7 - Compositions before ca. 1956

Summary

When one sets out to describe a fairly large oeuvre in its entirety and in considerable detail, one needs the courage to establish a line where earlier compositions are concerned—a dividing line between “promising” pieces and those already accepted into the body of acknowledged works. I have decided to draw this line at about the year 1944. This does not represent an undervaluing of pieces written earlier, of which much has since appeared in print, and deservedly so. Nevertheless, one has to start somewhere. In the case of Heiller, identifying this boundary is assisted somewhat by the fact that it coincides with his sudden recognition by the general public, which is well documented.

Piano Works and Chamber Music

Sometimes this happens in the life of a composer: the sudden “breakthrough” with one particular work. In Heiller's case it was the Toccata for Two Pianos that placed him among a small group of promising and now also recognized young Austrian composers, and it was a secular, rather than a sacred composition. The year of its creation is not quite certain. Both Erna and Anton Heiller frequently mentioned 1945, but the first performance seems to have taken place on November 27, 1943, at one of Bruno Seidlhofer's house concerts, and the Heillers performed it together. In this program a Toccata for Two Pianos is definitely mentioned and one can assume that no other work with the same title exists. They were to play this work often, for instance in 1946, when none other than Francis Poulenc attended the concert—he was staying in Vienna to appear as soloist in his own piece Concert Champêtre. He relates his impressions of the evening in question in a short article that is worth reading in its entirety.

FROM AUSTRIA

A NEW MUSICIAN: ANTON HEILLER

“It is lovely to go on a journey from which one can bring back a poem” (Giraudoux)

Having just returned from Vienna, I can only reiterate this charming quote by Giraudoux, because for me it is an equally great joy to bring back the name of a new musician, from a country so long separated from us.