Henze, Hans Werner

(b Gtersloh, 1 July 1926). German composer. His formidably

numerous operas, ballets, symphonies and concertos have gained
an established place in the international repertory. His personal
and compositional development has been documented in
numerous interviews, articles, autobiographical essays and books.
Striving for a communicative, impure music concerned with
feelings, ideas, history, people and politics, he has drawn
inspiration for his vocal and instrumental works from a broad
spectrum of renowned poets, writers and librettists.
1. Youth and education, 192649.
2. Composing for the stage, 194652.
3. Italian intermezzo, 195365.
4. Musical activism, 196676.
5. Reflection and synthesis, 1976 and after.
WORKS
WRITINGS
BIBLIOGRAPHY
VIRGINIA PALMER-FCHSEL
Henze, Hans Werner
1. Youth and education, 192649.
Henze was the eldest of six children born to the schoolteacher
Franz Henze and his wife, Margarete (ne Geldmacher). Due to
financial considerations, Margarete and the children remained in
Gtersloh until 1930, when Franz brought the growing family to live
with him in Bielefeld. Budget cuts forced him to accept another
position at the collective school. A proficient amateur musician, he
directed a workers' chorus and brass ensemble and played the
viola in a local chamber orchestra. As befitting the eldest child of a
teacher, Hans Werner received his first piano lessons soon after
beginning primary school. In 1935, by order of the Nazi regime, the
socialist-orientated collective school was dissolved. Franz Henze
was sent to the small village of Dnne, near Bnde, where, in the
framework of village life, he could hardly escape the political and
social pressure exerted by the Nazis. Henze recalls in his memoirs,
Reiselieder mit bhmischen Quinten, how fascist, anti-communist
and anti-Semitic literature gradually filled his father's bookshelves,
replacing banned books by Jewish and Christian authors. With all
the fervour of an uneasy convert to the Nazi party, Franz Henze
imposed the new order and philosophy conscientiously. Religious
instruction ceased and the older boys donned the brown uniform of
the Hitler Youth. Radio propaganda and news programmes
became obligatory fare for the entire family.
But the radio also nourished Henze's musical appetite; through
surreptitious enjoyment of the classical music programmes he
became acquainted with a great deal of Mozart. And despite the

onset of war, he remembers many pleasures. A puppet theatre

opened the children's imaginations to the world of drama. A gift of
the Anna Magdalena notebook introduced him to the music of J.S.
Bach. He formed an ensemble with some other schoolchildren and
occasionally attempted a composition. In addition to his weekly
piano and theory lessons with a local teacher, he was allowed to
accompany his teacher to a chamber music circle in a partly
Jewish household. Until his father discovered their secret, Henze,
together with a boyhood friend who had obtained access to the
library's room for proscribed books, steeped himself in the literature
of authors such as Trakl, Wedekind, Werfel, Hofmannsthal, Mann,
Zweig and Brecht.
By 1942 Henze's father had finally become reconciled to the boy's
vocation as a musician. Having narrowly escaped being sent to a
military music school, Henze won a stipend to attend the Brunswick
State Music School for orchestral musicians, where he studied the
piano, percussion and music theory. He improved his piano
technique under Ernst Schacht and studied Thuillian harmonic
theory with Rudolf Harting. Although he was able to obtain a brief
glimpse into contemporary music outside Germany through a
performance of Frank Martin's Le vin herb, the music of
Hindemith, Bartk, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Webern and Berg
remained a rumour. Meanwhile he utilized his freedom from the
constraints of his family to hear and make as much music as
possible, hardly missing a concert, opera or theatre piece. Mozart's
operas, especially Figaro, became synonymous with classical
beauty, humour and drama. He earned some pocket money and
gained more practical experience by accompanying fellow
musicians and singing in the cathedral choir.
As timpanist in the school orchestra, he learned to appreciate
much of the traditional orchestral literature from its acoustical
depths. This perspective permeates many works, beginning with
the neo-classical First Symphony (1947) in which the timpani, low
woodwinds and low strings form the rhythmic and melodic
foundation. The slow Notturno, which Henze left almost untouched
in his 1963 revision of the symphony, evokes his father's favourite
instrument with an extended viola solo.
Henze's father volunteered for re-entry into the army in 1943; he
was later sent to the Eastern front, from which he never returned.
The difficult relationship with his father fuelled Henze's growing
hatred of fascism, the Nazi regime and war in general. Following
several months of forced labour at the beginning of 1944, most of
the 17-year-olds were conscripted. Commanded to an armoured
tank division stationed in Magdeburg, Henze learned the duties of
a radio officer. In his free time he practised the art of composing
and hearing scores without a piano. He escaped more active duty
through his good fortune in being chosen for a military training-film
team, but his film idyll in Prague was cut short by the Russian
offensive. As the allied armies closed in, Henze's troupe made their

way via Berlin towards Denmark. During his brief internment in a

British prisoner of war camp, Henze used every opportunity to
improve his English and find out about life outside the cultural
prison of the Third Reich. He listened hungrily to works by foreign
and exiled composers broadcast by the BBC. 40 years later he
could still say: Everything that the fascists persecute and hate is
beautiful to me.
For his first major commission, Henze composed out some of his
feelings about the war with a choral and orchestral lament drawn
from the second part of Goethe's Faust, the Chor gefangener
Trojer (1948). His sensitivity to public and personal shame long
continued to motivate musical statements: in his Ninth Symphony
he emulated Beethoven with a seven-movement choral symphony,
setting poems by Hans-Ulrich Treichel based on Anna Seghers's
Das siebte Kreuz, a novel about the trials and martyrdom of young
antifascists.
After returning to his family's new quarters near Bielefeld, Henze
assumed the responsibilities of an eldest son, contributing to the
support of his mother and siblings through jobs as a transport
worker. Despite postwar rubble, hunger, poverty and cold, a
seemingly insatiable appetite for new sounds and music fed his
compositional urges. He gained helpful experience and
connections through volunteer work as a rptiteur for the Bielefeld
Stadttheater. Friends convinced him that, in order to study
composition, he would have to leave Bielefeld. Through a series of
fortunate circumstances, he landed in Heidelberg, where he met
Wolfgang Fortner. Fortner accepted him as a composition student,
enabled his enrolment in the Heidelberg Evangelisches
Kirchenmusikalisches Institut, and placed him with a family as livein tutor. Under Fortner's disciplined instruction, he gained a solid
foundation in Fuxian counterpoint, score reading, instrumentation
and music history. At the same time, he recalled, Fortner gave me
a comprehensive introduction to the realm of modern music and
the aesthetic problems connected with contemporary composition.
His student attempts reflect this rapid study of modern works,
beginning with those of Hindemith, Bartk and Stravinsky. In the
summer of 1946, he attended the first Darmstadt summer courses
for new music, for which he composed the short Kammerkonzert
(1946), a neo-baroque concerto grosso for piano, flute and strings
dedicated to his teacher. Although in many respects still an
apprentice piece, this at its first performance nevertheless won him
a contract from the influential publisher Willy Strecker, the
auspicious beginning of an enduring association with the firm
Schott.
A year later, following his first hearings of Bartk's and Berg's violin
concertos, he gradually distanced himself from the confines of
post-Hindemithian neo-classicism, exploring the possibilities of 12note composition. The first movement of his First Violin Concerto
contrasts a folk-like melody in A Lydian with a 12-note melodic

theme, while the repetitive bitonal opening theme of the third

movement betrays his growing fascination with Stravinsky's
melodic and harmonic idiom. More than 30 years later, in his
published notebook Die Englische Katze, he confessed that even
today, in my new works, one notices the influence of Stravinskian
harmony. Under the occasional tutelage of Josef Rufer in Munich
and Ren Leibowitz in Darmstadt and Paris, Henze became the
first of the younger German composers to embrace the 12-note
method as an answer to his aesthetic and technical difficulties. His
gradual mastery of the principles can be observed in such works as
Whispers from Heavenly Death (1948), a cantata for high voice
and eight solo instruments, and the Kammersonate for piano trio
(1948, rev. 1963). Henze came to regard the chamber concerto for
harpsichord and eight solo instruments Apollo et Hyazinthus
(19489), as one of his first mature works, uniting the abstract 12note method and the formal ideal of the concerto-sonata with an
extra-musical story culminating in a poem. Following a contrapuntal
scherzo and the expected harpsichord cadenza, an alto stands
and, to a lyric melody outlining successively three permutations of
the row, sings Trakl's autumn lament Im Park. This textually
orientated tangle of associations, styles, means and themes
became characteristic of Henze's mature idiom. As the Darmstadt
school of 12-note composition closed ranks, Henze became the
first to question the reign of serialism, preferring an undogmatic,
tonally flexible approach to dodecaphonic composition. The use of
12-note rows as vital material during the conceptual stages can be
observed in the sketches even of works from the 1990s.
Henze, Hans Werner
2. Composing for the stage, 194652.
Whereas at the beginning of his 20s Henze was still struggling for a
living, within a few years he was in the enviable position of having
more commissions than he could handle. His student years in
Gttingen were followed by brief periods in Konstanz, Berlin,
Wiesbaden and Munich: it was a frenetic time of beginnings, first
successes and scandals. He made his way in a life-sized theatre,
juggling roles, masks, costumes, scenery, relationships, puzzles
and games of identity. In search of the right sounds for the given
dramatic moment, he assimilated many musical styles, unifying
diverse elements within his lyrical, tonally orientated 12-note idiom.
He became adept at stylistic quotation and parody. Still distrusting
the bourgeois milieu of opera, he used actors for his first
experiment with imaginary musical theatre, Das Wundertheater
(1948, revised in 1964 for singers and orchestra), based on an
intermezzo by Cervantes. Meanwhile his sympathies were being
drawn increasingly to dance. His first choreographic poem, BallettVariationen (1949, rev. 1992 and 1998), was inspired by a
performance of the Sadler's Wells Ballet in Hamburg. In the
summer of 1949 he was appointed musical adviser to the shortlived German Theatre in Konstanz. His next ballet, Jack Pudding,

was compiled from music composed for performances of Molire's

Georges Dandin. (Henze recomposed the ballet in 19925 under
the new name Le disperazioni del Signor Pulcinella, adding some
song numbers based on Neapolitan texts.) Dance metaphors also
mould his First Piano Concerto (1950). The scenario moves from a
lively dialogue between orchestra and piano in the first movement,
Entre, through the intimate Pas de deux to a toccata-like Coda.
Following the disappointing Berlin premire of Wundertheater,
Henze won the patronage of the chief choreographer of the Berlin
Stdtische Oper, Tatjana Gsovsky. While angling for a ballet
commission, he composed his Third Symphony (194950) with the
suggestive subtitles Invocation of Apollo, Dithyramb and
Evocation Dance. The East German composer Paul Dessau
befriended him, beginning a fatherly dialogue that anticipated
Henze's later politicization. But it proved too difficult at this time for
the young provincial composer to make his way in postwar Berlin.
Henze wove many impressions from this failure-ridden winter into a
ballet piece, Das Vokaltuch der Kammersngerin Rosa Silber
(1950). This exercise with Stravinsky on a picture of Paul Klee,
which he revised in 1990, combines classical ballet exercises,
variations on a French folksong and compositional touches
recalling Stravinsky and Blacher, to whom the piece was dedicated.
In 195053 Henze received commissions for dramatic music of
various kinds, beginning with an operatic modernization of the
Manon Lescaut material, Boulevard Solitude (1950) and ending
with Wolfgang Hildesheimer's loveless legend Das Ende einer
Welt (radio opera, 1953). A picture of Henze's increasingly stressed
lifestyle can be drawn from the statistics: five ballet pieces, a
monodrama, a wind quintet, a piano sonata, his second string
quartet and four sets of incidental stage music were composed and
produced between the aforementioned operas. Many of these
works were occasioned by Henze's new position in Wiesbaden as
artistic director and conductor of the Hessisches Staatstheater
ballet. Later he judged the mixed quality of these pieces severely.
Three were withdrawn completely from his 1964 list of works. Many
underwent thorough revisions. Four decades later some of the
rejected ballet sketches inspired new compositions.
Henze, Hans Werner
3. Italian intermezzo, 195365.
With the help of friends advances, a small stipend and meagre
savings, Henze fled from mounting personal and social pressures
to Italy. He chose a seaside house in Forio on the island of Ischia
for his hermitage, devoting his days to studying the local language
and culture, composing, writing, and the critical evaluation of his
compositional methods and goals. His initial task was the
completion of the cello concerto Ode an den Westwind (1953), the
first piece in which he attempted a closer interaction between
instrumental music and text, a kind of poetry for the instruments.

The five sonnets of Shelley's ode inspire not only the form and
mood of the concerto, but are sung by the cello voice.
Henze's primary attention was then given to the realization of
Heinz von Cramer's libretto for Knig Hirsch, a retelling of Gozzis
fairytale about magical transformation, metamorphosis and
liberation. The composition process lasted three years, becoming a
compositional diary in which Henze worked through his
impressions of Italian musical life, both high and low. Whereas at
the beginning he was still employing 12-note methods, over time
his style grew more vocally and tonally orientated. He explored
simpler elements of song which could touch the listener at the
primal, sensual level. As he recalled:
the discovery of melody brought about an enrichment
of my expressive means. The difficult process of
simplifying my musical language was accelerated by
the discovery of the remarkable vigour and
immediacy of street cries and canzonetti resting on
simple intervallic relationships. In place of serial
melody, which outwardly guaranteed a certain
contemporaneity, came the most simple sequence
of notes the basic intervals that were naturally
related to song were to contain everything that was to
be said.
For his modern rendition of a Baroque Mrchenoper, Henze strung
together scenes based on closed, historical forms: arias, duets,
cabalettas, canzoni, ensembles, passacaglias and hunt music.
Bridge passages joined the broad scenes, lending the whole a
through-composed continuity, the finale of the second act, a
seasonal forest symphony, became the Symphony no.4 (1955).
But even before its premire in September 1956, the opulently
scored opera in three acts was doomed. Convinced of the
impossibility of this long and, in his opinion, unfashionable opera,
Hermann Scherchen, the conductor, undertook radical cuts. The
mutilated opera earned justifiably mixed reviews. Henze and
Cramers compromised version, retitled Il re cervo, oder Die
Irrfahrten der Wahrheit (1963), compensated for discarded scenes
with some new recitatives and a narrative speaking role, the
magician Cigolotti. The original score was not performed in its
entirety until 1985.
The Austrian poet Ingeborg Bachmann joined Henze at his island
retreat in the summer of 1953, strengthening a friendship that
yielded six collaborations. Their probing dialogue about literature,
history, music and philosophy laid the foundation for Henze's
understanding of the reciprocal relationship of text, music and
signs. In a 1959 lecture about the message of music, he wrote:
Language and music are two parallel spheres that
are often connected; more than half of all existing
music consists of settings of words. This relationship

has diverse forms; sometimes music seizes violently

upon language, and crushes it in its embrace, or
sometimes language wants to seize upon music; they
both can degrade but also can elevate one another.
At Henze's request, Bachmann worked on a new concept and text
for his ballet-pantomime Der Idiot (scenario by Gsovsky based on
Dostoyevsky's novel), which had received its Berlin premire in
1952. Bachmann replaced Gsovsky's pastiche of quotes with a
dramatic Monologue of Prince Mishkin. Her superior text,
however, disrupted the delicate balance of pantomime, dance,
poetry and music, necessitating a revision of the music (completed
in 1990). While finishing Knig Hirsch, Henze composed an
orchestral counterpoint to Bachmann's radio play, Die Zikaden.
With Quattro poemi (1955), commissioned by the city of Darmstadt
for the tenth of the international summer courses for new music,
Henze declared his independence from the Darmstadt avant garde.
For his next two ballets he ventured into hitherto alien territory,
exploring jazz in Luchino Visconti's social critique Maratona (1956)
and 19th-century Romanticism for Frederick Ashton's evocative
vehicle for Margot Fonteyn, Undine (19567). Impressions of
Henze's new residence in Naples coloured orchestral songs such
as the Fnf neapolitanische Lieder (1956, composed for Dietrich
Fischer-Dieskau and dedicated to Bachmann) and Nachtstcke
und Arien (1957), three orchestral movements framing two
Bachmann poems for lyric soprano and orchestra.
Henze's bittersweet honeymoon with classical Greece and Italy
reverberated in Kammermusik 1958, a setting of a Hlderlin ode on
classical themes. The original 12 movements, balancing three
songs for tenor and guitar and three tentos for solo guitar with
three octet movements and three movements for the full ensemble,
attain melodic and harmonic unity through intervallic relationships
introduced in the first movement. A final Adagio for the octet was
added in 1963, in honour of Josef Rufer's 70th birthday.
Notwithstanding the choice of title, Kammermusik 1958 is the
antithesis of abstract music. The recurring themes and semantic
chains of the poem are associated with musical elements and
signs, thus facilitating an audible relationship between words and
music. In his search for means to express the inexpressible within
the intimate confines of chamber music, Henze drew upon models
as diverse as Dowland, Miln, Monteverdi, Britten (to whom the
work is dedicated), Schoenberg and Webern. As with most of his
concertos and chamber works, Kammermusik 1958 was composed
for specific musicians, enhancing and challenging the artistry of the
tenor Peter Pears and the guitarist Julian Bream.
The musical and textual themes of Kammermusik 1958 unfolded in
his next opera, Der Prinz von Homburg (1958), which he dedicated
to Stravinsky. Bachmann's perceptive adaptation of Heinrich von
Kleist's play focusses on the opposition of reality and dreams,
freedom and force, choice and compulsion, Olympian classicism

and German Romanticism. The resulting conflicts are echoed in

the carefully balanced musical tension between vocal and
instrumental idioms, contrapuntal polyphony and homophonic
lyricism, structural serialism and free tonality.
Emboldened by the success of Homburg, Henze asked W.H.
Auden and Chester Kallmann for a psychological drama suitable
for a chamber opera on the scale of Mozart's Cos. They
responded with Elegy for Young Lovers, a tragicomic opera of
mutually exploitative relationships revolving around a Romantic
genius-hero, the poet Mittenhofer. The passage of time amid the
snow-covered Austrian Alps of the scenario suggested the cold
sound of percussive instruments, including the celesta, tubular
bells, marimba, vibraphone, timpani, drums, crotales and metal
blocks. Each of the six singers received a personal musical idiom
and an instrumental consort suited to their character and vocal
range. Henze refined this technique in later operas. For this one he
also took on the additional role of stage director, in order to be able
to realize the drama he had envisioned while composing. Due to
the short time between commencement and the May 1961
premire at the Schwetzingen Festspiele he worked with several
assistants in Berlin in order to facilitate the composition, translation,
score production and stage direction for what turned out to be one
of his most successful operas.
Needing to live closer to Rome and an international airport, yet
longing for a quiet country residence, Henze found his heart's
home in the Castelli Romani, settling at first in Castel Gandolfo. He
also accepted a composition masterclass at the Salzburg
Mozarteum (19626) and worked on his Fifth Symphony (1962).
The opening notes of a song from Elegy pervade this work, again
illustrating Henze's premise that Everything moves towards
theatre, and thence returns again. In May 1963 he flew for the first
time to New York for the premire of his Fifth Symphony under
Bernstein. The grim contrast of Harlem and Fifth Avenue spurred
his quest for Mozartian beauty, culminating in three vocal works:
Ariosi (settings of five Tasso poems for soprano, violin and
orchestra), the choral Cantata della fiaba estrema and Being
Beauteous, a cantata for coloratura soprano, harp and cello
quartet. His setting of the enigmatic Rimbaud poem evokes an
image of beauty on the verge of being, elusive, beyond reach.
Within a sonata-like structure, Being Beauteous balances severe
counterpoint with vocal coloratura. Surreal waltzes surround an
ethereal pas de deux between the harp and soprano. The four
atonal, disguised canons contrast with homophonic passages
employing tonal devices such as prolonged pedal points, tense
stacks of fully-diminished seventh chords and unresolved
cadences.
Now Henze was finally able to enjoy the pleasure of conquering
Berlin. On 9 and 12 April 1964 all five of his symphonies were
performed under Karajan by the Berlin PO, together with the

premire of Being Beauteous, sung by Ingeborg Hallstein. And the

Deutsche Oper Berlin commissioned a new opera, for which Henze
turned to Bachmann. Bachmann suggested Wilhelm Hauff's
parable Der Affe als Mensch. Her elegantly satirical libretto foils the
eccentric whims of an outsider, a rich English Lord, against the
Gemtlichkeit of a small German city's populace. Taking buffo
operas of Rossini and Mozart for his models, Henze limited himself
to a Classical orchestra with few modern trimmings. The escalating
confusion of the ensemble numbers framing the lovers' duets
provided ample opportunity for humorous parody spiced with
quotations, contrasting established conventions with contemporary
techniques:
In my works for the theatre I have therefore never
completely left tonality, not even in the earliest ones.
My music is nourished by just this state of tension:
the abandonment of traditional tonality and the return
to it. Rather like tensing a bow, it is here a kind of
tensing the ear.
Proceeds from the widely performed opera Der junge Lord
financed the completion of Henze's countryside villa, La Leprara, in
nearby Marino. While composing the score he expressed his
gratitude to his sister with a Chorfantasie, Lieder von einer Insel
(1964), setting poetic impressions from Bachmann's first days with
Henze in Ischia. Intimately contrapuntal dialogues between two
cellos connect the choruses. In keeping with the thoughtfully festive
nature of the poems, the chamber choruses are accompanied by
low melodic instruments.
The subject for Henze's next opera, The Bassarids (19645), was
proposed by Auden in 1961. When Henze requested a new libretto
for the Salzburg Festival in August 1966, Auden assented to the
task, provided Henze take a corrective dose of Wagner's
Gtterdmmerung. Auden and Kallmann's opera seria, a
psychoanalytical reinterpretation of Euripides' play, links major
characters to similar manifestations from antiquity to the belle
poque. Immediately after the premire of Der junge Lord Henze
went to work at a feverish pace in order to be ready for the
Salzburg production by the Berlin Elegy and Lord team (the
Deutsche Oper of Berlin with Rudolf Sellner as director, Christoph
von Dohnnyi conductor and Filippo Sanjust designer; fig.2).
Despite Auden's prescription, Wagner's dramas left few traces in
Henze's music at this time; rather he invoked Mahler and mocked
Strauss. Brief Bachian quotations underline pivotal developments.
Cast in the form of a symphony in four movements, with Auden's
farcical intermezzo interrupting the long adagio scene between
Pentheus and Dionysus, The Bassarids condensed all that Henze
had learnt since emigrating to Italy.
Henze, Hans Werner
4. Musical activism, 196676.

The travails of travelling, teaching, conducting engagements,

commissions, revisions of earlier works and composing two so very
different operas withing the space of one and a half years led to a
personal and compositional crisis. This time Henze's compulsive
questioning of himself and the world around him led in new
directions. Bachmann and friends among the left-wing intelligentsia
had already prodded him out of his musical isolation, directing his
attention towards antifascist literature and current events. This had
resulted in musical statements such as the collective oratorio
Jdische Chronik (1960, compositions by Blacher, Dessau,
Hartmann, Henze and Wagner-Rgeny to texts by Jens Gerlach)
and In memoriam: Die Weie Rose (1965), a double fugue for 12
instruments dedicated to the young antifascist martyrs Hans and
Sophie Scholl. Henze's operatic loner figures (such as the leading
male roles of Knig Hirsch, Elegy, Der junge Lord and The
Bassarids) now gave way to a new concern for the analogous
conflicts between individuals and society inherent in the concerto
form. In Musen Siziliens (1966), a concerto for mixed choir, two
pianos, wind instruments and timpani on fragments from the
Eclogues of Virgil, he highlighted the concertante piano duo and
melodic instruments, relegating a declamatory, almost
accompanimental role to the amateur chorus. With the Double
Bass Concerto (1966), composed for Gary Karr, his search for
friendship, fellowship, understanding yielded a more social,
discursive relationship between the protagonists. The virtuoso
doubles of the Double Concerto (1966) for oboe, harp and strings
were composed for Heinz and Ursula Holliger, whose pioneering
expertise encouraged Henze to experiment with new techniques
for the soloists, such as percussive effects, harmonics, double trills
and microtones. The nocturnal opening of his one-movement Piano
Concerto no.2 (1967, composed for Christoph Eschenbach and the
Bielefeld PO) gives way to a rhythmically aggressive battle
between the piano and orchestra, with the pianist pitted against the
percussion battery. Henze's tormented self-examination concludes
with saturnine music inspired by the Shakespeare sonnet The
expense of spirit in a waste of shame.
Triggered by a teaching stint in Dartmouth, New Hampshire
(summer 1967), and the student protests in Berlin (19678),
Henze's internal unrest exploded into action. He met with leaders
of the socialist student groups, participated in peace
demonstrations and co-initiated the Vietnam Congress. The
socialist poet Hans Magnus Enzensberger introduced him to
Gastn Salvatore, a Chilean student who contributed the outraged
poems for his first experiment with avant-garde vocal techniques in
Versuch ber Schweine (composed in 1968 for the unique vocal
range and talents of Roy Hart). But his revolt first became public on
9 December 1968, when scandal wrecked the premire of his
oratorio volgare e militare Das Floss der Medusa, for soprano,
baritone, mixed chorus, boys' voices and large orchestra.
Encouraged by the work's dedication to Ernesto Che Guevara

(occasioned by the guerrilla hero's assassination in October 1967),

students hung a red flag from Henze's conducting podium,
provoking a spontaneous boycott by the NDR SO and the RIAS
Chamber Choir which escalated into a full-blown battle. Henze fell
uncomfortably between stools. The promoters held him responsible
for the fiasco; critics, patrons and the concert-going public were
outraged by his betrayal; and Marxist agitators accused him of
armchair communism.
Many of his vocal compositions of the late 1960s and early 70s can
be regarded as period pieces, barely separable from the events
that produced them. His recital for four El Cimarrn (196970),
however, transcended its Cuban impetus (stimulated by the
premire of his Sixth Symphony in Havana) to become one of his
most frequently performed chamber works. He wrote it for the black
American baritone William Pearson, Karlheinz Zller on a wide
selection of flutes, the Japanese percussionist Stomu Yamash'ta
and the Cuban composer and guitarist Leo Brouwer. The four
performers co-create a dramatic portrayal of the runaway slave
Estaban Montejo (adapted freely by Hans Magnus Enzensberger
from Miguel Barnet's documentary novel); Caribbean colours and
expressive
contemporary
techniques
enrich
Henze's
unconventionally notated score. The emotionally charged vocal
part expands on song, recitative and Sprechgesang with special
effects such as falsetto, whistling, scat, screams, chanting and
laughing.
This series of experiments with political vocal works culminated in
Voices (1973), a collection of songs for mezzo-soprano and tenor.
The 22 German, English, Italian and Spanish songs (a personal
selection of protest, resistance, socialist and communist poems
ending with an Enzensberger happy-end duet) are dedicated to a
symbolic list of comrades and friends. Henze's deliberately eclectic
palette blends exotic folksong elements, protest songs, touches of
Weill and Dessau, standard dances, marches, light opera, cabaret
and popular traits of classical music with contemporary features
such as 12-note writing, extended instrumental techniques,
aleatory passages and controlled improvisation. Calling for over 80
individual instruments, the work was tailored to the capabilities of
the 15 core players of the London Sinfonietta.
Henze's doubts, concerns and socialist dreams were also echoed
in his instrumental works. Compases para preguntas
ensimismadas (196970, for viola and 22 instrumentalists) carries
musical individualism to its logical extreme: every player is a
soloist. The viola's opening short notes about passing moods
develop toward a seemingly anarchical climax out of which the
viola ascends, leading the way towards agreement. Electronically
processed tape elements pervaded works such as Henze's
monodrama Der langwierige Weg in die Wohnung der Natascha
Ungeheuer (1971), the Second Violin Concerto (1971) and Tristan
(19723). The concerto, a theatrical commentary on

Enzensberger's Hommage Gdel, includes a bass-baritone part

and a tape. Tristan, subtitled preludes for piano, electronic sounds
and orchestra is an elegiac homage to the Wagner opera and its
legendary beings. Tristan's folly expressed Henze's grief over the
recent deaths of Bachmann, Auden, the choreographer John
Cranko, Neruda and Salvador Allende.
Henze, Hans Werner
5. Reflection and synthesis, 1976 and after.
Beginning with his leadership of the Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte
in Montepulciano, Henze began to devote more time to his musical
past and posterity. In the mid-1980s he donated his manuscripts to
the Paul Sacher Foundation and later, while writing his memoirs
and putting his works in order for an up-to-date annotated
catalogue, undertook revisions of works that failed to meet his
current compositional standards. Hardly a year passed without new
honours, workshops and professorships, including a composition
class at the Staatliche Hochschule fr Musik in Cologne (198091),
the Bach Prize of Hamburg (1983), a chair at the RAM in London
(1987), artistic direction of the Munich Biennale festival for new
music theatre (beginning in 1988), the Grosses Verdienstkreuz der
Bundesrepublik Deutschland (1991), the Accademico Onorario of
the Accademia di S Cecilia, Rome, and an honorary doctorate from
the University of Osnabrck (1996).
During the first years of the socio-cultural experiment in
Montepulciano, Henze contributed many new compositions.
Performances of his versions of the Paisiello operas Don
Chisciotte (1976) and Il re Teodoro in Venezia (19912), involved
local talent as much as possible. His first sonata for solo guitar,
Royal Winter Music (19756), more than repaid Julian Bream for
teaching masterclasses during the first Cantiere. Portraying
Shakespearean characters, the six movements probe the dramatic,
musical and technical range of the instrument. A second
Shakespearean sonata for guitar followed in 1979. The operatic
fairy tale Pollicino (1980) strove towards an educationally useful
and musically rewarding integration of children and professional
musicians. Many assistants were rewarded with chamber pieces.
For instance, the mixed quintet Amicizia! (1976) was written for the
composer's loyal Hamburg comrades from Hinz und Kunst, a
politically active group of composers and instrumentalists who were
also featured in his imaginary theatre for a singer and a small
instrumental ensemble El rey de Harlem (1979). For his throughcomposed setting of Garca Lorca's ode, he experimented with a
system of textual-musical signal motives. Using a chromatic scale
linked to the alphabet, Henze wove key words into the densely
contrapuntal texture. Surface signs such as street noises, Spanish
ornamentation and jungle effects help the listener imagine the
action.

A Sonata for solo violin (19767, rev. 1992) became the first of a
constellation of works prompted by Monteverdi's Orfeo. Still
mourning the death of his mother, Henze asked Edward Bond for a
ballet treatment of the myth. In Orpheus (1978) instruments replace
voices, singing a drama that the dancers enact. The central five
poems were later set for a cappella chorus in Orpheus behind the
Wire (19813). Barcarola for large orchestra (1979) was dedicated
to the memory of Dessau; the viola introduces a variation theme
that Henze identified with the river Styx. His preoccupation with the
themes of life and death, fear, war and love later found poignant
expression in the wordless Requiem for solo piano, concertante
trumpet and large chamber orchestra (199092), created as a
memorial to Michael Vyner. The nine sacred concertos are based
musically on the withdrawn Concerto per il Marigny for piano and
seven instruments (1956), motifs from the requiem mass and two
12-note rows.
As with Bachmann and Auden, Henze's collaborations with Edward
Bond yielded two very different operas. Their violent actions for
music We Come to the River (19746), relate a politically
motivated morality tale performed on three stages, each with its
own orchestra. For the controversial Covent Garden premire,
Henze again directed the staging. Following Orpheus, he asked
Bond for a comic animal opera based on Balzac's Peines de coeur
d'une chatte. Behind a deliberately clich-ridden, pseudo-Victorian
mask, satirical strokes underline comparisons with contemporary
hypocrisies. As in Elegy, the lovers are sacrificed unjustly to the
higher good. Henze delineates the main characters with signature
instruments and individual melodic-harmonic styles. Lord Puff
dithers with an English Renaissance air, Tom swaggers with
bravura, while Minette warbles elaborate coloratura arias. For the
benefit of his composition students in Cologne, Henze kept a
detailed autobiographical diary of the work's progress, Die
Englische Katze, which was published in time for the opera's
premire at the Schwetzingen Festival on 2 June 1983, once again
with Henze as stage director.
15 years after his Cuban Sixth Symphony for two orchestras (1969,
revised in 1994), Henze responded to a commission from the
Berlin PO with a retrospective, four-movement treatment of the
standard form. His Seventh Symphony (19834) begins with an
allemande, after which a slow lied and a scherzo in perpetual
motion are followed by a calm, cheerless finale expressing the
essence of Hlderlin's poem Hlfte des Lebens. In contrast with
the sombre Germanic nature of this work, the lighter Eighth
Symphony (19923) reaffirmed his affection for England and Italy.
Three scenes from A Midsummer Night's Dream provided the
impetus for this piece of imaginary theatre. Voicing Oberon's
command to Puck, the airy first movement suggests
Mendelssohn's music for the same play. In the second movement,
groups of instruments become the actors for a danced dialogue
between the love-sick Titania and the ludicrous Bottom (to be

compared with the treatment of Bottom's dream in the second

Royal Winter Music sonata). The adagio finale, based loosely on
images from Puck's epilogue, unveils the 12-note theme of the
variations heard in the preceding movements.
Desirous of composing German operas again, Henze now found it
necessary to train a young poet in the art of writing words for his
music. He chose Hans-Ulrich Treichel for his next pair of operas,
Das verratene Meer (19869) and Venus und Adonis (19935). In
both a tragic love triangle forms the dramatic core. In Henze and
Treichel's two-act adaptation of Yukio Mishima's novel The Sailor
who Fell from Grace with the Sea, the conflicts inherent in a
mother-son, mother-lover complex are intensified by the gap
between teenage ideals and adult compromises. The throughcomposed score identifies with the characters and their drama
within a dispassionate structure representing universal symbols
such as seasons, colours and the betrayed sea.
Henze's youthful passion for drama, ballet, mythology and classic
themes of love come full circle with Venus und Adonis (19935). In
their one-act reinterpretation of Ovid and Shakespeare, Henze and
Treichel extended the triangle symbolism to all formal aspects. The
tragic development of a backstage affair involving a prima donna, a
heroic actor and a young tenor are shadowed by dancers enacting
Venus, Adonis and Mars. Three orchestras support the mythic
prototypes. A brief pantomime by masked dancers represents the
animalistic level of mare, stallion and boar. Often to the detriment
of the dramatic development, the orchestral and vocal music
express Henze's ongoing search for wild, free beauty and
Mozartian perfection of form. As in The English Cat, he reserves
his most moving counterpoint for choral interludes, here sung by
six pastoral madrigalists fulfilling the role of a Greek chorus.
Lonely was I when torn by the boar.
Now
I
am
a
star
among
stars.
Lonely was I when my feet touched the ground.
Lonely was I when a heart beat within me.
Adonis's epilogue speaks on behalf of an aging composer who still
wishes only to understand and to be understood.
Henze, Hans Werner
WORKS
operas and music-theatre
ballets
other dramatic works
symphonies
orchestral
choral
solo vocal
chamber
solo instrumental
arrangements and reconstructions

Henze, Hans Werner: Works

operas and music-theatre
Das Wundertheater (op for actors, 1, after M. de Cervantes, trans. A. Graf von
Schack), 1948, Heidelberg, Stadttheater, 7 May 1949; rev. for singers, 1964,
Frankfurt, Staatstheater, 30 Nov 1965
Boulevard Solitude (lyric drama, 7 scenes, G. Weil, scenario by W. Jockisch), 1951,
Hanover, Oper, 17 Feb 1952
Ein Landarzt (radio op, after F. Kafka), 1951, Hamburg, 19 Nov 1951, broadcast 29
Nov 1951; rev. 1994; stage version 1964, Frankfurt, Staatstheater, 30 Nov 1965
Das Ende einer Welt (radio op, prol, 2, epilogue, W. Hildesheimer), 1953, Hamburg,
4 Dec 1953; rev. 1993; stage version, 1964; Frankfurt, Staatstheater, 30 Nov 1965
Knig Hirsch (3, H. von Cramer), after C. Gozzi), 19525, Berlin, Stdtische Oper,
23 Sept 1956; rev. 1962 as Il re cervo, oder Die Irrfahrten der Wahrheit, Kassel,
Staatstheater, 10 March 1963
Der Prinz von Homburg (3, I. Bachmann, after H. von Kleist), 1958, Hamburg,
Staatsoper, 22 May 1960; reorchd 1991, Munich, Bayerische Staatsoper, 24 July
1992
Elegy for Young Lovers (3, W.H. Auden and C. Kallman), 195961, Schwetzingen,
Schwetzinger Schloss, 20 May 1961; rev. 1987, Venice, La Fenice, 28 Oct 1988
The Bassarids (os with intermezzo, 1, Auden and Kallman, after Euripides: The
Bacchae), 19645, Salzburg, 6 Aug 1966
Der junge Lord (comic op, 2, Bachmann, after W. Hauff), 1964, Berlin, Deutsche
Oper, 7 April 1965
Moralities (3 morality plays, Auden, after Aesop), 1967, Cincinnati, 18 May 1968;
rev. version, Saarbrcken, Kongresshalle, 1 April 1970
Der langwierige Weg in die Wohnung der Natascha Ungeheuer (show, G.
Salvatore), 1971, Rome, RAI, 17 May 1971
La Cubana, oder Ein Leben fr die Kunst (vaudeville for TV, 5 scenes, H.M.
Enzensberger, after M. Barnet), 1973, New York, WNET Opera Theater, 4 March
1974; Munich, Staatstheater am Grtnerplatz, 28 May 1975; chbr version La piccola
Cubana, 199091
We Come to the River (actions for music, E. Bond), 19746, London, CG, 12 July
1976
Pollicino (musical fairy tale, G. Di Leva, after Collodi, J.L. and W.C. Grimm and C.
Perrault), 197980, Montepulciano, 2 Aug 1980
The English Cat (story for singers and instrumentalists, 2, Bond, after H. de Balzac),
198083, Stuttgart, Staatsoper, 2 June 1983; rev. 1990, Montepulciano, 9 Aug 1990
dipus der Tyrann (musical play, H. Hollmller), 1983, collab. H.-J. von Bse, S.
Holt, D. Lang, Kindberg, 30 Oct 1983; withdrawn
Das verratene Meer (music drama, 2, Treichel, after Y. Mishima: Gogo No Eiko [The
Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea]), 19869, Berlin, Deutsche Oper, 5 May
1990
Venus and Adonis (1, Treichel), 19935, Munich, Staatsoper, 11 Jan 1997
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
ballets
Ballet-Variationen, 1949, concert perf. Dusseldorf, 28 Sept 1949, staged Wuppertal,
21 Dec 1958; rev. 1992, concert perf. Berlin, 14 Nov 1998
Jack Pudding (3 pts, S. Sivori, after Molire: Georges Dandin), 1949, Wiesbaden,
Hessisches Staatstheater, 30 Dec 1950; withdrawn, incorporated into ballet Le

disperazioni di Signor Pulcinella, 19925

Das Vokaltuch der Kammersngerin Rosa Silber, 1950, concert perf. Berlin, TitianaPalast, 8 May 1951, staged Cologne, 15 Oct 1958; rev. 1990, concert perf., London,
14 Jan 1991
Le Tombeau d'Orphe, 1950, withdrawn
Labyrinth (1. M. Baldwin), 1951, concert perf. 29 May 1952; new version, 1996,
Schwetzingen, Schwetzinger Schloss, 25 May 1997
Der Idiot (Mimodram, Bachmann, after F.M. Dostoyevsky), 1952, Berlin, 1 Sept
1952, rev. 1990
Pas daction, 1952, Munich, Bayerische Staatsoper, 1952; withdrawn, incorporated
into Tancredi, 1964
Maratona (Tanzdrama, 1, L. Visconti), 1956, Berlin, Stdtische Oper, 24 Sept 1957
Undine (3, F. Ashton, after F.H.K. de la Motte Fouqu), 19567, London, CG, 27 Oct
1958
Lusignolo dellimperatore (balletto-pantomima, G. di Majo, after H.C. Andersen),
1959, Venice, La Fenice, 16 Sept 1959; red. H. Brauel, fl, cel, pf, perc, 1970
Tancredi (2 scenes, P. Csobdi), 1964, Vienna, Staatsoper, 18 May 1966 [based on
Pas d'action, 1952]
Orpheus (6 scenes, E. Bond), 1978, Stuttgart, Wrttembergische Staatsoper, 17
March 1979; concert version, spkr, orch, 1978
Le disperazioni del Signor Pulcinella (commedia di balletto con canto, S. Sivori,
after Molire: Georges Dandin), 19925, Schwetzingen, Schwetzinger Schloss, 25
May 1997 [extended rev. of Jack Pudding, 1949]
Le fils de l'air (L'enfant chang en jeune homme) (ballet, J. Cocteau), 19956,
Schwetzingen, Schwetzinger Schloss, 25 May 1997
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
other dramatic works
Die Gefangenen (incid music, M. Kommerell), 1950
Der tolle Tag (incid music, Beaumarchais), 1951, withdrawn
Judith (incid music, J. Giraudoux), 1952
Sodom und Gomorrha (incid music, Giraudoux), 1952
Der sechste Gesang (incid music for radio, E. Schnabel), 1955
Die Zikaden (incid music for radio, Bachmann), 1955, withdrawn
Les caprices de Marianne (incid music, J.-P. Ponnelle, after A. de Musset), 1962,
withdrawn
Muriel (film score, dir. A. Resnais), 1963
Der Frieden (incid music, Aristophanes, trans. P. Hacks), 1964
Der junge Trless (film score, dir. V. Schlndorff, after R. Musil), 1966
Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum (film score, dir. Schlndorff, after H. Bll),
1975
Der Taugenichts (film score, dir. B. Sinkel), 1977
The Woman (incid music, Bond), 1978, withdrawn
Montezuma (film score), 1980
Nach Lissabon (film score, J. Melo), 1982
Un amour de Swann (film score, dir. Schlndorff, after M. Proust), 1983
L'amour mort (film score, dir. Resnais), 1984
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
symphonies
Symphony no.1, chbr orch, 1947, rev. 1963, 1991

Symphony no.2, 1949

Symphony no.3, 194950
Symphony no.4, 1955 [from op Knig Hirsch]
Vokalsinfonie (H. von Cramer), solo vv, orch, 1955 [from op Knig Hirsch]
Symphony no.5, 1962
Symphony no.6, 2 chbr orch, 1969, rev. 1994
Symphony no.7, 19834
Symphony no.8, after W. Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream, 19923
Symphony no.9 (H.-U. Treichel, after A. Seghers: Das siebte Kreuz), chorus, orch,
19957
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
orchestral
Kammerkonzert, pf, fl, str, 1946
Concertino, pf, wind, perc, 1947
Violin Concerto no.1, 1947
Ballett-Variationen, 1949, rev. 1992 and 1998
Suite, small orch, 1949 [from ballet Jack Pudding]
Piano Concerto no.1, 1950
Sinfonische Variationen, chbr orch, 1950, withdrawn
Sinfonische Zwischenspiele, 1951 [from op Boulevard Solitude]
Tancredi, suite, 1952 [from ballet Tancredi]
Tanz- und Salonmusik, 1952, rev. 1989 [from ballet Der Idiot]
Ode an den Westwind, after P.B. Shelley, vc, orch, 1953
Quattro poemi, 1955
Sinfonische Etden, 1956, rev. as Drei sinfonische Etden, 1964
Maratona, suite, 2 jazz bands, orch, 1956
Jeux des Tritons, pf, orch, 19567, rev. 1967 [from ballet Undine]
Hochzeitsmusik, wind, 1957 [from ballet Undine]
Sonata per archi, 19578
Drei Dithyramben, chbr orch, 1958
Trois pas des Tritons, 1958 [from ballet Undine]
Undine, suite no.1, 1958 [from ballet]
Undine, suite no.2, 1958 [from ballet]
Antifone, 11 str, wind, perc, 1960
Los caprichos, fantasia, 1963
Zwischenspiele, 1964 [from op Der junge Lord]
Mnadentanz, 1965 [from op The Bassarids]
In memoriam: die weisse Rose, double fugue, 12 insts, 1965
Double Bass Concerto, 1966
Double Concerto, ob, hp, str, 1966
Fantasia, str, 1966, arr. str sextet, 1966 [from film score Der junge Trless]
Piano Concerto no.2, 1967
Telemanniana, 1967
Compases para preguntas ensimismadas, va, 22 insts, 196970
Violin Concerto no.2 (H.M. Enzensberger: Hommage Gdel), B-Bar, vn, 33 insts,
tape, 1971, rev. 1991
Heliogabalus imperator, allegoria per musica, 19712, rev. 1986
Tristan, preludes, pf, orch, tape, 19723
Katharina Blum, suite, chbr orch, 1975 [from film score]
Ragtimes and Habaneras, sinfonia, arr. H. Brauel, brass band, 1975 [from TV op La

Cubana]; arr. M. Wengler, sym. wind band, 1982; arr. D. Purser, brass ens, 1986
Aria de la fola espaola, chbr orch, 1977
Il Vitalino raddoppiato, chaconne, vn, chbr orch, 1977 [based on chaconne by T.
Vitali]
Apollo trionfante, winds, kbds, perc, db, 1979 [from ballet Orpheus]
Arien des Orpheus, gui, hp, hpd, str, 1979
Barcarola, 1979
Dramatische Szenen aus Orpheus I, 1979 [from ballet]
Dramatische Szenen aus Orpheus II, 1979 [from ballet]
Spielmusiken, amateur orch, 197980 [from op Pollicino]
Deutschlandsberger Mohrentanz no.1, 4 rec, gui, perc, str qt, str, 1984
Kleine Elegien, Renaissance insts, 19845 [from film score Der junge Trless]
Liebeslieder, vc, orch, 19845
Deutschlandsberger Mohrentanz no.2, 4 rec, gui, perc, str qt, str, 1985
Fandango, 1985, rev. 1992
Cinque piccoli concerti e ritornelli, 1987 [from op The English Cat]
Requiem: 9 geistliche Konzerte, pf, tpt, orch, 199092
La selva incantata, aria and rondo, 1991 [from op Knig Hirsch]
Introduktion, Thema und Variationen, vc, hp, str, 1992
Appassionatamente, fantasia, 19934 [from op Das verratene Meer]
Erlknig, fantasia, 1996 [from ballet Le fils de l'air]
Pulcinellas Erzhlungen, chbr orch, 1996 [from ballet Le disperazioni del Signor
Pulcinella]
Sieben Boleros, 1996 [from op Venus und Adonis]
Violin Concerto no.3, 3 portraits from T. Mann: Doktor Faustus, 1996
Zigeunerweisen und Sarabanden, 1996 [from ballet Le fils de l'air]
Fraternit, air, 1999
A Tempest, rounds, 2000
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
choral
Fnf Madrigle (F. Villon), small chorus, 11 insts, 1947
Chor gefangener Trojer (J.W. von Goethe: Faust, pt ii, act 3), chorus, orch, 1948,
rev. 1964
Wiegenlied der Mutter Gottes (L. de Vega, Ger. trans. A. Altschul), solo boy's
v/unison boys' chorus, 9 insts, 1948
Szenen und Arien, S, T, chorus, orch, 1956 [from op Knig Hirsch]
Jdische Chronik (J. Gerlach), 2 spkr, A, B, chbr chorus, chbr orch, 1960, collab.
Blacher, Dessau, K.A. Hartmann, Wagner-Rgeny
Novae de infinito laudes (cant., G. Bruno), S, A, T, Bar, chorus, ens, 1962
Cantata della fiaba estrema (E. Morante), S, chbr chorus, 13 insts, 1963
Lieder von einer Insel (Bachmann), chbr chorus, trbn, 2 vc, db, chbr org, perc, timp,
1964
Muzen Siziliens (choral conc., Virgil: Eclogues), chorus, 2 pf, wind, timp, 1966
Das Floss der Medusa (orat, Schnabel), S, Bar, spkr, chorus, 9 boys' vv, orch,
1968, rev. 1990
Mad People's Madrigal (Bond), 12-pt chorus, 19746 [from music-theatre We Come
to the River]
Orpheus Behind the Wire (Bond), 8-/12-pt chorus, 19813
Hirtenlieder (S, S, Mez, T, Bar, B)/(chbr chorus), 19935 [from op Venus and
Adonis]

Henze, Hans Werner: Works

solo vocal
Sechs Lieder, high v, wind qnt, 1945, withdrawn
Whispers from Heavenly Death (cant., W. Whitman), S/T, tpt, vc, cel, hp, 4 perc,
1948; arr. S/T, pf, 1948
Der Vorwurf (concert aria, F. Werfel), Bar, tpt, trbn, str, 1948, withdrawn
Apollo et Hyazinthus (improvisations, G. Trakl: Im Park), A, hpd, fl, cl, bn, hn, str qt,
19489
Chanson Pflastersteine, S, pf, 1950, withdrawn
Fnf neapolitanische Lieder (anon. 17th-century), Bar, chbr orch, 1956
Nachtstcke und Arien (Bachmann), S, orch, 1957
Kammermusik 1958 (F. Hlderlin: In lieblicher Blue), T, gui/hp, cl, hn, bn, str qnt,
1958, rev. 1963
Drei Fragmente nach Hlderlin, T, gui, 1958 [from Kammermusik 1958]
Three Arias, Bar, small orch, 1960, rev. 1993 [from op Elegy for Young Lovers]
Ariosi (T. Tasso), S, vn, orch, 1963; arr. S, vn, pf 4 hands, 1963
Being Beauteous (cant., A. Rimbaud), coloratura S, hp, 4 vc, 1963
Ein Landarzt (Monodram, Kafka), Bar, orch, 1964 [from op]
Versuch ber Schweine (G. Salvatore), Bar (Sprechgesang), orch, 1968
El Cimarrn (recital, trans. H.M. Enzensberger, after M. Barnet), Bar, fl + pic + a fl +
b fl, gui, perc, 196970
Voices (various), 22 songs, Mez, T, 15 insts, 1973
Heb doch die Stimme an (M. Walser), Bar, cl, tpt, vc, perc, pf, 1975 [for Hommage
Kurt Weill, collab. others]
Kindermund (R. Thenier), S/B/spkr, pf, tpt, 1975 [for Hommage Kurt Weill, collab.
others]
El rey de Harlem (Imaginres Theater I) (F. Garca Lorca), Mez, cl, tpt, trbn, perc,
elec gui, pf, va, vc, 1979
Three Auden Songs, T, pf, 1983
Drei Lieder ber den Schnee (H.-U. Treichel), S, Bar, cl + b cl, bn, hn, 2 vn, va, vc,
db, 1989
An Sascha, S, A, 1991, unpubd
Zwei Konzertarien, T, small orch, 1991 [on material from op Knig Hirsch]
Lieder und Tnze, Mez, s sax, cl, tpt, trbn, perc, gui, pf, db, 19923 [from TV op La
Cubana, oder Ein Leben fr die Kunst]
Heilige Nacht (Treichel), medium v, rec/fl/ob/vn, 1993
Heimlich zur Nacht, 1v, pf, 1994, unpubd
Nocturnal Serenade (E. Bond), arr. M. Zehn, S, pf, 1996 [arr. of chbr work Notturno]
Sechs Gesnge aus dem Arabischen (Henze), T, pf, 19978
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
chamber
Kleines Quartett, ob, vn, va, vc, 1945, withdrawn
Sonata, vn, pf, 1946
Sonatina, fl, pf, 1947
String Quartet no.1, 1947
Kammersonate, pf trio, 1948, rev. 1963
String Quartet no.2, 1952
Wind Quintet, 1952
Concerto per il Marigny, pf, cl, b cl, hn, tpt, trbn, va, vc, 1956, withdrawn [partially

reworked into Requiem, pf, tpt, orch, 199092]

Quattro fantasie, cl, bn, hn, str qnt, 1963 [from 1963 version of Kammermusik 1958]
Divertimenti, 2 pf, 1964 [interludes from op Der junge Lord]
Der junge Trless, fantasia, str sextet, 1966 [arr. of Fantasia, str]
L'usignolo dell'imperatore, fl, cel, pf, 3 perc, vib + tubular bells ad lib, 1970 [concert
version of ballet]
Fragmente aus einer Show, hn, 2 tpt, trbn, tuba, 1971 [from op Der langwierige
Weg in die Wohnung der Natascha Ungeheuer]
Prison Song (H Ch Minh), perc, tape, 1971
Carillon, Rcitatif, Masque, mand, gui, hp, 1974
String Quartet no.3, 19756
Amicizia!, cl, trbn, vc, perc, pf, 1976
String Quartet no.4, 1976
String Quartet no.5, 1976
Konzertstck, vc, ens, 197785, withdrawn [material incorporated into Introduktion,
Thema und Variationen, 1992]
L'autunno, fl, ob, cl, bn, hn, 1977
Trauer-Ode fr Margaret Geddes, 6 vc, 1977
Sonata, va, pf, 19789
Sonatina, vn, pf, 1979 [from op Pollicino]
Le miracle de la rose (Imaginres Theater II), solo cl + E , fl + pic, ob + eng hn + ob
d'amore, bn + heckelphone ad lib, hn, tpt, trbn, perc, pf, 2 vn, va, vc, db, 1981
Variation, brass qnt, 1981, unpubd
Von Krebs zu Krebs, S, fl, pf, 1981, unpubd
Canzona, ob, pf, hp, 3 vn, vc, 1982 [on material from op The English Cat]
Sonata, pic tpt, 2 tpt, flugel hn, b tpt, 2 trbn, b trbn, 1983
Sonata, fl, cl, vn, vc, perc, pf, 1984 [from film score L'amour mort]
Selbst- und Zwiegesprche, trio, va, gui, small org/other kbd, 19845
Ode an eine olsharfe, after M. Mrike, solo gui, a fl, b fl, ob d'amore, eng hn, b cl,
bn, perc, hp, va d'amore, 2 va, va da gamba, 2 vc, db, 19856
Eine kleine Hausmusik, gui, pf, 1986, unpubd
Allegra e Boris, vn, va, 1987, unpubd
Fnf Nachtstcke, vn, pf, 1990
Paraphrasen ber Dostojewsky (Bachmann), actor, fl, cl, bn, tpt, trbn, perc, pf, str
qt, 1990 [from ballet Der Idiot]
Piano Quintet, 199091
Adagio, str sextet, 1992, unpubd
Adagio adagio, serenade, vn, vc, pf, 1993
Drei geistliche Konzerte, arr. M. Eggert, tpt, pf/org, 19946 [from Requiem]
Notturno, 2 fl, ob, eng hn, 2 cl, 2 bn, 2 hn, pf, db, 1995 [based on op The English
Cat, scene 2]
Leons de danse, (2 pf)/(pf, hp), 1996 [from ballet Le fils de l'air]
Minotauros Blues, concert music, 6 perc, 1996
Neue Volkslieder und Hirtengesnge, bn, gui, str trio, 1996 [from musical play
dipus der Tyrann]
Voie lacte soeur lumineuse, fl, cl, bn, hn, tpt, trbn, timp, perc, vib, mar, pf, cel, 2
vn, va, vc, db, 1996
Drei Mrchenbilder, arr. J. Ruck, 2 gui, 1997 [from op Pollicino]
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
solo instrumental

Sonatina, pf, 1947, withdrawn

Serenade, vc, 1949; arr. L. Drew, db, 1981
Variationen, pf, 1949
Drei Tentos, gui, 1958 [from Kammermusik 1958]
Piano Sonata, 1959
Six Absences, hpd, 1961
Lucy Escott Variations, hpd/pf, 1963
Memorias de El Cimarrn, gui, 1970; arr. E. Csoli and J. Ruck, 2 gui, 1995
Sonatina, tpt, 1974; arr. M. Harvey, trbn, 1974
Royal Winter Music, sonata no.1, gui, 19756
Capriccio, vc, 1976, rev. 1981
Sonata, vn, 19767, rev. 1992
Lndler, vn, 1977, withdrawn
S. Biagio 9 agosto ore 12.07, db, 1977
Five Scenes from the Snow Country, mar, 1978
Margareten-Walzer, pf, 1978, unpubd
Epitaph, vc, 1979, unpubd
Etude philarmonique, vn, 1979
Royal Winter Music, sonata no.2, gui, 1979
Toccata senza fuga, org, 1979 [from ballet Orpheus]
Drei Mrchenbilder, gui, 1980 [from op Pollicino]
Sechs Stcke fr junge Pianisten, 1980 [from op Pollicino]
Cherubino, 3 miniatures, pf, 198081
Euridice, fragments, hpd, 1981, rev. 1992 [from ballet Orpheus]
Une petite phrase, pf, 1984 [from film score Un amour de Swann]
Serenade, vn, 1986
La mano sinistra, pf left hand, 1988
Piece for Peter, pf, 1988
Clavierstck, pf, 1989, unpubd
Fr Manfred, vn, 1989, unpubd
Das Haus Ibach, pf, 1991, unpubd
Pulcinella disperato, fantasia, arr. M. Eggert, pf, 19912 [from ballet Le disperazioni
del Signor Pulcinella]
Minette, arr. A. Pfeifer, descant zither, 1992 [from The English Cat]; arr. J. Ruck, 2
gui, 1995
An Brenton, va, 1993, unpubd
Fr Reinhold, pf, 1994, unpubd
Toccata mistica, pf, 1994
Serenata notturna, arr. M. Zehn, pf/2 pf, 1996 [arr. of chbr work Notturno]
Trio, vn, va, vc, 1998
Henze, Hans Werner: Works
arrangements and reconstructions
Die schlafende Prinzessin (ballet after Tchaikovsky, prol, 4 scenes, H. Zehden)
1951, withdrawn
Don Chisciotte (comic op, arr. of Paisiello), 1976, collab. H. Brauel; concert suite, 2
S, T, Bar, wind band, chbr orch, 1976, rev. 1978; suite, arr. N. Studnitzky as Die
Abenteuer des Don Chisciotte, concert band, 1990
Jephte (orat, orch of Carissimi), 3 S, A, T, 2 B, 6vv, fl, hp, gui, mand, banjo, perc,
1976
Wesendonck-Lieder, S, chbr orch, 1976 [arr. of Wagner songs]

Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria (op, reconstruction after Monteverdi), 1981; concert

extracts, Scene e Arie da Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, S, A, T, Bar, orch, 1981
I sentimenti di Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, fl, orch, 1982 [transcr. of ClavierFantasie, h536 (w80)]
Der Mann, der vom Tode auferstand (mini-op after sketches by K.A. Hartmann),
1988
Frwahr ?! (mini-op after sketches by K.A. Hartmann), 1988
Drei Mozartsche Orgelsonaten, a fl, b fl, ob d'amore, eng hn, b cl, bn, hp, gui, va
d'amore, 2 va, 2 vc, cb, 1991 [arr. of Mozart k336/336d, k67/41h, k328/317c]
Il re Teodoro in Venezia (op, arr. of Paisiello), 19912, collab. D.P. Graham
Drei Orchesterstcke, 1995 [after K.A. Hartmann pf sonata 27. April 1945]
Richard Wagnersche Klavierlieder, Mez, Bar, chorus, orch, 19989
MSS in CH-Bps

Principal publisher: Schott

Henze, Hans Werner

WRITINGS
Undine: Tagebuch eines Balletts (Munich, 1959)
Essays (Mainz, 1964)
with H.M. Enzensberger: El Cimarrn: ein Werkbericht, ed. C.H.
Henneberg (Mainz, 1971)
Musik und Politik: Schriften und Gesprche 19551975, ed. J.
Brockmeier (Munich, 1976, enlarged 2/1984; Eng. trans.,
1982) [incl. Essays, 1964]
ed.: Neue Aspekte der musikalischen sthetik (Frankfurt, 197997)
Pollicino, eine Oper fr Kinder: der Komponist erzhlt, Musik und
Bildung, xiii (1981), 2169; Eng. trans. in MT, cxxi (1980),
7668
Die englische Katze: ein Arbeitsbuch 19781982 (Frankfurt, 1983)
An eine olsharfe: ein Tagebuch, Der Komponist Hans Werner
Henze, ed. D. Rexroth (Frankfurt, 1986), 2915, 3026
Einige
Beobachtungen
und
Hinweise
betreffend
die
Auffhrungspraxis meiner Werke, Das Orchester, iv (1987),
38082
Kanle, Schluchten, Flchen: Sonate in Prosa, Berliner Lektionen,
ed. M. von Ardenne (Berlin, 1988), 20113
Die Befreiung der Musik, Die Befreiung der Musik: eine
Einfhrung in die Musik des 20. Jahrhunderts, ed. F.X.
Ohnesorg (Bergisch Gladbach, 1994), 1011
Reiselieder
mit
bhmischen
Quinten:
autobiographische
Mitteilungen 19261995 (Frankfurt, 1996; Eng. trans., 1998)
Ein Werkverzeichnis 19461996 (Mainz, 1996)
ed.: Komponieren in der Schule: Notizen aus einer Werkstatt
(Frankfurt, 1997)
Henze, Hans Werner

BIBLIOGRAPHY
monographs
D. de la Motte: Hans Werner Henze: Der Prinz von Homburg
(Mainz, 1960)
K. Geitel: Hans Werner Henze (Berlin, 1968)
Geboren am 1. Juli 1926 in Gtersloh: Hans Werner Henze zum
Geburtstag (Gtersloh, 1986) [pubn of Gtersloh Kulturamt]
E. Restagno, ed.: Henze (Turin, 1986)
D. Rexroth, ed.: Der Komponist Hans Werner Henze (Frankfurt,
1986)
P. Petersen: Hans Werner Henze, ein politischer Musiker: zwlf
Vorlesungen (Hamburg, 1988)
H.-J. Wagner: Studie zu Boulevard Solitude: lyrisches Drama in 7
Bildern von Hans Werner Henze (Regensburg, 1988)
V. Palmer-Fchsel: The Solo Vocal Chamber Music of Hans
Werner Henze (diss., Technical U. of Berlin, 1990)
J. Buttmann: Die Kulturpdagogische Arbeit Hans Werner Henzes
am Beispiel des Cantiere Internationale DArte die
Montepulciano (Regensburg, 1992)
W. Schottler: Die Bassariden von Hans Werner Henze: der Weg
eines Mythos von der antiken Tragdie zur modernen Oper
(Trier, 1992)
P. Petersen: Hans Werner Henze: Werke der Jahre 19841993
(Mainz, 1995)
C. Mattenklott: Figuren des Imaginren: zu Hans Werner Henzes
Le Miracle de la rose (Hamburg, 1996)
H. Lck, ed.: Stimmen fr Hans Werner Henze: die 22 Lieder aus
Voices (Mainz, 1996)
NZM, Jg.157, no.4 (1996) [Henze issue; incl. articles by W.
Grimmel, H.-W. Heister, W. Konold, A. Krause, C. Mattenklott,
A. Rochroll, H.-U. Treichel]
T. Beck: Bedingungen librettistischen Schreibens: die Libretti
Ingeborg Bachmanns fr Hans Werner Henze (Wrzburg,
1997)
B. Wilms: Von der Schnheit Alter Jahrhunderte: Hans Werner
Henzes Bearbeitungen von Claudio Monteverdis Il ritorno
dUlisse (Saarbrcken, 1997)
S. Giesbrecht and S. Hanheide, eds.: Hans Werner Henze:
politisch-humanitres
Engagement
als
knstlerische
Perspektive (Osnabrck, 1998)
D. Jarman, ed.: Henze at the Royal Northern College of Music: a
Symposium (Todmorden, 1998)
interviews
G.-W. Baruch: Hans Werner Henze am Tyrrhenischen Meer:
sditalienischer Dialog, Melos, xxiii (1956), 7073
P. Heyworth: I can Imagine a Future : Conversation with Hans
Werner Henze, The Observer (23 Aug 1970)

H. Lck: Der lange Weg zur Musik der Revolution: Fragment zu

einer Standortbestimmung des Komponisten Hans Werner
Henze, Neue Musikzeitung, xx (1971), 34
H.K. Jungheinrich: 4 Stunden auf Henzes neuem Weg, Melos,
xxxix (1972), 20713
U. Strzbecher: Werkstattgesprche mit Komponisten (Cologne,
1971)
The Bassarids: Hans Werner Henze Talks to Paul Griffiths, MT,
cxv (1974), 8312
K.-R. Danler: Gesprche mit Henze: die Musik muss aus ihrer
Sprachlosigkeit herausfinden, Das Orchester, xx (1972), 137
8
A. Dmling: Vieles von Brechts Theaterdenken ist mir in Fleisch
und Blut bergangen, Lasst euch nicht verfhren: Brecht und
die Musik (Munich, 1985), 64048
U. Hbner: Hans Werner Henze im Gesprch, Musica, xl (1986),
33942
D. Rexroth: Ich begreife mich in der Schnberg-Tradition, NZM,
Jg.147, no.11 (1986), 237
D. Rexroth: Ich kann mich in Zusammenhngen sehen, Der
Komponist Hans Werner Henze, ed. D. Rexroth (Frankfurt,
1986), 31521
I. Strasfogel: All Knowing Music: a Dialogue on Opera, ibid., 137
42
J. Bultmann: Sprachmusik: eine Unterhaltung, Neue Aspekte der
musikalischen sthetik, iv: Die Chiffren: Musik und Sprache,
ed. H.W. Henze (Frankfurt, 1990), 724
A. Dmling: Man resigniert nicht, man arbeitet weiter , NZM,
Jg.157, no.4 (1996), 511
H. Krellmann: ber Musik nachdenken: Hans Werner Henze im
Gesprch, Venus und Adonis (Bayerische Staatsoper, 1997),
1219 [programme book]
D. Jarman, ed.: Henze at the Royal Northern College of Music:
Conversations (Todmorden, 1999)
other literature
E. Kuntz: Hans Werner Henze, Melos, xvii (1950), 3413
K.H. Wrner: Hans Werner Henze, ZfM, Jg.112 (1951), 240
R. Stephan: Hans Werner Henze, Die Reihe, iv (1958), 327;
Eng. trans. in Die Reihe, iv (1960), 2935
H. Pauli: Hans Werner Henzes Undine, Schweizer Monatshefte,
xxxviii (19589), 1053
H. Pauli: Hans Werner Henze, Musica, xiii (1959), 7612
H. Pauli: Hans Werner Henzes Italian Music, The Score, no.25
(1959), 2637
Melos, xxxii/2 (1965) [Henze issue]
Meine Musik auf dem Theater, Mz, xxi (1966), 36973 [special
no. on The Bassarids]
E. Schnabel: Das Floss der Medusa: Text zum Oratorium von
Hans Werner Henze: zum Untergang einer Urauffhrung
Postscriptum (Munich, 1969)

P. Heyworth: Henze and the Revolution, Music and Musicians,

xix/1 (197071), 3644
S. Walsh: Henze's Sixth Symphony, The Listener (4 March 1971)
A. Porter: Henzes Voices, Financial Times (7 Jan 1974)
R. Blackford: The Road to the River, Music and Musicians,
xxiv/11 (19756), 2024
W. Burde: Tradition und Revolution in Henzes musikalischem
Theater, Melos/NZM, ii (1976), 2715
R. Henderson: Hans Werner Henze, MT, cxvii (1976), 5668
C.M. Schmidt: ber die Unwichtigkeit der Konstruktion:
Anmerkungen zu Hans Werner Henzes 6. Symphonie,
Melos/NZM, ii (1976), 27580
D. Symons: Hans Werner Henze: the Emergence of a Style,
SMA, iii (1969), 3552
W. Burde: Tradition und Revolution in Henzes musikalischen
Theater, Melos/NZM, ii (1976), 2715
W. Klppelholz: Henzes El Cimarrn: eine didaktische Analyse
fr die Sekundarstufe II, Musik und Bildung, x (1978), 95104
H.-K. Jungheinrich: Komponieren ohne Dogma: ein Versuch, die
gegenwartige Arbeit von Hans Werner Henze zu beschreiben,
HiFi-Stereophonie, xv (1976), 70912, 71618
P. Moor: Hans Werner Henze's Late-Night Revolution, High
Fidelity/Musical America, xxviii/6 (1978), MA22, 40 only
K. Lindemann: Die Sehnsucht nach dem hchsten Ausdruck: zu
meiner filmischen Umsetzung von Henzes Tristan-Romantik:
ein imaginrer Dialog, NZM, Jg.141 (1980), 21720
E.H. Flammer: Politisch engagierte Musik als kompositorisches
Problem (Baden-Baden, 1981)
G. Gronemeyer: Zu Hans Werner Henzes El Rey de Harlem,
Mz, xxxvi (1981), 5512
H. Heise: Annherung an ein unkonventionelles Stck: 2.
Violinkonzert, Zeitschrift fr Musik Pdagogik, xix (1982), 14
38
H.-W. Heister: Kinderoper als Volkstheater: Hans Werner Henzes
Pollicino, Oper heute: Formen der Wirklichkeit im
zeitgenssischen Musiktheater, ed. O. Kolleritsch (Vienna,
1985), 16687
E. Voss: Musica da piazza und Musica da camera oder Lied
und Kunstmusik: zu Hans Werner Henzes Fnf
neapolitanische Lieder, Melos, xlvii (1985), 221
A. Dmling: Ein reflektierter Freudentanz: Versuch einer
Interpretation des 1. Satzes von Hans Werner Henzes 7.
Symphonie, Musik, Deutung, Bedeutung: Festschrift fr Harry
Goldschmidt, ed. H.-W. Heister and H. Lck (Dortmund, 1986),
10711
H. Floray and J. Wolff: Kammermusikalische Formen Hans
Werner Henzes: aufgefhrt von Hinz& Kunz, Geboren am 1.
Juli 1926 in Gtersloh: Hans Werner Henze zum Geburtstag
(Gtersloh, 1986), 5960

H.-W. Heister: Tod und Befreiung: Henzes imaginares

Musiktheater in den Werken El Cimarrn, El Rey de Harlem
und Le Miracle de la Rose, Musik, Deutung, Bedeutung:
Festschrift fr Harry Goldschmidt, ed. H.-W. Heister and H.
Lck (Dortmund, 1986), 5960
R.U. Ringger: Richard Wagners Wesendonck-Lieder
transponiert von Hans Werner Henze,Von Debussy bis
Henze: zur Musik unseres Jahrhunderts (Munich, 1986), 125
30
S. Zehle: Der Schillernde, Zeit Magazin (1988), no.24, pp.2834
M. Klger: Hans Werner Henzes Gitarrenmusik als Spiegel seiner
Musiksthetik, Gitarre und Laute, xii/5 (1990), 1319, xiii/1
(1991), 4551
U. Mosch: Zum Formdenken Hans Werner Henzes:
Beobachtungen
am
Particell
der
6.
Symphonie,
Quellenstudien, ii: Zwlf Komponisten des 20. Jahrhunderts,
ed. F. Meyer (Winterthur, 1993), 169204
P. Petersen: Klischee als Sujet: Hans Werner Henzes The
English Cat und sein Arbeitstagebuch, Klischee und
Wirklichkeit in der musikalischen Moderne, ed. O. Kolleritsch
(Vienna, 1994), 6291
R. Braunmller: Der einsame Fremde: Hans Werner Henzes
Oper Der junge Lord und die Tradition der Komdie, Musica,
l (1996), 1848
H.-K. Jungheinrich: Alles ist sprachfhig: Reflexionen ber Hans
Werner Henze, Neue Musikzeitung, xlv/3 (1996), 3
P. Petersen: Ein unbekanntes Skizzenheft zu Knig Hirsch von
Hans Werner Henze, Opernkomposition als Prozess, ed. W.
Breig (Kassel, 1996), 14764
H.-J. Schaal: Musik aus dem Geiste des Theaters: Hans Werner
Henze zum 70. Geburtstag, Das Orchester, xliv/11 (1996), 7
11
J. Bokina: Political Ideas in Opera, from Monteverdi to Henze
(New Haven, CT, 1997)