Ellie Ney is a German pianist and music teacher. She was born on September 27, 1882 in Dusseldorf, and died on March 31, 1968 in Tutzing. She taught and toured a lot, giving preference to the works of Beethoven. During her life, Ellie has lived in Europe and the United States.
Biography and education
Her career as a pianist developed in Bonn. At the beginning of Ellie Ney's music studies, her teacher was Leonhard Wolf, the famous German violinist and composer, musicologist and talented teacher. Ellie followed in the footsteps of her first music director, graduating from the Cologne Conservatory. Here she was lucky to learn from the famous professor of Jewish origin Isidor Seiss, as well as from the renowned composer and conductor Franz Wüllner, after whom one of the Munich streets is named. The Polish composer, who taught thousands of musicians, Theodor Leschetitsky, contributed to the development of Ellie as a pianist of genius within the walls of the Cologne Conservatory. He instilled in his students attention to the quality of sound, melodic melody and expressiveness of performance.
Ellie Ney's teachers include Emil von Sauer. This German-Austrian composer, pianist and teacher masterly mastered the technique of performance, talentedly mentored many brilliant pianists and no less successfully toured, created his own musical works and recorded concerts of famous composers. As a student, Ney was noted by critics and the public. She was awarded the Mendelssohn Music Prize. In addition, Ellie Ney is the winner of the Ibach award, a manufacturer of pianos, grand pianos and organs.
Career and personal life
After graduating from the Conservatory, Ellie Ney taught in Cologne and in 1907 met her future husband, the violinist Willem von Hoogstraten. Willem was 2 years younger than Ellie and studied in Cologne with the Dutch violinist Brahm Eldering, and then in Prague with Professor Otakar Iosifovich Shevchik. Ellie and Willem began performing as a violin-piano duet not only in Germany, but also in other European countries. Their creative union in 1911 passed into marriage. Unfortunately, it only lasted 16 years and the couple broke up in 1927. Ellie's husband began conducting in 1914, and when the Ney-Hoogstraten family moved to the United States in the 1920s, he performed there with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra as a second conductor. In 1925, Willem joined the Oregon Symphony Orchestra, where he was Principal Conductor.
Ellie, on the other hand, performed in the United States mainly with the works of Beethoven and Brahms. In 1930, she decided to leave the states and return to her native Europe. During her stay in the United States, the pianist gained worldwide fame and recognition. In 1931, Ellie Ney became the main initiator of the creation of the Beethoven Folk Days festival on an annual basis. This event received a great response and lasted until 1944, and later developed into the modern Beethoven Festival. But before that, the brainchild of Ney underwent many changes. For example, from 1944 to 1947, the festival was held twice a year, and since 1974, on the contrary, only once every 3 years. In 1993, the Bonn administration completely abandoned this musical event. But since 1999, the festival has regained a permanent basis, thanks to the public organization "Citizens for Beethoven", the new city administration, social democrats and the "greens". Today it is an annual academic music festival lasting 4 weeks from late August to early October. The organizers and sponsors of the festival are the Bonn administration, Deutsche Welle radio, the city Beethoven Orchestra, the Bonn Opera and the Beethoven House-Museum.
Creation
Supporting the fascist regime in Germany, Ellie Ney joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party in 1937. At that time, it was the only legal party in the country. Ney taught in music schools. She was a teacher at the Krakow Conservatory, which was set up by the Germans in occupied Poland. Ellie was anti-Semitic and in her letter to Joseph Goebbels, one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates, she asked if Holland had been cleared of Jews. Only in this case did she agree to tour the Netherlands.
As soon as the Second World War ended and the fascist party was disbanded by the Control Council, which was created by the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition, Ellie Ney was forbidden to speak. However, in 1952, during the rehabilitation period, she was allowed to resume concert activities, and she actively performed until the end of her life. She managed to make many musical recordings, testifying to her virtuoso playing, in which history is in harmony with modernity. Among the recorded performances of this pianist, you can find works by the following composers:
- Franz Peter Schubert;
- Felix Mendelssohn;
- Frederic Chopin;
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Johannes Brahms;
- Johann Sebastian Bach.
In addition, Ney's music library includes many works by Ludwig van Beethoven, for example:
- Sonatas Nos. 4, 14, 17, 21;
- Sonatas Nos. 8, 12, 18;
- Sonatas Nos. 30, 31, 32;
- Piano Concerts Nos. 3, 4, 5.
Some of the concerts were recorded in collaboration with the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the pianist's husband, Willem von Hoogstraten. Ellie Ney retired at 85, a few weeks before her death. The famous pianist is distinguished by her expressive manner, originality and naturalness of her playing. Ney performed in harmony with the atmosphere of the 19th century. She felt better than the rest of the performers the works of her favorite composer Beethoven. Ellie's contemporaries celebrate her inexhaustible energy.
