Renato de Grandis
Born(1927-10-24)24 October 1927
Venice, Italy
Died(2008-12-02)2 December 2008
Citizenship Italy
EducationConservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello di Venezia
Occupation(s)Composer, musicologist, writer
SpouseBrigitte Grossmann[1]

Renato de Grandis (24 October 1927 – 2 December 2008) was an Italian composer, musicologist, writer and Theosophist.[note 1]

Biography

External image
image icon R. de Grandis

Renato de Grandis was born in 1927 in Venice. He studied piano, conducting, composition, and musicology in Conservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello di Venezia. Among his teachers were famous musicians Gian Francesco Malipiero and Bruno Maderna.[3][4]

Music

In 1945, Renato, being an eighteen-year-old student, won the first prize in a composition competition organized by the Italian radio, and in 1953 he had the first national award of Italy for composition.[3][4][5] In 1959, he settled in Darmstadt, where he lived for about twenty years, then lived in Brussels. He wrote 2 operas, 4 symphonies, 12 sonatas for piano, and other works. De Grandis was an outstanding but atypical figure in the context of avant-garde music of the late 20th century. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung called him an "avant-garde outsider," while the music encyclopedia MGG (1st edition) wrote that "he pointed the way in European musical theater for decades."[5] He was considered one of the most significant European avant-garde composers. His music was being performed in Darmstadt, Dortmund, Cologne, Kiel, Hanover, Munich, Stuttgart, Wiesbaden, Brussels, Warsaw, Dublin.[2]

Theosophy

In 1987, de Grandis decided to abandon the composition and, returning to Italy, engaged in philosophy, poetry, painting, and teaching.[note 2][note 3] He became interested in research in Kabbalah, Buddhism, and Theosophy.[note 4] During the 1980s, he traveled a lot, especially in southern India.[3][2]

Prof. Joscelyn Godwin noted that de Grandis was "an active member of the Italian Section" of the Theosophical Society.[6] He was the founder of the International Center for the Theosophical Research in Cervignano del Friuli, which continues to work successfully to this day. He wrote books such as Teosofia di base, Teosofia contemporanea, Theos-Sophia, Abhidharma e Psicologie Occidentali, in addition, he published comments to the Book of Dzyan and The Voice of the Silence by Helena Blavatsky.[7][note 5]

Works

Compositions

External videos
Music by R. de Grandis
video icon "Clair de lune"
video icon "Midrash"
video icon "Antahkarana"[note 6]
  • Etudes for flute and piano (1960)
  • Canti sulle pause (1961)
  • Toccata a doppio coro figurato per due pianoforti (1965)
  • Salterio populare, 1 (1968)
  • Salterio populare, 2 (1969)
  • Second serenade, for solo cello (1970)
  • Eduard und Kunegunde (1971)
  • Rosenkreuzer-Sonate, seventh piano sonata (1972)
  • Preludio ai poemi di Dzyan, for large orchestra (1973)
  • Zweite Rosenkreuzer-Sonate, eighth piano sonata (1976)
  • Memory of the World: symphonic readings from an unknown archive[4] (1976)
  • Memory of the Fire[8] (1983)
  • Movimento perpetuo, preludes for piano (1998–2002)

Discography

  • Movimento perpetuo (2013), Antonio Tarallo, piano

Books and articles

Notes

  1. ↑ A 17th century composer and kapellmeister Vincenzo de Grandis was his ancestor.[2]
  2. ↑ The break in a music composing lasted only a few years.[2]
  3. ↑ The documents of the personal archive of de Grandis, acquired in 2018 by the Giorgio Cini Foundation, testify to his interest in Eastern philosophy and literature.[1]
  4. ↑ He dedicated his piano prelude "Midrash" (1998) to Abraham Abulafia, the "Kabbalist and mystic".[2]
  5. ↑ In 1999, de Grandis dedicated his piano prelude "Echi" to the president of the Theosophical Society Radha Burnier.[2]
  6. ↑ The word "Antahkarana" derives from the Vedantic philosophy.[2]

References

  1. 1 2 Archivio.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Hahn 2013.
  3. 1 2 3 Konold 2001.
  4. 1 2 3 Hahn 2010.
  5. 1 2 Teosofia.
  6. ↑ Godwin.
  7. ↑ Notizie.
  8. ↑ Symphony 1983.

Sources

  • "A Fondazione Cini archivio De Grandis" [The Cini Foundation has acquired the archive of De Grandis]. ANSA.it (in Italian). Roma: ANSA. 16 June 2018. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • "Renato De Grandis: un compositore veneziano a Darmstadt" [Renato De Grandis: a Venetian composer in Darmstadt]. Notizie (in Italian). Società Teosofica Italiana. 30 August 2018. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • "R. De Grandis Teosofia di base: riflessioni filosofiche sulle basi della teosofia" [Basis of Theosophy: philosophical reflections about the basis of Theosophy by R. De Grandis]. Edizioni (in Italian). 2007. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • "Symphony for the TS: Memory of the Fire by Renato de Grandis". The American Theosophist. 71 (1): 17. January 1983. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • Godwin J. (4 April 2012). "Music, Theosophy and". Theosopedia. Manila: Theosophical Publishing House. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • Hahn, Christoph (October 2010). "Sinfonische Lektüren aus einem unbekannten Archiv" [Symphonic readings from an unknown archive]. Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (in German). Mainz: Schott Music. 171 (5): 50–53. ISSN 0945-6945. JSTOR 23994103.
  • ———— (2013). Tempo non-rigido: Renato de Grandis e i Preludi per pianoforte [Non-rigid tempo: Renato de Grandis and his Preludes for piano] (PDF). WERGO (Media notes) (in Italian). Translated by Brigitte Grossmann de Grandis. Mainz: Schott Music. p. 3. Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 February 2014. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • Konold, W. [in German] (2001). "De Grandis, Renato". In Sadie, S. J. (ed.). Oxford Music Online. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2nd ed.). London: Macmillan. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.11615. ISBN 9780195170672. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
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