Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email
Answers.com

Carl Czerny

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Karl Czerny
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Britannica Concise Encyclopedia

(born Feb. 20, 1791, Vienna, Austria — died July 15, 1857, Vienna) Austrian composer, teacher, and pianist. Son of a musician, he made his piano debut at age 9 and began study with Ludwig van Beethoven at 10. A brilliant pianist, he later became a famous piano teacher; his students included Sigismond Thalberg (1812 – 71) and Franz Liszt. Though he was a prolific composer, he is known today almost exclusively for his hundreds of piano exercises and études.

For more information on Karl Czerny, visit Britannica.com.

Search unanswered questions...

Enter a question here...
Search: All sources Community Q&A Reference topics

Music Encyclopedia: Carl Czerny
Top
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Music Encyclopedia

(b Vienna, 21 Feb 1791; d there, 15 July 1857). Austrian >piano teacher, composer,pianist and writer on music. As Beethoven's pupil and Liszt's teacher he occupies a unique position among 19th-century pianists, both as a transmitter of ideas from one master to another and for his extraordinary productivity during a time of dramatic change in the piano and its literature. After early training from his father he was accepted as a pupil by Beethoven, who stressed material in C.P.E. Bach's Versuch and legato playing. He made his début in 1800, gaining renown for his interpretation of Beethoven, but was drawn to teaching rather than a career as a travelling virtuoso; among his pupils were Beethoven's nephew Karl, Döhler, Thalberg, Leopoldine Blahetka and Liszt, whose Transcendental Studies were dedicated to him. He was a remarkably prolific composer, with an output of over 1000 works, including chamber and orchestral music, sacred choral music and hundreds of arrangements in diverse styles; more significant are his wide range of studies and exercises and the treatises School of Extemporaneous Performance Opp. 200, 300 and Complete Theoretical and Practical Pianoforte School op.500 (1839).


 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Karl Czerny
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Columbia Encyclopedia - People
Czerny, Karl (chĕr'nē), 1791-1857, Austrian pianist; pupil of Beethoven and teacher of Liszt. He is known for his technical studies for the piano; his numerous other works are seldom performed.
Dictionary: Czer·ny   (chĕr'nē) pronunciation, Karl
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Dictionary - People
1791-1857.

Austrian pianist and composer. A student of Beethoven and the teacher of Liszt, he wrote piano exercises, such as School of the Left Hand, that remain in wide use.


Artist: Carl Czerny
Top
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Classical Artists
  • Period: Romantic (1820-1869)
  • Country: Austria
  • Born: February 21, 1791
  • Died: July 15, 1857

Biography

Carl Czerny was born to a musical family. His father was Wenzel Czerny, an oboist, organist, singer, piano teacher, and piano repairman. The family was Czech, and Czech was Carl's first language. Carl's was an early developing talent. He was playing piano when he was three, writing his own music when he was seven, and demonstrated a fine musical memory. Wenzel was part of a kind of co-op of various teachers to instruct each others' children; thus Carl learned literature, violin, Italian, German, and French in exchange for Wenzel teaching the other children piano. At the age of ten his violin teacher, Krumpholz, took him for an interview with Beethoven, who accepted the boy as his pupil.

Czerny gained fame as an interpreter of Beethoven's piano works. In 1816 he started a weekly series of concerts at his home, devoted solely to Beethoven's music. Czerny wrote commentaries on the performance of Beethoven's piano music. These are an extraordinarily valuable and authoritative source for all pianists.

He started teaching at age 15. His two most famous pupils were Sigismund Thalberg and Franz Liszt. Despite teaching at times as many as ten hours a day, he managed to compose an immense amount of music, over 1,000 works. He composed so prolifically that he set up a series of desks in his workroom. Each would hold a composition in the process of composition. Czerny would start with one, fill a pair of pages, then progress to the next new work, write a pair of pages of it, and so forth all around the room. By the time he got back around to the first, the ink on its pages would have had time to dry and he could resume work on it.

He is mainly known for his many sets of studies and exercises for piano. These cover virtually every significant issue of technique and interpretation faced by pianists at all levels. Czerny's studies, especially the "School of Velocity, Op. 299," are known (and dreaded) by piano students to this day. It is the endless repetition of them and the fiendish little traps he sets that turns students against Czerny as a composer.

This is unfortunate. Although he was not a particularly original composer, the better of his many essays in creative composition are more than just technically accomplished. They are often witty, imaginative, and charming in ways that surprise.

He never married: He was so driven by the need to compose constantly that he consciously gave up the idea of marriage, or so he said. After his death, writings were found to show that he had an unrequited love for an unknown woman. In the 1840s he health began failing. His unparalleled productivity earned him a respectable estate; he left the bulk of it, on his death, in a series of well-planned bequests to various charities, including the Vienna Gesselschaft der Musikfreunde, the Monks and Nuns of Charity, and (in an apparent tribute to his teacher Beethoven) an institute for the deaf. ~ Joseph Stevenson, All Music Guide
Wikipedia: Carl Czerny
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
Carl Czerny, lithograph by Josef Kriehuber, 1833

Carl Czerny (sometimes Karl; February 21, 1791 – July 15, 1857) was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny knew and was influenced by the well-known pianists Muzio Clementi and Johann Nepomuk Hummel.

Contents

Biography

Carl Czerny was born in Vienna to a family of Czech origin. His father Václav Černý came to Vienna from Nymburk, Bohemia and Carl himself didn't speak German until the age of ten. He was taught piano by his father before taking lessons from Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri, and Ludwig van Beethoven. Carl Czerny also attended courses which Muzio Clementi held in Paris, Vienna, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Prague, Rome and Milan.

Carl Czerny was a child prodigy, making his first appearance in public in 1800 playing a Mozart piano concerto. However, he was never comfortable playing in public and he resolved to withdraw permanently from the stage, and from society in general.[1] He quickly took to teaching and composition, and by the age of fifteen, he was already a sought after instructor. He remained in Vienna for the rest of his life, only leaving three times (he visited Leipzig in 1836, Paris and London in 1837, and Lombardy in 1846).[1] At age 21, in February 1812, he returned to the public to give the Vienna premiere of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5, "Emperor".

His most famous student was Franz Liszt, who dedicated his twelve Transcendental Etudes to Czerny and also involved him in the collaborative work Hexaméron (the fifth variation on Bellini's theme is his).

His other notable students included Sigismond Thalberg, Stephen Heller, Alfred Jaëll, Theodor Leschetizky, Theodor Kullak, Theodor Döhler, and Anne Caroline de Belleville

Czerny composed a very large number of pieces (up to Op. 861), including a number of masses and requiems, and a large number of symphonies, concertos, sonatas and string quartets. None of these pieces are played often today, however, and he is known as a composer almost exclusively because of the large number of didactic piano pieces he wrote, many of which are still used today, such as The School of Velocity and The Art of Finger Dexterity. He was one of the first composers to use étude ("study") for a title.

On a minor note, he was one of 50 composers who each wrote a Variation on a theme of Anton Diabelli for Part II of the Vaterländischer Künstlerverein (published 1824). He also wrote a coda to round out the collection. Part I was devoted to the 33 variations supplied by Beethoven, which have gained an independent identity as his Diabelli Variations, Op. 120.

Czerny's published compositions number nearly 1,000 and include arrangements for eight pianos, four hands each, of two overtures of Gioachino Rossini. He also left an essay on performing the piano sonatas of Beethoven. He published an autobiographical sketch, Erinnerungen aus meinem Leben (1842; “Memories from My Life”).

Czerny died in Vienna at the age of 66. He never married and he had no near relatives. Shortly before his death, he disposed of his considerable fortune with the help of his friend Leopold von Sonnleithner.[1]

Signum Records recently issued at least three CD recordings of Czerny's symphonies and concerti, including a concerto for piano four hands in C major. In fact, the view of Czerny as primarily a composer of didactic works is being challenged, as can be seen in the review cited below of a Sony Classical CD of some of Czerny's four-hand works.

Media
Duo Concertante - 1. Allegro
Performed by Alex Murray (flute) and Martha Goldstein (piano)
Duo Concertante - 2. Scherzo - Allegro Molto
Performed by Alex Murray (flute) and Martha Goldstein (piano)
Duo Concertante - 3. Andantino Grazioso
Performed by Alex Murray (flute) and Martha Goldstein (piano)
Duo Concertante - 4. Rondo - Allegretto
Performed by Alex Murray (flute) and Martha Goldstein (piano)
Problems listening to these files? See media help.

References

  1. ^ a b c Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th ed. 1954, Eric Blom ed.

See also

Samples of scores

External links

Books and Sheetmusic

Sheet music


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

 
 

 

Copyrights:

Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Music Encyclopedia. The Concise Grove Dictionary of Music. Copyright © 1994 by Oxford University Press, Inc.. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/.  Read more
Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Artist. Copyright © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC. Content provided by All Music Guide ®, a trademark of All Media Guide, LLC. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Carl Czerny".  Read more