Wilhelm Kempff

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Lore & Background

Kempff was born in Jüterbog, Brandenburg, in 1895 and grew up in nearby Potsdam where his father was a royal music director and organist at St. Nicolai Church. His grandfather was also an organist and his brother Georg became director of church music at the University of Erlangen. Kempff studied music at first at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik at the age of nine after receiving lessons from his father at a younger age. Whilst there he studied composition with Robert Kahn and piano with Karl Heinrich Barth (with whom Arthur Rubinstein also studied). In 1917, Kempff gave his first major recital, consisting of predominantly major works, including Beethoven's Hammerklavier Sonata and Brahms Variations on a Theme of Paganini. Kempff toured widely in Europe and much of the rest of the world. Between 1936 and 1979 he performed ten times in Japan (a small Japanese island was named Kenpu-san in his honor). Kempff made his first London appearance in 1951 and his first in New York in 1964. He gave his last public performance in Paris in 1981, and then retired for health reasons (Parkinson's disease). He died in Positano, Italy, in 1991 at the age of 95, five years after his wife, whom he had married in 1926. During the Nazi rule, Kempff supported it by going on propaganda tours and performing in the countries under Nazi occupation.

Reader's Guide

Kempff's recorded legacy includes works of Schumann, Brahms, Schubert, Mozart, Bach, Liszt, Chopin and particularly of Beethoven. He recorded the complete sonatas of Franz Schubert long before these works became popular, albeit restricting himself to the finished movements, not fragments, in sonatas that Schubert left incomplete. He also recorded two sets of the complete Beethoven sonatas, one in mono (1951–1956) and the other in stereo (1964–1965); earlier, he recorded nearly all on shellac (1926–1945). He recorded the complete Beethoven piano concertos twice as well, both with the Berlin Philharmonic; the first from the early 1950s in mono with Paul van Kempen, and the later in stereo from the early 1960s with Ferdinand Leitner. Kempff also recorded chamber music with Yehudi Menuhin, Pierre Fournier, Wolfgang Schneiderhan, Paul Grümmer, and Henryk Szeryng, among others. As a performer Kempff stressed lyricism and spontaneity in music, particularly effective in intimate pieces or passages. He always strove for a singing, lyrical quality. He avoided extreme tempos and display for its own sake. In his book The Veil of Order, the pianist Alfred Brendel wrote that Kempff 'played on impulse... it depended on whether the right breeze, as with an aeolian harp, was blowing. You then would take something home that you never heard elsewhere.' He regards Kempff as the 'most rhythmical' of his colleagues. Brendel helped choose the selections for the Philips label's Great Pianists of the 20th Century issue of Kempff recordings, and wrote in the notes that Kempff 'achieves things that are beyond him' in his 'unsurpassable' recording of Liszt's first Legende, 'St. Francis Preaching to the Birds.' When pianist Artur Schnabel undertook his pioneering complete recording of the Beethoven sonatas in the 1930s, he told EMI that if he didn't complete the cycle, they should have Kempff complete the remainder. Later, when Kempff was in Finland, the composer Jean Sibelius asked him to play the slow movement of Beethoven's 29th Sonata, the Hammerklavier; after Kempff finished, Sibelius told him, 'You did not play that as a pianist but rather as a human being.'

Did You Know?

• A small Japanese island was named Kenpu-san in Kempff's honor after he performed ten times in Japan between 1936 and 1979.
• Kempff recorded the complete Schubert sonatas long before they became popular, but restricted himself to finished movements, not fragments.
• Composer Jean Sibelius told Kempff after hearing him play the slow movement of Beethoven's Hammerklavier: 'You did not play that as a pianist but rather as a human being.'
• Kempff's second symphony premiered in 1929 at the Leipzig Gewandhaus conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler.
• He gave his last public performance in Paris in 1981 and retired due to Parkinson's disease.

A Career Spanning Seven Decades

Kempff's performing life stretched from a landmark 1917 debut recital—featuring Beethoven's Hammerklavier Sonata and Brahms's Paganini Variations—through his final public appearance in Paris in 1981, when Parkinson's disease forced his retirement. Over those six decades he toured extensively across Europe and beyond, making ten visits to Japan between 1936 and 1979, an honor so significant that a small Japanese island was christened Kenpu-san in his name. His London debut came in 1951 and his New York debut in 1964. His recording career was equally vast: he laid down shellac discs from 1926 to 1945, produced two complete Beethoven sonata cycles (a mono set in 1951–1956 and a stereo set in 1964–1965), recorded the complete Schubert sonatas, and captured both Beethoven piano concerto cycles with the Berlin Philharmonic, whose partnership with him endured more than sixty years. He died in Positano, Italy, in 1991, at the age of 95.

A Philosophy of Lyricism and Impulse

Rather than chasing virtuosic extremes or showy tempos, Kempff cultivated what he considered the essential singing quality of the piano. He prized lyricism and spontaneity, qualities that shone most brightly in intimate passages. Fellow pianist Alfred Brendel captured this sensibility memorably, describing Kempff as someone who played on impulse, dependent on whether the right breeze was blowing, much like an aeolian harp, and noting that audiences would take home something they had never encountered anywhere else. Brendel also called him the most rhythmical of his peers and singled out his recording of Liszt's first Legende, St. Francis Preaching to the Birds, as unsurpassable. The composer Jean Sibelius, after hearing Kempff perform the slow movement of Beethoven's Hammerklavier in Finland, remarked that he had not played it as a pianist but as a human being. Even Artur Schnabel, upon completing his own landmark Beethoven sonata cycle in the 1930s, told EMI that if he could not finish, Kempff should be asked to complete the remainder.

Shaping the Next Generation

Beyond his own performances, Kempff devoted considerable energy to nurturing young pianists. From 1924 to 1929 he directed the Stuttgart College of Music, succeeding Max Pauer in that role. In 1931 he co-founded the summer courses at the Marmorpalais in Potsdam, creating a space for intensive musical exchange. His most enduring pedagogical venture came in 1957, when he established Fondazione Orfeo in Positano, southern Italy. He had the villa Casa Orfeo built specifically to host his annual Beethoven interpretation masterclasses, which he led each summer until 1982. The roster of pianists who studied under him reads like a who's who of the postwar generation: Jörg Demus, Norman Shetler, Mitsuko Uchida, Maria João Pires, Peter Schmalfuss, İdil Biret, and Ventsislav Yankov all counted him among their teachers.

Roots, Family, and the Composer Within

Kempff was born in Jüterbog, Brandenburg, in 1895, and raised in nearby Potsdam into a household saturated with music. His father served as a royal music director and organist at St. Nicolai Church, his grandfather was also an organist, and his brother Georg went on to direct church music at the University of Erlangen. Kempff began piano lessons with his father before enrolling at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik at the age of nine, where he studied composition with Robert Kahn and piano with Karl Heinrich Barth, a teacher who also guided the young Arthur Rubinstein. He married in 1926 and remained with his wife until her death in 1986; he himself passed away in Positano five years later. Beyond performance and teaching, Kempff was a composer who wrote for nearly every genre, including a three-act comic opera, Famile Gozzi (1934), and a second symphony premiered by Wilhelm Furtwängler at the Leipzig Gewandhaus in 1929. He also prepared Bach transcriptions and wrote his own cadenzas for Beethoven's first four piano concertos.