Udo Zimmermann

Udo Zimmermann (Dresden, 1943) is one of the most prominent German composers of the second half of the twentieth century, and his career combines composition with artistic direction and the management of theatres and music centres. As a boy he was a member of the celebrated Dresden Kreuzchor, and he studied at the Hochschule für Musik in his native city between 1962 and 1968, with Thilman in composition, as well as in conducting and singing.

He completed his training with Kochan at the Academy of Arts in East Berlin (1968-1970). During the 1960s he was awarded the GDR Mendelssohn Scholarship on three occasions and, in 1972, the Hanns Eisler Prize from Radio DDR. In 1974 he founded and directed the Studio Neue Musik, shared by the Dresden State Opera and Radio DDR. He was professor of composition at the Dresden Hochschule from 1982 and, between 1985 and 1990, directed the Werkstattbühne für Zeitgenössisches Musiktheater in Bonn.

In 1990 he took over the direction of the Leipzig Opera, where, it seems, his productions proved striking and the repertoire became unusual among the operas of Central Europe. Since then he has held numerous posts, and he was composer in residence at the Salzburg Festival in 1991 and 1995. His works have been performed by the leading European orchestras since 1979.

His music has a marked dramatic character. He employs a clear structure, serialism, aleatoric elements and collage, all subordinated to the dramaturgy and subject matter of each work. His opera Die weisse Rose, composed in two versions (1966-1968 and 1985), addresses the tragic fate of Hans and Sophie Scholl, students who opposed Hitler. In his vocal music he gives primacy to the text, with a syllabic style of singing close to recitative.

Zimmermann's compositional output declined from the late 1980s, a period in which he devoted himself to musical management; the opera Gantenbein is, it seems, virtually his only major work of the 1990s. His importance lies in his catalogue and in his role as a bridge between the musical life of the former GDR and reunified Germany, to which was added his appointment as future director of the Deutsche Oper Berlin from 2001.