Leo Ornstein (c. December 2, 1892 [or 1893] – February 24, 2002) was one of the leading American experimental composers and pianists of the early twentieth century. Though he gave his last public concert around the age of forty, he continued to compose through his late nineties. December 2 is the 336th day (337th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1892 (MDCCCXCII) was a leap year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... February 24 is the 55th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... For album titles with the same name, see 2002 (album). ... Experimental music is any music that challenges the commonly accepted notions of what music is. ... Composers are people who write music. ... This article deals with those who play the piano. ...

Ornstein as a young man

Born into a Jewish family in Kremenchug, a large town in the Ukrainian territory then under Russian rule, Ornstein reportedly had mastered the piano by the age of eight and was admitted to the St. Petersburg Conservatory as a ten-year-old. His family emigrated to the United States in 1907, where he enrolled in New York's Institute of Musical Art (the predecessor to the Juilliard School). Though he made an unexceptional New York debut in 1911, within two years he was the talk of the music scene for his performances of cutting-edge works by Bartók, Debussy, Kodaly, Ravel, Schoenberg, Scriabin, and Stravinsky (many of them American premieres) as well as his own, even more radical compositions. Image File history File links Leo_Ornstein_as_a_young_man. ... Image File history File links Leo_Ornstein_as_a_young_man. ... Kremenchuk (Ukrainian: ; Russian: , Kremenchug) is an important industrial city in central Ukraine, located on the banks of Dnieper. ... A baby grand piano, with the lid up. ... The St. ... The Juilliard School is recognized as one of the best performing arts conservatories in the world. ... Béla Bartók in 1927 Béla Viktor János Bartók (March 25, 1881 – September 26, 1945) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and collector of Eastern European and Middle Eastern folk music. ... Claude Debussy Achille-Claude Debussy () (August 22, 1862 – March 25, 1918) was a French composer. ... Zoltán Kodály Zoltán Kodály (IPA: /ˈzoltaːn ˈkodaːj/) (December 16, 1882 – March 6, 1967) was a Hungarian composer, ethnomusicologist, educator, linguist and philosopher. ... Joseph-Maurice Ravel (March 7, 1875 – December 28, 1937) was a French composer and pianist, known especially for the subtlety, richness, and poignancy of his music and generally considered to be one of the major composers of the 20th century. ... Arnold Schoenberg, Los Angeles, 1938 Schoenberg redirects here. ... Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin (Russian: Алекса́ндр Никола́евич Скря́бин, Aleksandr Nikolaevič Skrjabin; sometimes transliterated as Skryabin or Skrjabin) (6 January 1872–27 April 1915) was a Russian composer and pianist. ... Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (Russian: И́горь Фёдорович Страви́нский Igor Fjodorovič Stravinskij) (June 17, 1882 – April 6, 1971) was a Russian-born composer of modern classical music. ...

From 1913 through the mid-1920s, when he largely withdrew from concertizing, Ornstein was one of the better known (by some lights, notorious) figures in American classical music. Pieces of his such as Wild Men's Dance (aka Danse Sauvage; ca. 1913–14) for solo piano and Sonata for Violin and Piano (1915; not 1913 as is often erroneously given) pioneered the integrated use of the tone cluster in classical music composition, which Henry Cowell, five years Ornstein's junior, would do even more to popularize. Critic James Huneker wrote, "I never thought I should live to hear Arnold Schoenberg sound tame, yet tame he sounds—almost timid and halting—after Ornstein who is, most emphatically, the only true-blue, genuine, Futurist composer alive." (In addition to "futurist," Ornstein was also sometimes labeled—along with Cowell and others in their circle—an "ultra-modernist.") It is unclear when Ornstein wrote one of his most memorable pieces involving tone clusters, Suicide in an Airplane—probably 1918 or 1919. In 1927, he wrote his Piano Quintet—an epic tonal work marked by an adventurous use of dissonance and complex rhythmic arrangements, it is recognized as a masterpiece of the genre. While Ornstein made no audio recordings, his playing was by all accounts world-class, and it is preserved on numerous piano rolls he recorded for the Ampico label. A tone cluster, in music and in Western tuning, is a chord or simultaneity comprised of consecutive tones separated chromatically. ... Classical music is a broad, somewhat imprecise term, referring to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, European art, ecclesiastical and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly 1000 to the present day. ... Henry Cowell (March 11, 1897 - December 10, 1965) was an American composer, musical theorist, pianist, teacher, publisher, and impresario. ... // Early years Futurism was a 20th century art movement. ... In music, a consonance (Latin consonare, sounding together) is a harmony, chord, or interval considered stable, as opposed to a dissonance, which is considered unstable. ... // Rhythm (Greek ρυθμός = tempo) is the variation of the duration of sounds or other events over time. ... Example of a piano roll being punched. ...

Ornstein around 90

In the early 1930s, Ornstein gave his last public performance. Around that time, he and his wife—the former Pauline Mallet-Provost, also a pianist—founded the Ornstein School of Music in Philadelphia. The couple directed and taught at the school until it closed with their retirement in 1958. They essentially disappeared from public view until the mid-1970s, when they were tracked down by music historian Vivian Perlis, spending the winter in a Texas trailer park (they also had a home in New Hampshire).> Ornstein had never stopped writing music, though he had not sought to publicize it for decades. In 1990, at the age of ninety-eight, Ornstein's final work, the Eighth Piano Sonata, was completed and given its world premiere. The names of its movements reflect not only the passage of a remarkable span of time, but an undimmed sense of humor and exploratory spirit: I. "Life's Turmoil and a Few Bits of Satire" / II. "A Trip to the Attic—A Tear or Two for a Childhood Forever Gone" (a. "The Bugler" / b. "A Lament for a Lost Boy" / c. "A Half-Mutilated Cradle—Berceuse" / d. "First Carousel Ride and Sounds of a Hurdy-Gurdy") / III. "Disciplines and Improvisations." Image File history File links Leo_Ornstein_around_90. ... Image File history File links Leo_Ornstein_around_90. ...

In early 2002, Ornstein died in a small nursing home in Green Bay, Wisconsin, at the age of 109.

References

• Anderson, Martin (2002). Liner notes to Leo Ornstein: Piano Music (Hyperion 67320). (Source of Huneker quote and clarification of Suicide in an Airplane dating. The track listing for the second movement of the Eighth Piano Sonata mistakenly refers to "Sources of a Hurdy-Gurdy"; the liner notes correctly state "Sounds of a Hurdy-Gurdy.") Excerpted online at Sleeve Notes—Ornstein Piano Music
• Ornstein, Severo M. (2002). Liner notes to Leo Ornstein: Piano Sonatas (Naxos 8.559104). (Be aware that these notes incorrectly claim that Ornstein "never again played in public" after the mid-1920s; they also give an unsupported date of 1913 for Suicide in an Airplane. The dating in Severo Ornstein's website dedicated to his father, however, seems consistently proper.)
• Pollack, Howard (2000 [1999]). Aaron Copland: The Life and Work of an Uncommon Man. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. (Confirms Ornstein performed at a 1930 Copland-Sessions concert: p. 44.)
• Stepner, Daniel (1997). Liner notes to Leo Ornstein: Piano Quintet and Strinq Quartet No. 3 (New World 80509-2). (Well-sourced notes give 1933 as date of Ornstein's last public concert, though they do give the incorrect 1913 for Suicide in an Airplane.)

External links

• Leo Ornstein artist's website, including a list of works (many with scores on demand), prepared by his son Severo

Listening

• Leo Ornstein Centenary Program, December 1, 1992 the composer, on the occasion of his 100th birthday, visits with Charles Amirkhanian
• Leo Ornstein: The Last of the Original 20th Century Mavericks Ornstein and his wife interviewed by Vivian Perlis
• Ornstein Archive Ornstein interviewed by Max Schubel and Jennifer Rinehart
• Ornstein Piano Music Marc-André Hamelin's performance of Suicide in an Airplane from the Hyperion Leo Ornstein: Piano Music