Eisler, Hanns#
b. Leipzig (Germany), July 6, 1898, d. erlin (Germany), Sept. 6, 1962, composer; brother of Ruth Fischer, father of Georg Eisler, son of Viennese philosopher Rudolf Eisler; grew up in Vienna and studied under A. Schoenberg and A. von Webern. Awarded the Music Prize of the City of Vienna for his Piano Sonata Op. 1. Lived in Berlin from 1925. E. had already devoted himself to the labour movement (wrote pieces for worker's choirs) in Vienna, later became a radical Marxist. Friendship with B. Brecht, for whom he wrote stage and film music, combining elements of classical and light music. Spent the years immediately preceding and following World War II as well as the war itself (1933-1948) in exile in the Soviet Union, Spain and the USA; successful in Hollywood as a writer of film scores and music theoretician ( worked with T. W. Adorno). However, he was expelled from the USA in 1948 because of his adherence to Communism; lived in Vienna until 1950 and then in the German Democratic Republic (for which he wrote the national anthem) until his death.
Further works#
String Quartet, 1938; 14 Arten den Regen zu beschreiben, Op. 70, 1941. - Incidental music (e.g. to dramas by F. Schiller, W. Shakespeare, J. Nestroy, K. Kraus, J. R. Belcher). -Publications#
Composing for the films, 1947 (with T. W. Adorno; Komposition fuer den Film, 1949), Materialien zu einer Didaktik der Musik, 1973. - Edition: H. E. Gesamtausgabe (complete works), ed. by A. Duemling, 1998ff.Literature#
J. Shintani (ed.), H. E. 1898-1962, list of works, 1998; F. Hennenberg, H. E., 1998; J. Schebera, H. E., 1998.