Darmstädter Ferienkurse is a regular summer event of contemporary classical music in Darmstadt, Hesse, Germany. It was founded in 1946, under the name Ferienkurse für Internationale Neue Musik Darmstadt, as a gathering with lectures and concerts over several summer weeks. Composers, performers, theorists and philosophers of contemporary music met first annually until 1970, and then biannually. The event is organised by Internationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt. It is regarded as a leading international forum of contemporary and experimental music with a focus on composition. The festival awards the Kranichsteiner Musikpreis for performers and young composers.
History
Overview
The Ferienkurse were initiated in 1946 by Wolfgang Steinecke, then responsible for culture in the municipal government of Darmstadt. He directed them until his death in 1961, succeeded by , Friedrich Ferdinand Hommel, Solf Schaefer, and Thomas Schäfer, who has been artistic director and president of the IMD from 2009. The courses were first held annually, lasting for about twelve days. From 1970, they have been held biannually for two to three weeks. The first venue was Jagdschloss Kranichstein, a rural hunting palace in Darmstadt. Beginning in 1949, public buildings in Darmstadt have been used not only for some concerts as in the beginning, but also courses.
Background
The Ferienkurse were founded to connect Germany again to the international scene in classical music, as modernist forms of classical music had been systematically suppressed by the Nazis from 1933 as "degenerate music". Creative minds were expelled and murdered over a period of twelve years.
Beginning
The first event in 1946 offered courses in conducting by Carl Mathieu Lange, in musical composition by Wolfgang Fortner, in piano by Georg Kuhlmann, voice by Elisabeth Delseit, violin by Günter Kehr, opera direction by Bruno Hey and, and music criticism by Fred Hamel. A first series were courses, lectures and concerts, from 25 August to 21 September. They were followed by public concerts and lectures, titled Internationale zeitgenössische Musiktage from 22 to 29 September, held in collaboration with the city of Darmstadt, its Landestheater, and the broadcasters Süddeutscher Rundfunk and Radio Frankfurt. Events included an exhibition of the Neue Darmstädter Sezession, Zeitgenössische deutsche Kunst, and also Carl Orff's opera Die Kluge, and the award ceremony of the Georg Büchner Prize to Fritz Usinger. Concerts presented several world premieres, such as 's string sextet, Fortner's für Klavier, Günter Raphael's sonata for solo flute, a trio for flute, viola and cello by Günter Bialas, Henze's Kranichsteiner Kammerkonzert for flute, piano and strings, and Hölderlin-Lieder by Hermann Reutter. Willy Burkhard's Symphonie in einem Satz and Hindemith's String Quartet No. 6 received their first performance in Germany. During the first years of the event, a focus was on German premieres of works, sometimes decades after their composition, by composers such as Arnold Schönberg, Anton Webern, Igor Stravinsky and Béla Bartók. Schoenberg's Piano Concerto was played in 1948, and his String Quartet No. 4 in 1949. That year, a symphony concert was dedicated exclusively to Schoenberg's works, including the German premiere of his Violin Concerto, honouring his 75th birthday. The 70th birthday of Webern was honoured with a concert of his chamber music in 1953. It was the first forum of contemporary music in Germany after World War II, including music theory and philosophy. Lectures were held by instructors such as Theodor W. Adorno, René Leibowitz, Heinz-Klaus Metzger, and later Carl Dahlhaus and Rudolf Stephan, offering critical reflection of advanced composition. Composers such as Edgard Varèse, Olivier Messiaen, Ernst Krenek and John Cage visited, presenting their work and aesthetic in composition classes, and contributing to worldwide recognition of the institution.
For the organisation of the event, the Internationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt was founded in 1948. It also keeps an archive of past events and compositions. It holds around 20,000 photographies, 10,000 letters, sound files and other documents, available online since 2016. The event is sponsored by several organisations, especially public broadcasters.
Music prize
A prize, the was installed in 1952, first for performers, then also for composers. Recipients include performers and composers:
During the late 1950s and early 1960s the courses were charged with a perceived lack of interest on the part of some of its zealot followers in any music not matching the uncompromisingly modern views of Pierre Boulez—the "party subservience" of the "clique orthodoxy" of a "sect", in the words of Kurt Honolka, written in 1962 in an effort to "make the public believe that the most advanced music of the day was no more than a fancy cooked up by a bunch of aberrant conspirators conniving at war against music proper." This led to the use of the phrase 'Darmstadt School' as a pejorative term, implying a "mathematical," rule-based music.
Recordings
The courses presented in 70 years around 5,000 world premieres. The record labelcol legno has published recordings, often documenting world premieres and first performances in Germany.
