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Wilhelm Walter Friedrich Kempff (25 November 1895 – 23 May 1991) was a German pianist, teacher and composer. Although his repertoire included Bach, Mozart, Chopin, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms, Kempff was particularly well known for his interpretations of the music of Ludwig van Beethoven and Franz Schubert, recording the complete sonatas of both composers.Schubert, Complete Piano Sonatas, 9-LP set Deutsche Grammophon 1976, one of a number of boxed sets issued under the title Hommage à Wilhelm Kempff to celebrate his fifty years of recording for the DG label. Booklets dedicated to both Schubert and Kempff. He is considered to have been one of the chief exponents of the Germanic tradition during the 20th century and one of the greatest pianists of all time.Kaiser, Joachim; Wooldridge, David, translator; Unwin, George, translator (1971). Great Pianists of Our Time. New York: Herder and Herder. . An entire chapter is devoted to Kempff.
Kempff recorded over some sixty years. His recorded legacy includes works of Robert Schumann, Brahms, Franz Schubert, Mozart, Bach, Franz Liszt, Chopin and particularly of Beethoven.
He recorded the complete piano sonata of Franz Schubert long before these works became popular, albeit restricting himself to the finished movements, not fragments, in sonatas that Schubert left incomplete. He also recorded two sets of the complete Beethoven sonatas, one in mono (1951–1956) and the other in stereo (1964–1965); earlier, he recorded nearly all on shellac (1926–1945). He recorded the complete Beethoven twice as well, both with the Berlin Philharmonic; the first from the early 1950s in mono with Paul van Kempen, and the later in stereo from the early 1960s with Ferdinand Leitner. Kempff also recorded chamber music with Yehudi Menuhin, Pierre Fournier, Wolfgang Schneiderhan, Paul Grümmer, and Henryk Szeryng, among others.
He left recordings of most of his repertory, including the complete sonatas of Beethoven and Schubert. He performed to an advanced age, continuing to give concerts past his eightieth birthday. His association with the Berlin Philharmonic spanned over sixty years.
In his book The Veil of Order, the pianist Alfred Brendel wrote that Kempff "played on impulse... it depended on whether the right breeze, as with an aeolian harp, was blowing. You then would take something home that you never heard elsewhere." He regards Kempff as the "most rhythmical" of his colleagues. Brendel helped choose the selections for the Philips label's Great Pianists of the 20th Century issue of Kempff recordings, and wrote in the notes that Kempff "achieves things that are beyond him" in his "unsurpassable" recording of Liszt's first Legende, "St. Francis Preaching to the Birds."
When pianist Artur Schnabel undertook his pioneering complete recording of the Beethoven sonatas in the 1930s, he told EMI that if he didn't complete the cycle, they should have Kempff complete the remainder. Later, when Kempff was in Finland, the composer Jean Sibelius asked him to play the slow movement of Beethoven's 29th Sonata, the Hammerklavier; after Kempff finished, Sibelius told him, "You did not play that as a pianist but rather as a human being." Complete Beethoven Sonatas sleevenotes {{which}}
Other noted pianists to have studied with Kempff include Jörg Demus, Norman Shetler, Mitsuko Uchida, Maria João Pires, Peter Schmalfuss, İdil Biret and Ventsislav Yankov. 88 notes pour piano solo, Jean-Pierre Thiollet, Neva Ed., 2015, p. 340. .
Service to the Nazi regime
During the Nazi rule, Kempff supported it by going on propaganda tours and performing in the countries under Nazi occupation.[1][2]
Technique and style
As a performer Kempff stressed lyricism and spontaneity in music, particularly effective in intimate pieces or passages. He always strove for a singing, lyrical quality. He avoided extreme tempos and display for its own sake.
As a teacher
From 1924 to 1929, Kempff took over the direction of the Stuttgart College of Music as a successor of Max Pauer. In 1931, he was co-founder of the summer courses at Marmorpalais Potsdam. In 1957, Kempff founded Fondazione Orfeo (today: Kempff Kulturstiftung) in the south-Italian city Positano and held his first Beethoven interpretation masterclass at Casa Orfeo, which Kempff had built especially for this reason. He continued teaching there once a year until 1982. His wife died in 1986.
As a composer
A lesser-known activity of Kempff was composing. He composed for almost every genre and used his own cadenzas for Beethoven's Piano Concertos 1–4. His student İdil Biret has recorded a CD of his piano works. His second symphony premiered in 1929 at the Leipzig Gewandhaus by Wilhelm Furtwängler. He also prepared a number of Bach transcriptions, including the siciliana from the Flute Sonata in E-flat major, that have been recorded by Kempff and others. His opera Famile Gozzi, a comic work in three acts, was written in 1934.
Autobiography
Recordings
Among many others:
External links
Categories: 1895 Births, 1991 Deaths, Deutsche Grammophon Artists, German Male Classical Pianists, Litteris Et Artibus Recipients, Musicians From The Province Of Brandenburg, People With Parkinson's Disease, Mendelssohn Prize Winners, 20th-century German Composers, 20th-century German Classical Pianists, 20th-century German Male Musicians
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