Kanitz: Chamber Music

The ARC Ensemble’s “Music in Exile” series continues with this exploration of Ernest Kanitz’s chamber music. Born in 1894 into a wealthy Viennese family and encouraged by his mother to pursue music, Kanitz began piano lessons at the age of seven and composed just one year later. Persuaded by his parents to study law, Kanitz also studied piano, music theory, and composition (with Franz Schreker, who also served as his mentor). His reputation steadily grew, and his works were championed by conductors such as George Szell and Clemens Krauss. In 1922, he was appointed a teacher at the New Vienna Conservatory and founded the Vienna Women’s Chamber Choir in 1930, which quickly made a name for itself throughout Europe with performances of works by Zoltán Kodály, Arthur Honegger, and Igor Stravinsky (as well as Kanitz!). Although Kanitz had converted to Christianity in 1914, he was forced to leave his home in 1938 due to his Jewish ancestry following the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany. After a brief stay in New York, Kanitz and his wife Gertrude moved to Rock Hill, South Carolina, where he had found a teaching position. After Gertrude’s early death from cancer, Kanitz eventually moved to California, where he built a successful teaching career at the University of Southern California. His retirement from USC in 1960 gave him much more time for composing (although he continued to teach and give lectures), which led to successful premieres by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, to name just a few. After his death in 1978, his music, like that of so many exiled composers, fell into obscurity.