© Thorsten Mischke
© Thorsten Mischke

Siegfried Mauser,

born 1954 in Straubing/Bavaria, studied piano under Rolf Koenen, Rosl Schmid and Alfons Kontarsky at the Munich Music University and in addition, he read musicology, philosophy and history of art at the universities of Munich and Salzburg where he earned a doctorate for his thesis on "Das expressionistische Musiktheater der Wiener Schule" - The Expressionist Musical Theatre of the Vienna School.

After a lectureship in musicology and piano at the Munich Music University, he was appointed professor at the University of Wurzburg as early as 1982; this was followed by an appointment as professor at the Mozarteum Salzburg, where he founded the  "Forschungsinstitut für musikalische Hermeneutik" – the Research Institute for Musical Hermeneutics. After 15 years he returned to the Munich University of Music and Performing Arts, where he has been president from 2003 until 2014. From 2014 to 2016 he was Chancellor of the Mozarteum University Salzburg. Furthermore, he is a renowned lecturer of international master classes in piano, song interpretation and chamber music, among others at the International Summer Academy of the University Mozarteum Salzburg or the University of Music Reina Sofía Madrid.

Siegfried Mauser also regularly performs as a juror in international competitions, such as the Bonn Beethoven Competition, the German Music Competition, the Hastings Piano Concert Contest, or the Isang Yun International Music Competition.
He also pursues a wide range of scientific teaching activities, e.g. at the Harvard University, the University of Vienna or the Karlsruhe University of Design.

 

Mauser has been decorated with various prizes and awards, such as the Austrian Honorary Cross for Science and Arts (2009), the Federal Republic of Germany Order of Merit (2010) and the Bavarian Maximilian Order (2012). He has been an ordinary member of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts since 1990 and in 2002 was appointed Director of its Music department.

 

Mauser’s various concerts as soloist and chamber musician have given him to travel around the world. He is a frequent guest at renowned festivals such as the Munich Biennale, the Ruhr piano festival and the Salzburg Festival.

 

As soloist, he has played with famous orchestras such as the Bavarian Symphony Radio Orchestra, the Bavarian State Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, the German Symphony Orchestra Berlin and the Munich Chamber Orchestra and he has worked with many renowned conductors, including Péter Eötvös, Friedrich Goldmann, Johannes Kalitzke, Alexander Lazarev, Kent Nagano, Emilio Pomarico, Christoph Poppen, David Robertson, Jonathan Stockhammer, Arturo Tamayo, Mario Venzago,  Lothar Zagrosek and Hans Zender.

Among his chamber music partners are Ana Chumachenco, Gottfried Schneider, Thomas Zehetmair (violin), Thomas Riebl, Tabea Zimmermann (viola), Heinrich Schiff, Sebastian Hess, Wen-Sinn Yang (violoncello) and Jörg Widmann (clarinet).

 

Mauser played the debut performance of several contemporary compositions, such as piano music and concerts of Wolfgang Rihm, Wilhelm Killmayer, Hans Werner Henze and Jörg Widmann.

 

The list of his most respected recordings is substantial: not only are the complete piano compositions of Paul Hindemith, Alexander Zemlinsky and Karl Amadeus Hartmann available, but also many recordings of contemporary piano music, chamber music and songs (i.e. with Siegfried Jerusalem and Christoph Prégardien).

 

His recently released recording of all piano sonatas of W.A. Mozart (Celestial Harmonies) accompanied by the opus guidebook (C.H. Beck) sets new standards of interpretation and already attracted a lot of public attention.

 

Siegfried Mauser writes and pioneers various publications on musical analysis, musical aesthetics and the history of music of the 19th and 20th centuries, and is editor of the “Handbuch der musikalischen Gattungen“ – the Musical Genres Handbook ,  “Studien zur musikalischen Hermeneutik“ - the Study of Musical Hermeneutics (pub. Laaber), and of “Beck Wissen Musik“ – Beck Knowledge: Music (pub. C.H. Beck). More recent publications include “Beethovens Klaviersonaten”  - Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas (Munich 2001), “Lexikon des Klaviers”  - the Piano Lexicon (Kammertöns/ Mauser, pub. Laaber 2006). In addition, the “ Eine neue Musikästhetik" ("Das Neue erhören") - "A New Music Esthetic" is in the making with the Carl Hanser publishing house.