Pianist Hoffmans biography

The biography of Joseph Hoffmann was born in Krakow, Poland, January 20 of the year. The boy grew up in a musical family: his mother was a soloist of the operetta and had an excellent soprano, his father was a composer, a pianist, as well as a conductor of the Warsaw Opera. From a young age, a love of music was vaccinated for children. The first teacher of Joseph was the older sister.

With an incredible speed, a three -year -old child learned all the piano exercises.

Later, his father, Casimir, began to train him. A year and a half after the young musician first touched the piano keys, Joseph's professional debut took place in the suburbs of Warsaw. Soon the glory of a virtuoso boy swept throughout Poland; The family began to receive numerous proposals about Joseph's speeches at various sites of the country. However, the father did not want to exploit the child, and agreed only to a few charity concerts.

At the age of seven, Hoffmann performed the first part of Beethoven's first piano concert in Warsaw. Critics noted in the performance of the pianist a natural sense of style, accuracy and roundness of tone. Here the young musician was first heard by Anton Rubinstein. The maestro was delighted with the game of Joseph and a little later spoke about the incredible boy of the largest impresario in Germany, German Wolf.

Anton Rubinstein considered Hoffmann a unique, one of his kind pianist, like which before that was not in the history of music. Thanks to the persistent persuasion of Rubinstein and Wolf, his father allowed his ten -year -old son. The first performance of Hoffmann Jr. outside Poland was to participate in one of the concerts in the Berlin Philharmonic, where he performed Beethoven's first concert; Hans von Bulov stood behind the conductor's remote control.

This concert became triumphal - the applause and enthusiastic cries did not silent for a long time, causing a young genius to bow. The concert in Paris was attended by Kamil Saint-Sans himself, who said that the boy was the greatest miracle of the era. Much was printed in the press about the Hoffmann; Critics compared him to Mozart, and the listeners idolized him. One day, the parents promised Joseph to pay 25 cents for each concert, and once, after another successful performance, when the audience asked to perform a work on BIS, the young virtuoso said: “No, the concert is over and I earned my quarter.

Having fulfilled another number, behind the scenes he told his father: “From that moment on, you must pay me for each work: 2 cents - for what I wrote, and 5 for everything else.” On the stage of the Metro Opera, he performed the first piano concert of Beethoven, the variation of the Ramo, the brilliant polonaise of the Weber List, several works of Chopin and one work of his own essay.

Adolf Neendorf conducted. The ovations were heard as soon as Joseph ascended the stage. The child was dressed in a striped sailor shirt and knee -deep bridges. The boy made a tremendous impression on the American public. It was a real miracle - Joseph Hoffman played as a master, his performance was poetic and incredibly deep, which did not correspond to the actual age of the artist.

A series of performances followed; In ten weeks, he gave fifty -two concerts in the United States. The organizers carefully monitored the number of pianist's performances; No more than four concerts were supposed to take place per month. However, this requirement was regularly violated, in connection with which the president of the company sent a complaint to the mayor of New York.

On the second of February, Joseph Hoffmann was subjected to a medical examination, which revealed a state of chronic fatigue and general overwork in the boy. Father decided to cancel all the planned concerts. From the side of Henry Abby, a lawsuit was followed in the amount of 75 thousand dollars as a penalty for violation of the terms of the contract. A new medical examination showed that a physically healthy child shows signs of a “mental disorder”.

Abby was forced to withdraw the accusation, otherwise the angry admirers of Hoffmann's work would not give him the possibility of organizational activity and further work. The philanthropist from New York, Alfred Korning Clark decided to help young talent and allocated the amount of money necessary for learning, provided that the child would not concert before adulthood. Moshkovsky was delighted with the pianist’s game, stating that Hoffmann plays the piano much better than himself.

In the year, Joseph was honored to become the only private student of Anton Rubinstein. For two years of classes, Rubinstein gave him about 40 lessons. In his book “Piano Game. He writes the answers to questions about the piano game ”:“ Rubinstein chose the method of indirect instruction through leading questions in the strict sense of the word. Thus, he sought to arouse in me a concrete-musical flair as a parallel to his generalizations, and thereby protect my musical individuality.

” It was Rubinstein who insisted on uncompromising fidelity to the new text, which in practice did not correspond to the maestro's own game.The timid question that Rubinstein should not be proclaimed rule answered: “When you are at my age, you can do the same. If you can. " One day, Maestro called Joseph to himself and asked to prepare in two days his re-minor concert for the performance of the NO4 piano concert Anton Rubinstein, Opus from that moment the pianist became an independent artist.

In the fall of the year, Joseph Hoffmann went on a concert tour. It began in England where his benefactor Alfred Korning Clark came to specially from America, then concerts took place in Germany and Russia. The joint performances of the year, together with Anton Rubinstein, became the last for a creative tandem. Rubinstein died on November 20. Hoffmann learned about his death from the newspaper, heading for a solo concert from London in Cheltenham.

By an amazing coincidence of the circumstances that evening, Joseph Hoffmann performed the Great Second Sonata of Chopin, the third part of which is a mourning march. And that evening he played her not for the audience, but for his closest friend and teacher, Anton Rubinstein. On the last page of the sonata, the audience rose and continued to silently stand up to the final chords, thus choosing the memory of the departed musician.

The day before, on the day of Rubinstein’s death, the first solo concert of Hoffmann took place in London after a seven -year break, not counting the debut in Hamburg. The pianist was performed by Anton Rubinstein Polonaz Mi-Bemol Minor, who was part of the collection “Memories of Dresden”, Opus No. Only twice this essay was performed by Hoffmann in public - on this day and on the second anniversary of the death of the teacher, in St.

Petersburg. In the year, Hoffmann again performed on the stage of the United States. In the year, Hoffmann met with the great pianist Leopold Germ, becoming a close friend with him for many years. Without stopping a stormy concert activity, Hoffmann emigrated to the United States in the year, and received American citizenship in the year. In the year, he headed the Kertisov Institute of Music in Philadelphia, becoming its director, and remained in this post up to a year.

During this time, the institute gained the status of a musical educational institution of world significance. The active performing activity of the musician lasted up to a year; The last time Joseph Hoffmann went on stage on January 19 in Carnegie Hall. The great pianist died on February 16 at the age of 79. In addition to performing practice, Joseph Hoffmann was engaged in composing his own works.

He created about a hundred piano plays in the style of salon music. He wrote music under the pseudonym Mikhail Dvorsky, hiding this fact for many years. By nature, Hoffmann possessed exceptional musical hearing and picked up the works instantly and absolutely accurately, not seeing a musical text before that. History remembers an amazing case of how Hoffmann picked up a difficult piano work by hearing - the transcription of the anniversary "bat" Strauss.

Periodically visiting Leopold Oddovsky in his studio, Joseph eagerly listened to how he worked on this work. A week later, Hoffmann played her note in the note, although Dadovsky himself did not yet record the musical text on paper. Hoffmann was a versatile person. He led radio programs, popularly talking about classical music a wide audience, and was also a good athlete - played tennis, drove a yacht and a car.

The special enthusiasm for Hoffmann was an engineering business - a pianist belonged to a patent for hydraulic springs for the car and on the mechanism of wiper brushes. In the year, Joseph Hoffmann carried out one of the world's first sound recordings on the phonograph. In the last years of his life, the musician was engaged in developments in the field of musical mechanics and recording: he owned several dozen patents for various improvements in the device of piano.

The game of Hoffmann was different from the game of his contemporaries, even from the game Ferrucio Buzoni. She was strict in comparison with the execution of representatives of the Liszt and Leshetitsky school, it reflected a new attitude of the modernity for strict adherence to the musical text. The content of the work and the meaning embedded by its creator have gained paramount importance.

This approach was new, today it is a law for musicians. The composer came to the forefront, while earlier the performer was the main thing - therefore, a free interpretation of the text, its decoration, a large number of improvisations were allowed. Hoffmann believed that the task of the Contractor was to correctly reproduce the musical text and maximally convey the plan of the composer, without introducing improvisations or moving away from what was written, even minimally.

The accuracy of the text did not deprive his performance of freedom and poetry, the music seemed to come to life under the fingers of the musician. Hoffman himself in the book “Piano Game. The answers to questions about the piano game ”said:“ The deliberate, loud protrusion of the precious performing “I” by arbitrary adding nuances, shades, effects, etc. The performer should always be convinced that he plays only what is written ...

The correct interpretation of the musical work follows from the correct understanding of it, and this, in turn, depends only on the meticulously accurate reading. ”