Jascha Horenstein
|
|
Jascha Horenstein (May 6, 1898 - April 2, 1973) was a conductor.
Horenstein was born in Kiev; his mother was Austrian. His family moved to Vienna in 1911 and he studied there with Franz Schreker among others before moving to Berlin and working as an assistant to Wilhelm Furtwangler. During the 1920s he conducted the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Forced as a Jew to flee the Nazis, he moved to the United States of America in 1940 (he eventually became an American citizen). He died in London.
Horenstein is particularly remembered for championing modern music (in 1929 he conducted the premiere of the arrangement for strings of three movements of Alban Berg's Lyric Suite), and for his advocacy of the works of Anton Bruckner and Gustav Mahler at a time when both composers were very unfashionable. He gave the first (concert) performance of Berg's Wozzeck in 1950. He recorded all of Mahler's symphonies and Robert Simpson's 3rd Symphony during 1969 to 1971.