Friedrich Gulda

Friedrich Gulda (1930–2000) was an Austrian pianist and composer who worked in both the classical and jazz fields. Born in Vienna the son of a teacher, Gulda began learning to play the piano at age 7 with Felix Pazofsky at the Wiener Volkskonservatorium. In 1942, he entered the Vienna Music Academy, where he studied piano and musical theory under Bruno Seidlhofer and Joseph Marx. Gulda won first prize at the Geneva International Music Competition in 1946. Although most renowned for his Mozart and Beethoven interpretations, Gulda also performed the music of J. S. Bach (often on clavichord), Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Debussy and Ravel. In the late 1960s Gulda recorded the complete Beethoven sonatas. He continued to perform classical works throughout his life, composing cadenzas for two Mozart concertos. His piano students included Martha Argerich, who called him "my most important influence," and the conductor Claudio Abbado. From the 1950s on Gulda cultivated a professional interest in jazz, writing songs and free improvisation or open music improvisations. In 1980, he wrote his Concerto for Cello and Wind Orchestra, which has been called "as moving as it is lighthearted", in five movements "involving jazz, a minuet, rock, a smidgen of polka, a march and a cadenza with two spots where a star cellist must improvise." In 1982, Gulda teamed up with jazz pianist Chick Corea, who was between the breakup of Return to Forever and the formation of his Elektric Band. Issued on The Meeting (Philips, 1984), Gulda and Corea communicate in lengthy improvisations mixing jazz ("Some Day My Prince Will Come" and the lesser known, adapted by Miles Davis song "Put Your Foot Out") and classical music (Brahms' "Wiegenlied"). Gulda and Corea continued their musical relationship and recorded Mozart's Double Piano Concerto with the Concertgebouw Orchestra with Nikolaus Harnoncourt (conductor). They also played jazz piano duets of Gulda's "Fantasy For Two Pianos" and Corea's "Ping Pong For Two Pianos". Gulda died of heart failure at the age of 69 on 27 January 2000 at his home in Weissenbach, Austria.