ** Concert suite * ''Die chinesische Nachtigall'' after

Hans Christian Andersen Hans Christian Andersen ( , ; 2 April 1805 – 4 August 1875) was a Danish author. Although a prolific writer of plays, travelogue (literature), travelogues, novels, and poems, he is best remembered for his literary fairy tales. Andersen's fai ...

(1953) ** Suite ''Divertissement'' for string orchestra * ''Casanova in London'' (1969; Extracts as ''Englische Suite'')

Orchestral works

* ''Kleine Symphonie'' (1926) * ''Olympische Festmusik'' (1936; text from

Carl Diem Carl Diem (24 June 1882 – 17 December 1962) was a German sports administrator, and as a Secretary General of the Organizing Committee of the Berlin Olympic Games, he was also the chief organizer of the 1936 Olympic Summer Games. He cre ...

) * ''Orchester-Sonate'' (1947/48) * ''Französische Suite'' after

Jean-Philippe Rameau Jean-Philippe Rameau (; ; – ) was a French composer and music theory, music theorist. Regarded as one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century, he replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of ...

(1949; reworked as a ballet 1952) * ''Allegria'' (1952; Ballet 1953) * Variationen über ein karibisches Thema (1959; Ballet ''Danza'', 1960) * ''2. Sonate für Orchester'' (1969) * ''Spiegelzeit'' (1979) * ''Musik für eine verschollene Romanze''. Overture (1980) * ''Der Revisor''. Concert suite for trumpet and string orchestra (1981) * ''Die Zaubergeige''. Overture arranged for wind ensemble (1981) * ''Canzona'' for cello and orchestra (1982) * ''Nachtanz'' (Opus postumus, Premiered 1985)

Vocal works

*''Herrgott noch ein Stück Brot'' Chorus SSTT (1923) * '' Furchtlosigkeit und Wohlwollen''. Oratorio for tenor, mixed chorus, and orchestra; (1931; Revised 1959) * '' La tentation de Saint Antoine'' ''d’après des airs et des vers du 18e siècle'' for alto, string quartet, and string orchestra (1952; ballet version 1969) * ''Nachgefühl''. Cantata for soprano and orchestra after

Klabund Alfred Henschke (4 November 1890 – 14 August 1928), better known by his pseudonym Klabund, was a German writer. Life Klabund, born Alfred Henschke in 1890 in Krosno Odrzańskie, Crossen, was the son of an apothecary. At the age of 16 he came ...

(1975)

Singspiels (musical plays)

* ''Die Löwe und die Maus''.

Singspiel A Singspiel (; plural: ; ) is a form of German-language music drama, now regarded as a genre of opera. It is characterized by spoken dialogue, which is alternated with ensembles, songs, ballads, and arias which were often strophic, or folk- ...

for children (1931) * ''Der Fuchs und der Rabe''. Singspiel for children (1932) * ''Die Historie vom Ritter Don Juan aus Barcelona''. After an old folk play (1932)

Film music

* ''{{Interlanguage link, Der Herr vom andern Stern, de'' (Film by

Heinz Rühmann Heinrich Wilhelm "Heinz" Rühmann (; 7 March 1902 – 3 October 1994) was a German film actor who appeared in over 100 films between 1926 and 1993. He is one of the most famous and popular German actors of the 20th century, and is considered a Ge ...

, 1948)

Writings

* 1953: ''Abstrakte Oper Nr. 1'' – (

Libretto A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to th ...

for a work by

) * 1958: ''Das Zauberbett'' – Comedy * 1960: ''Musik, Wort, Bild'' – Essays * 1973: ''Die Zeit wartet nicht'' – Autobiography * Various essays in ''{{Interlanguage link, Melos (journal), de, 3=Melos (Zeitschrift), lt=Melos'', ''

Das Orchester ''Das Orchester'' is a German-language magazine for musicians and management which has been published eleven times a year since 1953 by Schott Music and is distributed in over 45 countries worldwide. The editor-in-chief is based in Berlin while ...

'', ''

Neue Zeitschrift für Musik The New Journal of Music (, and abbreviated to NZM) is a music magazine, co-founded in Leipzig by Robert Schumann, his teacher and future father-in law Friedrich Wieck, Julius Knorr and his close friend Ludwig Schuncke. Its first issue appe ...

'', ''Österreichische Musikalische Zeitung''.

References

Sources * {{cite book, last=Kater, first=Michael, author-link=Michael Hans Kater, title=Composers of the Nazi Era: Eight Portraits, url=https://archive.org/details/composersofnazie0000kate, url-access=registration, year=2000, publisher=Oxford, location=New York, isbn=0-19-515286-7, page
3–30
}