Bart Berman
Encyclopedia
Bart Berman is a Dutch
-Israel
i pianist and composer, best known as an interpreter
of Franz Schubert
and 20th century music
.
Bart Berman studied piano with Jaap Spaanderman
at a predecessor of the Conservatorium van Amsterdam
and complemented his piano education with Theo Bruins
and a master class
by Alfred Brendel
.
As a soloist
Berman was awarded the Dutch Prize of Excellence, the first prize in the Gaudeamus Competition for interpreters of contemporary music, the Friends of the Concertgebouw
Award and four first prizes at competitions for young soloists. He performs in Israel, Europe
and the United States
, as a soloist and in chamber music
. Berman was a soloist with many Dutch and Israeli orchestras and often records for CDs, radio and television.
Current collaborations include flautist Abbie de Quant
(since 1970), Duo 4 with pianist Meir Wiesel, the Tamar Piano Trio and ensembles with vocalists such as Bat-Sheva Zeisler
and Shimrit Carmi. Past partnerships include Duo Beer Sheva with the late pianist Sara Fuxon. In the seasons of 2004-2008 he also accompanied the remake of Hanoch Levin
's satirical
cabaret
You, Me and the Next War. In 2007, he was the pianist and musical director of Schubert Plus, An Operatic Episode in Two Acts.
Berman was a senior faculty of piano at the conservatoires of Rotterdam and Arnhem
and editor of the Israel Music Institute
. Among his many students are Cleem Determeijer, Kees van Eersel, Margriet Ehlen
, Dror Elimelech
, Gerard Houtman and Matthijs Verschoor
.
Berman studied composition with Bertus van Lier and Wouter van den Berg. He has composed
many original works, including cadenzas to all piano concerti
by Haydn
, Mozart
and Beethoven
and second piano parts to be played alongside original compositions by Muzio Clementi
and Daniel Steibelt
. Most noted are his completions to Schubert's unfinished piano sonata
s and J.S. Bach
's Art of Fugue
.
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
-Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i pianist and composer, best known as an interpreter
Interpreting
Language interpretation is the facilitating of oral or sign-language communication, either simultaneously or consecutively, between users of different languages...
of Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...
and 20th century music
20th century classical music
20th century classical music was without a dominant style and highly diverse.-Introduction:At the turn of the century, music was characteristically late Romantic in style. Composers such as Gustav Mahler and Jean Sibelius were pushing the bounds of Post-Romantic Symphonic writing...
.
Bart Berman studied piano with Jaap Spaanderman
Jaap Spaanderman
Jacobus Hendrikus Bastiaan Spaanderman jr. was a Dutch pianist, cellist, conductor and piano and conducting pedagogue....
at a predecessor of the Conservatorium van Amsterdam
Conservatorium van Amsterdam
The Conservatorium van Amsterdam is a Dutch academy of music located in Amsterdam. This school is the music division of the Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten, the city's vocational university of arts...
and complemented his piano education with Theo Bruins
Theo Bruins
Theo Bruins was a Dutch pianist and composer.Bruins' earliest piano lessons were with his mother. His professional piano studies commenced in 1946 with Jaap Spaanderman at the Conservatoire of the Amsterdam Muzieklyceum Foundation...
and a master class
Master class
A master class is a class given to students of a particular discipline by an expert of that discipline—usually music, but also painting, drama, or any of the arts....
by Alfred Brendel
Alfred Brendel
Alfred Brendel KBE is an Austrian pianist, born in Czechoslovakia and a resident of the United Kingdom. He is also a poet and author.-Biography:...
.
As a soloist
Solo (music)
In music, a solo is a piece or a section of a piece played or sung by a single performer...
Berman was awarded the Dutch Prize of Excellence, the first prize in the Gaudeamus Competition for interpreters of contemporary music, the Friends of the Concertgebouw
Concertgebouw
The Concertgebouw is a concert hall in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The Dutch term "concertgebouw" literally translates into English as "concert building"...
Award and four first prizes at competitions for young soloists. He performs in Israel, Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, as a soloist and in chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
. Berman was a soloist with many Dutch and Israeli orchestras and often records for CDs, radio and television.
Current collaborations include flautist Abbie de Quant
Abbie de Quant
Abbie de Quant is a renowned Dutch flautist. She teaches at the music academies of Amsterdam and Utrecht and has her own bi-annual concert series at the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam....
(since 1970), Duo 4 with pianist Meir Wiesel, the Tamar Piano Trio and ensembles with vocalists such as Bat-Sheva Zeisler
Bat-Sheva Zeisler
Bat-Sheva Zeisler is an Israeli vocalist, actress, and voice teacher. She sings in the soprano range.Zeisler graduated from the Tel Aviv University, where she studied drama and literature...
and Shimrit Carmi. Past partnerships include Duo Beer Sheva with the late pianist Sara Fuxon. In the seasons of 2004-2008 he also accompanied the remake of Hanoch Levin
Hanoch Levin
Hanoch Levin , was a prominent Israeli dramatist. He was also a theater director, an author and a poet, but he is best known for his plays.- Early life :...
's satirical
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
cabaret
Cabaret
Cabaret is a form, or place, of entertainment featuring comedy, song, dance, and theatre, distinguished mainly by the performance venue: a restaurant or nightclub with a stage for performances and the audience sitting at tables watching the performance, as introduced by a master of ceremonies or...
You, Me and the Next War. In 2007, he was the pianist and musical director of Schubert Plus, An Operatic Episode in Two Acts.
Berman was a senior faculty of piano at the conservatoires of Rotterdam and Arnhem
Arnhem
Arnhem is a city and municipality, situated in the eastern part of the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of Gelderland and located near the river Nederrijn as well as near the St. Jansbeek, which was the source of the city's development. Arnhem has 146,095 residents as one of the...
and editor of the Israel Music Institute
Israel Music Institute
The Israel Music Institute is the first publicly owned music publishing house in Israel. It is devoted primarily to the publication of Israeli art music, but also publishes books and booklets on Israeli music and composers, CDs of Israeli art music, and a periodical, IMI News...
. Among his many students are Cleem Determeijer, Kees van Eersel, Margriet Ehlen
Margriet Ehlen
Margriet Ehlen is a Dutch poet and a composer, conductor and educator of classical music.-Life and career:She has composed for a large variety of instruments, yet is particularly active in composition for voice. These works extend from solo vocalists to choir music. Many of her compositions for...
, Dror Elimelech
Dror Elimelech
Dror Elimelech is an Israeli psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and poet, and a composer and performer of contemporary classical music....
, Gerard Houtman and Matthijs Verschoor
Matthijs Verschoor
Matthijs Verschoor is a Dutch classical pianist.He studied at the conservatoires of Rotterdam and Amsterdam and continued his studies in Rome and London. Among his teachers are Bart Berman, Willem Brons and John Bingham....
.
Berman studied composition with Bertus van Lier and Wouter van den Berg. He has composed
Musical composition
Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...
many original works, including cadenzas to all piano concerti
Piano concerto
A piano concerto is a concerto written for piano and orchestra.See also harpsichord concerto; some of these works are occasionally played on piano...
by Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
, Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
and Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
and second piano parts to be played alongside original compositions by Muzio Clementi
Muzio Clementi
Muzio Clementi was a celebrated composer, pianist, pedagogue, conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer. Born in Italy, he spent most of his life in England. He is best known for his piano sonatas, and his collection of piano studies, Gradus ad Parnassum...
and Daniel Steibelt
Daniel Steibelt
Daniel Gottlieb Steibelt , was a German pianist and composer who died in Saint Petersburg, Russia.-Life and music:Daniel Steibelt was born in Berlin, and studied music with Johann Kirnberger before being forced by his father to join the Prussian army. Deserting, he began a nomadic career as a...
. Most noted are his completions to Schubert's unfinished piano sonata
Piano sonata
A piano sonata is a sonata written for a solo piano. Piano sonatas are usually written in three or four movements, although some piano sonatas have been written with a single movement , two movements , five or even more movements...
s and J.S. Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
's Art of Fugue
The Art of Fugue
The Art of Fugue , BWV 1080, is an incomplete work by Johann Sebastian Bach . It was most likely started at the beginning of the 1740s, if not earlier. The first known surviving version, which contained 12 fugues and 2 canons, was copied by the composer in 1745...
.
Discography
| Participation | Albums | Collections |
|---|---|---|
| Piano solo |
|
|
| Piano duos |
|
|
| Various ensembles |
Sergei Prokofiev Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century... : Romeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet (Prokofiev) Romeo and Juliet is a ballet by Sergei Prokofiev based on William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. It is one of the most enduringly popular ballets... (1976) Hanoch Levin Hanoch Levin , was a prominent Israeli dramatist. He was also a theater director, an author and a poet, but he is best known for his plays.- Early life :... : You, Me and the Next War (2004) |
Peter Schat Peter Schat was a Dutch composer.Schat studied composition with Kees van Baaren at the conservatories in Utrecht and The Hague from 1952 until 1958, and then went on to study in London with Mátyás Seiber in 1959 and with Pierre Boulez in Basle in 1960–61... : To You (1974) George Antheil George Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author and inventor. A self-described "Bad Boy of Music", his modernist compositions amazed and appalled listeners in Europe and the US during the 1920s with their cacophonous celebration of mechanical devices.Returning permanently to... : Ballet Mécanique Ballet mécanique Ballet Mécanique was a project by the American composer George Antheil and the filmmaker/artists Fernand Léger and Dudley Murphy. Although the film was intended to use Antheil's score as a soundtrack, the two parts were not brought together until the 1990s. As a composition, Ballet Mécanique is... (1977) Frank Martin (composer) Frank Martin was a Swiss composer, who lived a large part of his life in the Netherlands.-Childhood and youth:... : Chamber Music (1991) |
Notable performances
|
György Ligeti György Sándor Ligeti was a composer of contemporary classical music. Born in a Hungarian Jewish family in Transylvania, Romania, he briefly lived in Hungary before becoming an Austrian citizen.-Early life:... Workshop, Jerusalem (1987) Israel Festival The Israel Festival is a multidisciplinary arts festival held every spring in Israel. Its center is Jerusalem.The Israel Festival started in 1961 as a summer festival for classical music in the ancient Roman theater in Caesarea... , Jerusalem (1987, 1994) Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and centre of the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.Düsseldorf is an important international business and financial centre and renowned for its fashion and trade fairs. Located centrally within the European Megalopolis, the... (1987) Kol Yisrael Kol Yisrael is Israel's public domestic and international radio service, operated as a division of the Israel Broadcasting Authority.-History:... Festival in Upper Galilee Upper Galilee The Upper Galilee is a geographical-political term in use since the end of the Second Temple period, originally referring to a mountainous area overlapping the present northern Israel and southern Lebanon, its borders being the Litani river in the north, the Mediterranean Sea in the west, the Beit... , Kfar Blum Kfar Blum Kfar Blum is a kibbutz in the Hula Valley part of the Upper Galilee in Israel. Located about southeast of the town of Kiryat Shmona, it falls under the jurisdiction of Upper Galilee Regional Council. In 1994 the population was 615.-History:... (1989, 2007) Chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part... Festival, Tel Aviv (1997) Ethnomusicology Ethnomusicology is defined as "the study of social and cultural aspects of music and dance in local and global contexts."Coined by the musician Jaap Kunst from the Greek words ἔθνος ethnos and μουσική mousike , it is often considered the anthropology or ethnography of music... Conference, Jerusalem (1998) IJ (bay) The IJ is a river, formerly a bay, in the Dutch province of North Holland. It is known for being Amsterdam's waterfront. The name derives from the generic Germanic term for "water" and is similar to other Aa/Ee names for bodies of water. In Dutch, the name consists of the digraph ij, which is... to Sea, Amsterdam (2001) University of Chicago The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890... , Illinois Illinois Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,... (2002) Sinzig Sinzig is a town in the district of Ahrweiler, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is situated on the river Rhine, approx. 5 km south-east of Remagen and 25 km south-east of Bonn, and it has approximately 20,000 inhabitants .-History:... , Germany (2003, 2006, 2008) Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees.... , Evanston Evanston, Illinois Evanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan... , Illinois (2004) YMCA The Young Men's Christian Association is a worldwide organization of more than 45 million members from 125 national federations affiliated through the World Alliance of YMCAs... Festival, Jerusalem (2007) |
Composition
- Duo in Mediterranean Style for violin and viola (1957)
- Christmas Song on a text by Bertus van Lier for choir a cappellaA cappellaA cappella music is specifically solo or group singing without instrumental sound, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. It is the opposite of cantata, which is accompanied singing. A cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato...
(1957) - Israeli Sonatina for piano (1958)
- String Quartet (1958)
- Four Melodies for piano (1960, revised 1980)
- Three New Canons on the Royal Theme of J.S. Bach: The Musical OfferingThe Musical OfferingThe Musical Offering , BWV 1079, is a collection of canons and fugues and other pieces of music by Johann Sebastian Bach, all based on a single musical theme given to him by Frederick II of Prussia , to whom they are dedicated...
(1978) - Birthday Bunch (1994)
- Film music for The Staircase (1995)
- Variations and Fugue on a theme by Nikolai MedtnerNikolai MedtnerNikolai Karlovich Medtner was a Russian composer and pianist.A younger contemporary of Sergei Rachmaninoff and Alexander Scriabin, he wrote a substantial number of compositions, all of which include the piano...
(2009)
Cadenzas
- CastiglioniNiccolò CastiglioniNiccolò Castiglioni was an Italian composer, pianist, and writer on music.Castiglioni was born and raised in Milan, where he began studying piano at the age of 7. He received his performer's diploma from the Milan Conservatory in 1952, and graduated there in composition in 1953...
: Arabeschi for flute, piano and orchestra (1974) - The Beethoven piano concerti (1966–1990)
- The Mozart solo, double and triple piano concerti (1970–1990)
- The Haydn piano concerti (1970–1990)
Completions
- J.S. Bach: The Art of FugueThe Art of FugueThe Art of Fugue , BWV 1080, is an incomplete work by Johann Sebastian Bach . It was most likely started at the beginning of the 1740s, if not earlier. The first known surviving version, which contained 12 fugues and 2 canons, was copied by the composer in 1745...
(1970) - Schubert: Unfinished Piano Sonatas (1976–1990)
- Mozart: Unfinished Four Hands Piano Sonata K357 (1991)
- GlinkaMikhail GlinkaMikhail Ivanovich Glinka , was the first Russian composer to gain wide recognition within his own country, and is often regarded as the father of Russian classical music...
: Unfinished Viola Sonata (1999) - Beethoven: Romance Cantabile for flute, bassoon, piano and orchestra (2001)
Piano parts
- Second Piano Part for Daniel SteibeltDaniel SteibeltDaniel Gottlieb Steibelt , was a German pianist and composer who died in Saint Petersburg, Russia.-Life and music:Daniel Steibelt was born in Berlin, and studied music with Johann Kirnberger before being forced by his father to join the Prussian army. Deserting, he began a nomadic career as a...
: Sonatina Opus 33 in C (1981) - Right Hand Piano Part for J.S. BachJohann Sebastian BachJohann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
: Sonatas in E Minor and E Major (1988) - Second Piano Part for ClementiMuzio ClementiMuzio Clementi was a celebrated composer, pianist, pedagogue, conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer. Born in Italy, he spent most of his life in England. He is best known for his piano sonatas, and his collection of piano studies, Gradus ad Parnassum...
: Six Sonatinas Opus 36 (1995)