Biography of composer, Bernhard Heiden
August 24, 1910 - April 30, 2000
As quoted from the printed program of his Memorial Concert
Indiana University School of Music - Auer Hall
Bloomington, Indiana - September 18, 2000

'Bernhard Heiden was born in Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany on August 24, 1910 to Ernst and Martha (Heimer) Heiden. He became interested in music at the age of five, and a year later composed his first pieces. When he began formal music instruction he studied piano, clarinet and violin, in addition to his lessons in theory and harmony. He was admitted to the Hochschule for Musik in Berlin in 1929, and studied composition under Paul Hindemith, whom he considered his principal teacher. In 1933, his last year at the Hochschule, he was awarded the Mendelssohn Prize in Composition, and was married in 1934 to Cola de Joncheere, pianist and fellow student at the Hochschule.
'Bernhard and Cola came to the United States in 1935 and settled in Detroit, Michigan, where Bernhard taught on the faculty of the Art Center Music School for eight years. During this time he also served as staff arranger for local radio station WWJ and conducted the Detroit Chamber Orchestra, as well as giving piano, harpsichord, and chamber music recitals, and supplying incidental music for theatrical productions at Wayne State University.
'Having been naturalized as a United States citizen in 1941, Bernhard was inducted into the US Army in 1943 and became Assistant Bandmaster of the 445th Army Service Band, for which he wrote over one hundred arrangements. Following his discharge in 1945 he entered Cornell University, studying musicology with Donald Grout and receiving his M.A. degree in 1946. He joined the faculty of the Indiana University School of Music that same year, serving as chair of the composition department until 1974, and remaining on the faculty until his retirement in 1981. After retirement Bernhard's composing energies continued unabated, and he remained an active figure on the IU and Bloomington music scene until his death.
'Strongly influenced by Hindemith's devotion to craft, Bernhard Heiden's music is described by Nicolas Slonimsky in Baker @ Biographical Dictionary of Music and musicians as 'neoclassical in its formal structure, and strongly polyphonic in texture; it is distinguished also by its impeccable formal balance and effective instrumentation.' He was the recipient of many awards and prizes over the course of his long career, including two Fromm Foundation awards and a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation; and his works were performed by the symphony orchestras of Detroit, Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, Saint Louis, Rochester and Chicago, the New York Philharmonic, and by numerous chamber ensembles and eminent solo artists.
'As a gifted teacher and advisor to his students, Bernhard encouraged experimentation in their work at the same time that he also searched for new and broader outlets for his own creative energies. In addition to the shaping of an active composition department at IU, Bernhard was also instrumental in establishing the Indiana University Early Music Institute, having influenced its founder, Thomas Binkley, to come to Bloomington.
'Bernhard is remembered with devotion by his many students and colleagues, who will recall not only the high standards of his teaching and his deep knowledge of the craft of composition, but also his affection, his concern for their well being and careers, and his unfailing equanimity, dry wit, and self-deprecating sense of humor. How fortunate we are that so many of those same qualities live on in his music.'

Briefly - the memorial program consisted of excerpts from his various works, A Bestiary - 1986, Prelude, Theme and Variations for Recorder - 1994, Sonata for Cello and Piano - 1958, Encounters for Brass Quintet - 1994, Serenata for Four Celli - (not dated), and remarks by Dean Emeritus Charles Webb, Composition Professor Emeritus Juan Orrego-Salas, and Heiden's nephew, Karl Sterne.
See:
Darkened City, drawings for an opera.
Score of 'Darkened City'.
Another Obituary.
Works and Discography in 1981.
See also information contributed by Tamara Fudge fudgelink@yahoo.com.
Posted 9/19/2000, Revised 03/23/2003 by Julian Livingston

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