Ferruccio Busoni

Italian classical composer and conductor

• Born: April 1, 1866
• Birthplace: Empoli, Italy
• Died: July 27, 1924
• Place of death: Berlin, Germany

A virtuoso concert pianist who championed Johann Sebastian Bach, Busoni urged other composers to take up bold, new musical experiments. His own compositions owe much to his personal study of Bach’s music and demand great technical prowess from performers.

The Life

Dante Michelangelo Benvenuto Ferruccio Busoni (fehr-REW-chyoh boo-SOH-nee) was born to musical parents: His father, Ferdinando, was a virtuoso clarinetist, and his mother, Anna Weiss, was a concert pianist. Busoni received his early musical education from his parents and was introduced to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach by his father. With the help of money from a wealthy patron, Busoni began studies at the Vienna Conservatory when he was nine years old. Unsatisfied with the curriculum, the family moved to Graz, Austria, where Busoni studied composition with Wilhelm Mayer. In 1886 Busoni moved to Leipzig, Germany, where he made a living through performing, teaching, and publishing transcriptions and original compositions. There he developed friendships with composers Edvard Grieg and Frederick Delius as well as the young Egon Petri, who would become one of Busoni’s most famous piano students. Busoni also contributed to Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, an important musical journal.

In 1888, at the age of twenty-two, Busoni accepted a post as professor of piano at the conservatory in Helsinki, Finland. While in Finland, he cultivated a friendship with composer Jean Sibelius (only a few years his elder). Busoni entered the Anton Rubinstein Competition in St. Petersburg, Russia, taking first place for his Concert Piece for piano and orchestra. His success opened new professional opportunities, and in 1890 Busoni left Helsinki to accept a teaching post at the Moscow Imperial Conservatory. While in Moscow, he married Gerda Sjöstrand, the daughter of Swedish sculptor Carl Aeneas Sjöstrand. After only one year, Busoni left for the United States to teach piano and composition in the graduate department of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. While in Boston, their first son, Benvenuto (“Benni”), was born. Disappointed with the limitations and restrictions of his academic appointments, Busoni began to support his family primarily through his performing and compositional activity.

The family returned to Europe in 1894, taking up permanent residence in Berlin, Germany. A second son, Rafaello (“Lello”), was born in 1900. Busoni focused his beliefs on the future of music and artistic expression in the essay “Entwurf einer neuen Ästhetik der Tonkunst” (1907, revised in 1916; “Outline of a New Aesthetic of Music,” 1911). The events of World War I drove the family to leave Berlin. They resided in the United States for a short time and eventually moved to Zurich, Switzerland. While in Zurich from 1915 to 1920, Busoni turned increasingly to operatic composition. His operas Arlecchino and Turandot both premiered to great critical success in 1917.

Busoni returned to Berlin in 1920. Increasingly ill, he gave his final public piano performance on May 29, 1922. He continued to teach a small number of composition students, including Kurt Weill. He spent his last years working on his opera Doktor Faust, leaving two scenes unfinished at the time of his death in 1924 from heart failure and kidney disease.

The Music

Busoni the Pianist. Technique came easily to Busoni, even in his youth; however, he despised the notion of technique as an end in itself. While he was a clear descendant of the Romantic piano tradition, Busoni’s approach to playing was cerebral and analytical. He experimented boldly with the instrument, especially with the pedals, to achieve new effects in tone production.

Busoni had a prodigious memory and his repertoire was vast, but the music of Bach and Franz Liszt remained the cornerstone of his programming. The piano concerti of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart were also greatly admired by Busoni. He performed them frequently, with original cadenzas that reflected modern compositional trends rather than Mozartian conventions. Busoni also programmed the works of Frédéric Chopin, though his performances were criticized for being perfunctory and abstract. Busoni would often take liberties with the music of other composers, adding notes and recomposing in a manner unheard of today. While he performed his own compositions, he rarely performed modern works.

During his lifetime, Busoni made only a few recordings. He disliked the process greatly, given that the works often had to be distorted to fit time constraints. Of the recordings that were eventually released, only about a half hour’s worth of music exists. These include performances of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody, No. 13; a Bach prelude; an ecossaise by Beethoven; a handful of pieces by Chopin; and Busoni’s own arrangement of a Bach chorale prelude.

Busoni the Philosopher. Busoni’s musical and compositional contributions are augmented by his writings. He was a prolific letter writer and essayist, and his “Outline of a New Aesthetic of Music” reached a wide readership at its revised publication in 1916. In the essay Busoni advocated the attributes of absolute music over program music, arguing that the latter is often trivial and of little depth. He outlined his beliefs for music theater, condemning the trend of realism in favor of more psychological or spiritual representations. For Busoni, the artist should not be bound by laws and prescribed forms but rather should seek to cultivate new modes of expression. Near the end of the essay, he proposed exploring further subdivisions of the octave beyond its traditional twelve tones, a technique known as microtonalism. His criticisms of the German musical traditions created a backlash, most notably in the writings of Hans Pfitzner; at the same time, Busoni stirred up support, especially among the younger set of artists in Berlin.

Bach and Busoni. Busoni was introduced to the music of Bach at a young age; as an adult, he paved the way for the development of a pianistic approach to Bach’s music, which was originally conceived for the harpsichord, clavichord, and organ.

Busoni’s earliest transcription of Bach’s works dates from the Leipzig years. After hearing a performance of Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in D Major played at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, Busoni quickly produced a piano transcription. Other transcriptions followed, including his now-famous piano transcriptions of the Chaconne for Violin in D Minor and ten of Bach’s organ chorale preludes. He prepared a complete edition of Bach’s two volumes of The Well-Tempered Clavier (vol. 1, 1894; vol. 2, 1916). These editions are heavily edited and annotated but reveal an insight into Busoni’s understanding of this music as both a pianist and a composer. Busoni’s editions are still in print and consulted frequently by students, teachers, and performers.

The study of Bach left an indelible imprint on Busoni’s original compositions. His An die Jungend for piano features a movement in which Busoni combines themes from Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in D Major in a contrapuntal tour de force. In the same year, Busoni wrote the haunting Fantasia nach J. S. Bach, dedicated to the memory of his deceased father. His most monumental work in the tradition of Bach is the Fantasia contrappuntistica, which takes its inspiration and material from Bach’s The Art of Fugue, the German chorale All Glory Be to God on High, and Bach’s own musical signature: the pitches B-flat, A, C, and B-natural (H, in German).

Late Operas. Busoni spent the last decade of his life composing opera. His one-act opera Arlecchino (with a libretto by the composer) is based on characters and situations from Italian commedia dell’arte. Busoni’s work is dark and satirical, exploring themes of fidelity and human cruelty. Busoni’s Turandot premiered in the same year as Arlecchino and in fact was considered a possible companion piece. For Turandot, Busoni constructed a libretto based on the play by Carlo Gozzi. (Giacomo Puccini used the same source material for his opera of the same name.) However, these music-theater pieces were only preludes to the major project of his last years, Doktor Faust. In fact most of Busoni’s compositions written after 1918 were studies for a grand musical-theater piece that he had been planning since his teenage years. Conductor Antony Beaumont refers to twenty-three “satellite pieces” that provided Busoni with the musical material for Doktor Faust. The opera, which remained unfinished at the time of Busoni’s death, has been completed in at least two versions: one by composer Philipp Jarnach (performed in Dresden, Germany, in 1925) and another by Beaumont (performed in Bologna, Italy, in 1985).

Musical Legacy

Busoni left little in terms of recorded performance. His pianistic legacy lives on largely through the playing and teaching of his students (Egon Petri the most influential among them) and his writings on the subject. Busoni invigorated a tradition of playing the keyboard music of Bach on the piano in public. He developed a technical and stylistic approach to the Bach repertoire (albeit one that runs counter to current trends of historically informed performance) and disseminated his interpretations through his editions and transcriptions. His formidable piano technique is legendary; he inspired generations of pianists to experiment boldly with sound (especially through the use of the instrument’s pedals). Despite his vibrant presence in recital, Busoni promoted the music over the performer, abhorring the cult of the superstar virtuoso.

Busoni advanced some daring musical ideas in his writings, including the use of electronics and microtonalism. His ideas had direct influence on such composers as Edgard Varèse and members of the Italian Futurist movement, including Luigi Russolo.

Although Busoni’s editions and transcriptions of Bach’s works have been widely available since his death, his own works are complex and often difficult to perform. His piano concerto takes more than an hour and requires a men’s chorus in addition to the orchestra and soloist. Nevertheless, his music, noted for its depth and richness, is drawing an ever-growing audience.

Principal Works

orchestral works: Piano Concerto, Op. 39, 1904; Turandot Suite, Op. 41, 1905; Die Brautwahl, 1911; Sonatina seconda, 1912 (for piano); Turandot, 1917 (based on Carlo Gozzi’s play); Arlecchino, 1917; Piano Sonatina No. 6, 1920 (Fantasia da camera super Carmen); Fantasia contrappuntistica, 1921 (for two pianos); Doktor Faust, 1923.

piano works:An die Jugend, 1909; Fantasia nach J. S. Bach, 1909.

Principal Recordings

albums:Chorale Prelude “Nun freut euch liebe Christen,” 1922 (by Johann Sebastian Bach); Ecossaisen, 1922 (by Ludwig van Beethoven); Étude, Op. 10, No. 5, 1922 (by Frédéric Chopin); Étude, Op. 25, No. 5, 1922 (by Chopin); Hungarian Rhapsody No. 13, 1922 (by Franz Liszt); Nocturne, Op. 15, No. 2, 1922 (by Chopin); Prelude and Fugue No. 1, 1922 (by Bach); Prelude, Op. 28, No. 7 and Étude, Op. 10, No. 5, 1922 (by Chopin).

Bibliography

Beaumont, Antony. Busoni the Composer. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. A chronological study of the life of the composer as seen through his musical works. Includes photographs, facsimiles, and a catalog of works.

Brendel, Alfred. “Busoni.” In Musical Thoughts and Afterthoughts. Suffolk, England: Robson Books, 1998. Brendel reflects on the legacy and pianism of Busoni.

Busoni, Ferruccio. The Essence of Music and Other Papers. Translated by Rosamond Ley. New York: Dover, 1957. A collection of Busoni’s short essays, letters, notes, and aphorisms.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Letters to His Wife. Translated by Rosamond Ley. London: E. Arnold, 1938. A look at the personal life of Busoni, told through correspondence with his wife.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Selected Letters. Translated and edited by Antony Beaumont. Boston: Faber & Faber, 1987. Letters give insight into Busoni and his music.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. “Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music.” In Source Readings in Music History, edited by Oliver Strunk and Leo Treitler, translated by Robert P. Morgan. New York: W. W. Norton, 1998. Excerpts from Busoni’s treatise in English translation, including Busoni’s outline for the use of microtonal divisions of the octave.

Couling, Della. Ferruccio Busoni: “A Musical Ishmael.” Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2005. A detailed yet readable biographical account of Busoni’s life, using letters and other source material.

Schonberg, Harold C. “Dr. Faust at the Keyboard.” The Great Pianists: From Mozart to the Present. Rev. ed. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987. The longtime music critic of The New York Times discusses Busoni’s pianism and his small recorded output.

Sitsky, Larry. Busoni and the Piano. New York: Greenwood, 1986. Second-generation Busoni student gives comprehensive analysis of the piano works. Includes a discography and bibliography.