Hans Werner Henze

Hans Werner Henze was born in Gütersloh, Westphalia (near Bielefeld or Dortmund) in 1926 and died in Dresden in 2012, aged 86.

He is generally associated with the post-war avant garde -that is, his music is generally thought to be difficult to listen to, in all its plinky-plonk awfulness. That doesn't do him justice, however: he certainly was inspired by serialism and atonality, but he was also influenced by Stravinsky, Jazz and Arabic music, amongst other things. As the New Groves puts it, “Combining a free application of Schönbergian principles with metrical and sound patterns ultimately traceable to Stravinsky, Henze's music achieved a fruitful, apparently effortless and very personal synthesis of two modes of thought considered at the time to be totally incompatible…”. His music nevertheless (to these eats, at least) is not easy to get comfortable with, though his symphonies certainly offer hours of intriguing (and pleasant, if challenging) listening.


Plays of music by Hans Werner Henze

Date Time Composition Genre Duration Play Count
2023-04-14 18:20:26 Englische Liebeslieder (Karttunen - 2014) Concerto 00:22:57 1
2023-04-13 12:34:58 Symphony No. 6 (Henze - 1972) Symphonic 00:37:37 1
2023-03-15 18:14:30 Symphony No. 1 (Henze - 1965) Symphonic 00:17:39 1
2023-03-01 16:05:48 Symphony No. 2 (Henze - 1965) Symphonic 00:21:13 1
2023-02-17 18:32:35 Heliogabalus Imperator (Knussen - 2014) Orchestral 00:29:10 1
2023-02-13 11:21:02 Los Caprichos (Knussen - 2014) Orchestral 00:15:34 1
2023-01-17 19:32:02 Symphony No. 4 (Henze - 1965) Symphonic 00:27:56 1
2023-01-13 13:52:40 Symphony No. 9 (Janowski - 2009) Symphonic 00:53:06 1
2023-01-09 13:06:06 Symphony No. 5 (Henze - 1965) Symphonic 00:20:45 1
2022-12-28 16:31:23 Ouverture zu einem Theater (Knussen - 2014) Orchestral 00:04:29 1
2022-12-18 15:33:58 Symphony No. 3 (Henze - 1965) Symphonic 00:24:36 1
2025/10/14 18:24 · 0 Comments