Hugo Riemann
Encyclopedia
Karl Wilhelm Julius Hugo Riemann (July 18, 1849 - July 10, 1919) was a German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 music theorist
Music theory
Music theory is the study of how music works. It examines the language and notation of music. It seeks to identify patterns and structures in composers' techniques across or within genres, styles, or historical periods...

.

Biography

Riemann was born at Grossmehlra
Obermehler
Obermehler is a municipality in the Unstrut-Hainich district of Thuringia, Germany....

, Schwarzburg-Sondershausen
Schwarzburg-Sondershausen
Schwarzburg-Sondershausen was a small principality in Germany, in the present day state of Thuringia, with capital at Sondershausen.-History:...

. He was educated in theory by Frankenberger, studied the piano with Barthel and Ratzenberger, studied law, and finally philosophy and history at Berlin and Tübingen. After going through the Franco-German war he decided to devote his life to music, and studied accordingly at the Leipzig Conservatory. He then went to Bielefeld
Bielefeld
Bielefeld is an independent city in the Ostwestfalen-Lippe Region in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population of 323,000, it is also the most populous city in the Regierungsbezirk Detmold...

 for some years as a teacher and conductor, but in 1878 returned to Leipzig as Privatdozent
Privatdozent
Privatdozent or Private lecturer is a title conferred in some European university systems, especially in German-speaking countries, for someone who pursues an academic career and holds all formal qualifications to become a tenured university professor...

at the University.

As a much-desired appointment at the Conservatory did not materialize, Riemann went to Bromberg in 1880, but 1881-90 he was a teacher of piano and theory at Hamburg Conservatory. After a short time at the Sondershausen Conservatory, he held a post in the conservatory at Wiesbaden (1890-95), but eventually returned to Leipzig University as lecturer in 1895. In 1901, he was appointed professor.

Writings

In addition to his work as a teacher, lecturer and composer of pedagogical pieces, Riemann had a worldwide reputation as a writer on musical subjects. His best known works are Musik-Lexikon (1882; 5th ed. 1899; Eng. trans., 1893-96), a complete dictionary of music
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...

 and musicians, the Handbuch der Harmonielehre, a work on the study of harmony
Harmony
In music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches , or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...

, and the Lehrbuch des Contrapunkts, a similar work on counterpoint
Counterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...

, all of which have been translated into English. One of his inventions, the Tonnetz
Tonnetz
In musical tuning and harmony, the Tonnetz is a conceptual lattice diagram representing tonal space first described by Leonhard Euler in 1739....

, is the predecessor of the modern idea of pitch space
Pitch space
In music theory, pitch spaces model relationships between pitches. These models typically use distance to model the degree of relatedness, with closely related pitches placed near one another, and less closely related pitches placed farther apart. Depending on the complexity of the relationships...

s, and is a fundamental analytical tool of the current field of neo-Riemannian theory
Neo-Riemannian theory
Neo-Riemannian theory refers to a loose collection of ideas present in the writings of music theorists such as David Lewin, Brian Hyer, Richard Cohn, and Henry Klumpenhouwer...

.

He authored many works on many different branches of music. His pupils included the German composer, pianist, organist, and conductor Max Reger
Max Reger
Johann Baptist Joseph Maximilian Reger was a German composer, conductor, pianist, organist, and academic teacher.-Life:...

, and the musicologist and composer Walter Niemann
Walter Niemann (composer)
Walter Rudolph Niemann was a German composer, arranger, and music critic.-Life:Born in Hamburg, Niemann was the son of composer and virtuoso pianist Rudolph Niemann . His uncle, Gustav Adolph Niemann was a violinist and important musical figure in Helsinki...

.

Compositions

He wrote many pieces for piano, songs, a piano sonata, six sonatinas, a violin sonata, and a string quartet.

See also

  • Modulatory space
    Modulatory space
    The spaces described in this article are pitch class spaces which model the relationships between pitch classes in some musical system. These models are often graphs, groups or lattices...

  • Neo-Riemannian theory
    Neo-Riemannian theory
    Neo-Riemannian theory refers to a loose collection of ideas present in the writings of music theorists such as David Lewin, Brian Hyer, Richard Cohn, and Henry Klumpenhouwer...

  • Chordal space
    Chordal space
    Music theorists have often used graphs, tilings, and geometrical spaces to represent the relationship between chords. We can describe these spaces as chord spaces or chordal spaces, though the terms are relatively recent in origin....

  • Pitch space
    Pitch space
    In music theory, pitch spaces model relationships between pitches. These models typically use distance to model the degree of relatedness, with closely related pitches placed near one another, and less closely related pitches placed farther apart. Depending on the complexity of the relationships...

  • Counter parallel
    Counter parallel
    In music theory, the counter parallel is terminology used in German theory derived mainly from Hugo Riemann to refer to relative diatonic functions and is abbreviated Tcp in major and tCp in minor...

  • Functional harmony

External Links

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