Heinz Winbeck

Heinz Winbeck (11 February 1946 – 26 March 2019) was a German composer, conductor and academic teacher.

He is known for five large-scale symphonies, which he programmatically subtitled, such as "Tu Solus" and "De Profundis".

As a composition teacher in Würzburg, he shaped a generation of students.

Winbeck was born in a small village named Piflas, now part of Ergolding, close to Landshut in Lower Bavaria, into a family of farmers.

He started his musical studies in 1964 at the Richard Strauss Conservatory in Munich: piano with Magda Rusy and conducting with Fritz Rieger.

From 1967 he studied conducting at the Musikhochschule München with Jan Koetsier and composition with Harald Genzmer and Günter Bialas, graduating with the Staatsexamen (State Exam) in 1973.

After his studies, he was encouraged especially by Wilhelm Killmayer to find his personal style.

Like Wolfgang Rihm and Manfred Trojahn, he turned to a Neue Einfachheit (New simplicity) and subjectivity.

From 1974 to 1978 he worked as a composer and conductor at the Stadttheater Ingolstadt, also for the festival Luisenburg-Festspiele.

In 1980 he taught at the Musikhochschule München.

In 1981 he studied for half a year at the Cité internationale des arts in Paris on a scholarship from the State of Bavaria.

He composed five large-scale symphonies between 1983 and 2011, comparable to the symphonies of Gustav Mahler.

By giving them titles, he reflected topics such as history as a sequence of wars and cruelty, the guilt of the generation of his parents, endangered ecology, the loneliness of humanity in the cosmos, and facing near-death.

Winbeck's First Symphony was premiered in 1984 at the Donaueschinger Tage für Neue Musik and recorded by WERGO, combined with Winbeck's second string quartet, with Dennis Russell Davies conducting the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Saarbrücken.

Winbeck's Fifth Symphony "Jetzt und in der Stunde des Todes" (Now and in the hour of death) reflects sketches of Anton Bruckner's unfinished 9th Symphony.

In 1987 he taught ear training and music theory at the Musikhochschule München.

In 1988 he was appointed professor of composition at the Hochschule für Musik Würzburg.

Among his students were Tobias PM Schneid, the composer and pianist Rudi Spring and Stefan Hippe as well as the composer Ines Lütge, composer and musicologist Daniel Hensel, Alexander Muno, Adrian Sieber, Henrik Ajax and the composer Joachim F.W. Schneider.

Winbeck was composer in residence at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Cabrillo, California.

From 1991 Winbeck lived in Schambach near Riedenburg in Lower Bavaria, in a monastery that he and his wife Gerlinde modernized.

In 1994 Heinz and Gerhilde Winbeck won a prize for the historical renovation by the Hypo-Foundation.

The work in three movements of about 55 minutes was played by the Bruckner Orchestra Linz, conducted by Dennis Russell Davies on 1 March 2010 at the Stift St. Florian.

The same year Winbeck started a collaboration with the Landestheater Linz, which resulted in the ballet "Lebensstürme" (Storms of life).

The composer commented on his way of composing: "Ich kann nichts anderes sagen, als daß ich buchstäblich nur das zu Papier bringe, das, würde ich es nicht tun, mich zersprengte. (All I can say is that I literally only put down on paper that which, were I not to do so, would cause me to explode.)"

Winbeck's works are published by Bärenreiter.

Vocal

Symphonic works

Chamber music

He died on 26 March 2019 in a clinic in Regensburg.

The CD box "Heinz Winbeck – The Complete Symphonies" published by the TYXart records label in 2019 was awarded the OPUS Klassik in August 2020, in the categories "Symphonic recording of the 20th / 21st century", "Editorial performance of the year" and "World premiere recording of the year", nominated and awarded the OPUS Klassik for the "world premiere recording" at the beginning of September 2020.

Winbeck revived the genre of the symphony, motivated by the need for existential expression.