Gyorgy Ligeti RIP

[Allen H]

Gyorgy Ligeti, 20th-century pioneering composer, dies at 83

ASSOCIATED PRESS

VIENNA, Austria, June 12 — Composer Gyorgy Ligeti, who fled Hungary after the 1956 revolution and gained fame for his opera ''Le Grand Macabre'' and his work on the soundtrack for Stanley Kubrick's ''2001: A Space Odyssey,'' died Monday. He was 83.

Ligeti, celebrated as one of the world's leading 20th-century musical pioneers, died in Vienna after a long illness, said Christiane Krauscheid, a spokeswoman for his publisher, Germany-based Schott Music. Details were unavailable, but Austrian media said he spent the last three years in a wheelchair.

Ligeti (pronounced lig'-ih-tee) was born in 1923 to Hungarian parents in the predominantly ethnic Hungarian part of Romania's Transylvania region. His father and brother later were murdered by the Nazis. He took Austrian citizenship after fleeing his ex-communist homeland and became known for ''Macabre,'' which he wrote in 1978.

He began studying music under Ferenc Farkas at the conservatory in Cluj, Romania, in 1941, and continued his studies in Budapest. But in 1943, he was arrested as a Jew and sentenced to forced labor for the rest of World War II.

After the war, Ligeti resumed his studies with Farkas and Sandor Veress at Budapest's Franz Liszt Academy. After graduation in 1949, he did research on Romanian folk music before returning to the academy as an instructor in harmony, counterpoint and formal analysis.

Ligeti's early work was heavily censored by Hungary's repressive regime, but his arrival in Vienna in 1956 opened up new possibilities. In the Austrian capital, he met key players in Western Europe's avant-garde music movement such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, Gottfried Michael Koenig and Herbert Eimert, who invited him to join an electronic music studio at West Germany's state radio in Cologne in 1957.

He won early critical acclaim for his 1958 electronic composition ''Artikulation'' and the orchestral ''Apparitions.'' He gained notoriety for a technique he called ''micropolyphony,'' which wove together musical color and texture in ways that transcended the traditional borders of melody, harmony and rhythm.

Ligeti spoke at least six languages, including his native Hungarian, German, French, and English, said Stephen Ferguson, who worked as his assistant and editor at Schott Music from 1992-96.

''He was one of the few avant-garde composers who found his way into the modern program,'' Ferguson said. ''He was fascinated by patters, but at the same time created wonderful atmospheres, such as in '2001: A Space Odyssey,' or in 'Clocks and Clouds.'

''He reintroduced techniques of polyphony out of the tradition of Bach and Palestrina with a playful and innovative sense of sound. He developed a new sound — cluster sound — which fascinated Kubrick and propelled Legiti to the top of the great composers of the second half of the 20th century.''

An excerpt from his 1966 work ''Lux Aeterna'' was used on the bestselling soundtrack for Kubrick's ''Space Odyssey,'' winning Ligeti a global audience.

Kubrick returned to Ligeti in 1999, using the composer's Musica Ricercata II (Mesto, rigido e cerimoniale), as the theme for what turned out to be his final film, ''Eyes Wide Shut.''

[Pedantic Wretch]

One of the greatest composers of the last century, and he was still producing interesting material in old age. The death of Ligeti, like that of Xenakis a few years ago, marks the continued passing of the mid-to-late-twentieth-century classical avant-garde.

[jaka]

Now, that's terrible news, the kind that ruin a day that was not that bad until now. A great loss to the music world.

[Salvador Dali Lama]

shit.

[graypencil]

That is truly sad news.

I hope Lutoslowski is still in good health.

[Surfer]

Terrible news. His cello and piano concertos are two of my favorite pieces from the 20th century. Such passion.

[Daniel]

i true genius. a sad day, but he left one helluva legacy

[letchhausen]

This is sad, sad, sad. Though he was sick.....I'm lucky that I got to attend much of Salonen's Ligeti festival in '98 when I was living in L.A. The Requiem being the centerpiece. Great works lovingly performed. Also Ligeti got to see the Sony Edition and then the Teldec Project record his works.

Guess I'll throw on one of those Sony discs and listen to those vocal works.....and I got plenty of others.....

Here's another article titled better than that Forbes one:

NY TIMES

and here:
Opera News

speaking of death, Warners pulls the plug on classical:

Norman Lebrecht

which means the Ligeti Project is no more......so stupid, that pig Bronfman pulling the plug on the one profitable venture in his cap. Though the sales were small, what was the benefit here? I hate the entire conglomerate media enterprise. I say bring back the guillotine for all of them....

[walto]

His music meant an awful lot to me as I was growing up.

[hearsay]

A titan of music! I recall being blown away when I first heard some of his piano music, I'm comforted to know that he recieved some success and respect in his lifetime.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by walto

His music meant an awful lot to me as I was growing up.

Walt, did you get to that Christopher Taylor concert of Ligeti's piano works at the Gardner in February?

[walto]

No, I couldn't make it, unfortunately.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by rostasi

Ummmm, Witold Lutoslawski has been dead for over 12 years!

Rod

At least his condition is stable.

[Sergio Zamora]

A bit late but this is a bummer. Still, he lived a pretty long and quite productive life.

[lazarus]

It´s very sad news.
He´s one of my favorite composers.

RIP

[sonic1]

Originally Posted by lazarus

It´s very sad news.
He´s one of my favorite composers.

RIP

Ditto.

[Rob Damen]

I guess I kind of missed this earlier.

The Second String Quartet was as fine as any other such work I've heard in that genre. It was one of the few times I heard classical music be as "free" sounding as anything in jazz, despite being almost completely written down. It completely re-drew my understanding of music.

And what can be said of the piano etudes? Eventually, they'll be thought of in the same league with the etudes of Debussy and Chopin, I'm sure. I still can't get over the look of surprise in the faces of the many jazz music critics for whom I played those Sonys.

And the "Le Grand Macbre"? Get both the Sony and Wergo. Those two versions are a lifetime of study right there.

Cheers,

Rob