Hans Werner Henze
Composer
Hans Werner Henze, whose childhood and youth were overshadowed by National Socialism and the experiences of war, became one of the most acclaimed and most frequently performed contemporary composers in the post-war period.
Hans Werner Henze was born in Gütersloh in 1926, the son of a Nazi-supporting teacher. Henze himself was an avowed anti-fascist, but was drafted into military service at the age of 18 and was taken prisoner by the British in 1945. After the war, he studied composition under Wolfgang Fortner in Heidelberg. He was successful with his compositions from the outset: after the premiere of his Kammerkonzert in 1946, Henze received a contract from the prestigious Schott publishing house. In 1953, the composer moved to Italy, where he found a second home away from the conflicts within the musical avant-garde and the creative freedom he needed for his work. Despite some failures – the premiere of his Nachtstücke und Arien for soprano and large orchestra caused a scandal in Donaueschingen in 1957 – Henze steadfastly pursued his aesthetic ideals. After the publication of the stage works Der Idiot, Elegy for Young Lovers, Der junge Lord and The Bassarids, he was finally acknowledged as the leading composer of contemporary music theatre. After a major crisis in the mid-1960s, he frequently took a stand on the political issues of his time and travelled to communist Cuba. He wrote a harrowing anti-war opera, We come to the river, which premiered in London in June 1976. When the Semperoper in Dresden opened its season in September 2012 with this haunting piece about guilt and responsibility, the composer was hailed with great enthusiasm by the audience even before the performance. When Henze died in Dresden on 27 October 2012 at the age of 86, the music world lost one of its most versatile and influential composers.
