Erwin Schulhoff

Born in Prague on June 8, 1894, Schulhoff exhibited many of the same traits as the child prodigy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. At age three he was picking out tunes on the piano. In 1901, his mother took him to be examined by the famous composer, Antonin Dvorak. Dvorak test him on recognizing pitches, intervals, and harmonies, then sent him on to study piano at the Prague Conservatory. He studied there until 1906, then continued his studies in Vienna until 1909, studies in piano, theory, and composition with Max Reger until 1910, and finished his studies between 1911-1914 in Cologne with Carl Friedberg. During his studies, Schulhoff acquired an affinity for the music of Richard Strauss and Claude Debussy. In 1913, Schulhoff studied briefly with Debussy, but was unhappy as Debussy insisted on teaching traditional harmonic styles, not the impressionistic styles that Debussy himself employed.(1)

 

The outbreak of World War 1 interfered with Schulhoff’s career as he was conscripted in the Austrian Army. In 1916, he was sent to Hungary, then onto the Russian front in 1917. He suffered a shrapnel wound to his hand.(2)

 

Following the war, Schulhoff was introduced to American jazz, ragtime, and dance music via recordings. Schulhoff used jazz in many of his works from the 1920's.  He also developed an interest in Slavonic folk music.  After the war, he traveled to Dresden to join his sister, a painter.  Together they established an artists’ salon, where some of the great artists of the Weimar years congregated. By 1923, Schulhoff was a well-established  internationally-known pianist and composer.  Besides personal appearances, he was often featured on radio concerts and made some early recordings.(3)

 

Following the war, Schulhoff turned to Marxism and Soviet Communism.  He traveled to the Soviet Union in 1933, giving concerts in Moscow and Leningrad.  After returning from Moscow in 1938, Schulhoff ‘s views on communism, as well as being Jewish, made him a target of the Nazis.  He began paperwork to emigrate to Great Britain, France or the United States, but the Nazi occupation created a situation where his best option seemed to be to return to the Soviet Union.  Schulhoff applied for Soviet citizenship for his family, which they received in April 1941.  He picked up the visas to emigrate on June 13, 1941.  The Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22 destroyed those plans. Schulhoff was arrested the June 23.  Schulhoff was deported to a concentration camp in Wülzburg, Bavaria, where he died of tuberculosis in August 1942. (4) In a moment of foresight, Schulhoff had sent his music to Russia prior to their assumed departure.

 

The Sonata for flute and piano was completed in Paris in 1927 and dedicated to French flutist Rene Le Roy. Schulhoff and Le Roy premiered the work.(5) The second and fourth moments show inspirations of both jazz and Slavonic folk music, typical of this period of his compositions.

 

 

 

(1) Eleonore Pameijer, Between Danube and Volga, Program notes, Nederlands: futureclassics, 2008.

 

(2) Erwin Schulhoff, The Orel Foundation, 2015. http://orelfoundation.org/index.php/composers/article/erwin_schulhoff/  Accessed November 21, 2015.

 

(3) Ibid.

 

(4) Ibid.

 

(5) Eleonore Pameijer, Between Danube and Volga