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September 2008 On September 5 and 6, 2008, the Hugo Kauder Society is presenting its 4th annual International Music Competition in New Haven. Nine pianists under the age of 35 and of various nationalities have just been selected to perform live in a public competition before a distinguished jury. Finalists will perform works by Hugo Kauder, as well as Classical, Romantic, and Contemporary works. The first, second and third prize winners will perform in the Winners Concert. The first prize winner will also receive a concert opportunity in New York. The Competition judges are Claude Frank, Yale School of Music and Curtis Institute of Music, Pamela Frank, Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University and Stony Brook, and Peter Frankl, Yale School of Music. The public is invited to attend both the Live Competition and the Winners Concert.
Live Competition
Winners Concert More information about the finalists will be available on the competition page. We look forward to seeing you at the events! The 2008 Competition is made possible, in part, thanks to the support of the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism. Hugo Kauder Society wins Connecticut grant The Society was awarded grant funding from the state of Connecticut, which was noted by New Haven Magazine in the January issue: “In mid-December the Connecticut Commission on the Arts announced its annual grants... New Haven’s own Hugo Kauder Society received $1,000 for its efforts to promote the work of Moravian (now part of the Czech Republic) self-taught composer Hugo Kauder.” January 2008 Another Warm Review for Kauder Quartet CD The Euclid Quartet’s Hugo Kauder. String Quartets 1-4 received another enthusiastic review. The CD, released in fall 2007, was already named Recording of the Month in this review by MusicWeb International. In the Jan/Feb 2008 issue of American Record Guide, Elaine Fine writes: This is the first time I have heard any of the 17 string quartets by the Czech composer Hugo Kauder (1888-1972), who spent his professional life as a violist and composer in Vienna and then lived in New York from 1940 on. The first quartet, written in 1921, sounds heavily influenced by the music of Richard Strauss. Once the Strauss influence fades (after 1) and the modal writing and the counterpoint (or as his friends called it “Kauderpoint”) begins, his string quartet music becomes a cornupcopia of fantastic fugal writing, folk songs and dances, and gorgeous modal melodies. The writing is rich, with generous melodic material given to the inner voices, particularly to the viola; and he is extremely creative and inventive while always using a tonal musical vocabulary. There is a Renaissance clarity and quality to his counterpoint, and a glance at the scores of some of his string quartet scores reveals that in Renaissance fashion he chose to write without measure lines, giving only a slash to indicate where the downbeat would fall. Hearing Kauder’s superb music adds a completely new dimension to my perception of the kind of music that was being written in Vienna in the 1920s. I imagine that Kauder’s Viennese dodecaphonic contemporaries envied his Bachian ability to write counterpoint that is both brilliant and beautiful. Much of Kauder’s music has been published, but very little of it has been recorded (this is the only professional recording I know of). A few years ago I heard a performance of a choral piece by Kauder that made a profound impression on me, and I wondered then why I had never heard of him. Maybe, now that tonality is appreciated once again, it is time for a recording "Renaissance" of Kauder’s music. There are more than 300 works, both vocal and instrumental, to choose from; and these four quartets, played beautifully by this very fine quartet, are an excellent start. |
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