Werner, Eric
WERNER, ERIC
WERNER, ERIC (Erich ; 1901–1988), musicologist and composer. Born in Ludenberg (near Vienna), Werner attended the Berlin Hochschule fuer Musik, graduating in 1924. He studied piano, organ, and composition in Vienna and Berlin (with E. Kornauth, F. Schreker, and F. Busoni), and musicology in Vienna, Prague, Berlin, Göttingen, and Strasbourg (with G. *Adler, R. Lach, G. Schünemann, C. *Sachs, J. Wolff, F. Ludwig, and T. Gerold), as well as Judaic studies and comparative religion (with M. *Buber, I. *Heinemann, J. *Horowitz, and E. Mueller). He earned his doctorate at the University of Strasbourg, in 1928, after submitting his dissertation in Latin, under the guidance of Théodore Gérold. His thesis deals with a comparative study of the Western Christian and Jewish forms of cantillation motives. After teaching at Holzminden and at the conservatory and gymnasium in Saarbrücken, Werner became lecturer at the rabbinical seminary in Breslau in 1935–38, and also taught Latin and music at the Jewish high school there. In 1938, seeking refuge from the Nazi regime, he and his wife emigrated to the United States, where, in 1939, he was invited to join the faculty at Hebrew Union College (Cincinnati) as A.Z. *Idelsohn's successor, remaining until 1951. There his full schedule included teaching, directing the choir and worship services, and serving as organist. The college's magnificent Edouard *Birnbaum collection provided material for his early research. His conception of a school of sacred music in New York, linked with Rabbi Stephen Wise's Jewish Institute of Religion (founded in 1922), was ultimately realized in 1950. Resettling in New York, he continued teaching until his retirement in 1967. From 1967 until 1971 he was the head of the department of musicology founded by him at Tel Aviv University.
A Guggenheim Fellowship (awarded in 1957) supported research on his work The Sacred Bridge; the Interdependence of Liturgy and Music in Synagogue and Church During the First Millennium, 2 vols. (London, 1959; New York, 1984), the first major synthesis of a basic direction of inquiry in both Jewish and European musicology. Werner's pathfinding studies encompassed such diverse topics as comparative Jewish and Christian chant, synagogue liturgy in medieval times, and the traditional music of Ashkenazi Jewry. Highly critical of the Wagner circle, he also wrote on Mozart, *Mahler, and Bruckner, and contributed a significant biography on *Mendelssohn. His book Mendelssohn: A New Image of the Composer and His Age (1963) is another significant reinterpretation. Mathematics, philosophy, and aesthetics are central facets in many of his writings. His liturgical music settings reflect current musical trends while preserving unity in the spirit of tradition.
add. bibliography:
ng2; mgg; Baker, Biog, Dict; Riemann-Gurlitt; J. Cohen, Bibliography of the Publications of Eric Werner (1968); in: Yuval, 1 (1968); I.J. Katz, "Eric Werner (1901–1988): A Bibliography of his Collected Writings," in: Musica Judaica, 10 (1987–88), 1–36.
[Bathja Bayer /
Israel J. Katz (2nd ed.)]