Sergiu Celibidache

13 August 1996

teacher

Sergiu Celibidache (; 13 August 1996) was a Romanian conductor, composer, musical theorist, and teacher.

Educated in his native Romania, and later in Paris and Berlin, Celibidache's career in music spanned over five decades, including tenures as principal conductor of the Munich Philharmonic, the Berlin Philharmonic, the RAI National Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de Radio France, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and many other European orchestras such as the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Danish National Symphony Orchestra or the London Symphony Orchestra.

Considering teaching as one of the most important activities, he taught music and musical phenomenology at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy as well as at Mainz University in Germany, at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival in Germany and towards the end at the Schola Cantorum in Paris.

Celibidache categorically refused to release his performances on commercial recordings during his lifetime, claiming that a listener could not have a "transcendental experience" outside the concert hall.

Many of the recordings of his performances were released posthumously.

He has nonetheless earned international acclaim for his interpretations of the classical repertoire and was known for a spirited performance style informed by his study and experiences in Zen Buddhism.

He is regarded as one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century.

Born at Roman in 1912, died at Nemours in 1996.

Born — 1912 06 28

Birthplace — Roman, Romania

Died — 1996 08 13

Place of death — Nemours, France

Education — * Hochschule für Musik Berlin

Friedrich Wilhelm University

Academic

Organization — * Munich Philharmonic

Hochschule für Musik Mainz

Curtis Institute

Awards — * Léonie Sonning Music Prize

Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany

28 June 1912

Sergiu Celibidache was born on 28 June 1912 to a father of Greek descent and a Romanian mother.

officer

His father, Demostene Celebidachi, born in Galați, became a cavalry officer of the Romanian army and later prefect of the Iași region.

His mother, Maria Celebidachi (née Brăteanu), was born in Roman, a small city in the Moldavia region of Romania, where his father was a government official.

He grew up in Iași, where his family soon moved after his birth.

He was already improvising at the piano by the age of four, and after a traditional schooling in mathematics, philosophy and music in Iași, was sent by his father to Bucharest and then to Paris, where he continued his studies.

1936

His father had expected him to pursue a political career in Romania, but in 1936 Celibidache enrolled in the Hochschule für Musik (Academy of Music) in Berlin (German authorities erroneously changed his surname from Celebidachi to Celibidache, the form he was known under), where he studied composition with Heinz Tiessen and conducting with Kurt Thomas, Walter Gmeindl and Fritz Stein.

He continued with doctoral studies at the Friedrich Wilhelm University (Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität), where he studied philosophy with Nicolai Hartmann and Eduard Spranger and musicology with Arnold Schering and Georg Schünemann.

1944

He submitted a dissertation on Josquin des Prez and received his degree in 1944.

dancer

choreographer

Throughout the 1940s, he accompanied and was romantically involved with Romanian-born dancer and choreographer Iris Barbura.

During his studies in Berlin, Celibidache was introduced to Zen Buddhism by his teacher Martin Steinke, and Buddhism informed Celibidache's worldview and work for the rest of his life.

1986

In a 1986 interview, he said, "I was born a Christian Orthodox, and studied philosophy, but I still couldn't find solutions to my problems.

It was through Steinke that I found [...] the way of Zen.

All I can say is that without Zen I couldn't have known this strange principle that the beginning is in the end, and the end is in the beginning.

Music is nothing but the materialization of this principle."

1945

1952

Wilhelm Furtwängler, unable to perform until his denazification trial was complete, Celibidache was principal conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic from 1945 to 1952.

He received this position shortly after the end of World War II, due to tragic circumstances: Leo Borchard, who was cleared to conduct by the American forces, was shot during a nocturnal car ride.

Celibidache just won the contest organised by the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra.

General

Director

In search of a replacement, the Berlin Philharmonic plucked Celibidache from the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra to become the youngest General Musik Director of the Berlin Philharmonic

1947

Following Furtwängler's denazification in 1947, Furtwängler was able to conduct the Berlin Philharmonic in alternation with Celibidache.

Celibidache had begun making waves with the orchestra's management regarding the age of some of the musicians as well as his controversial views regarding recordings.

1954

Following the death of Furtwängler in 1954, Celibidache was overlooked to be his official successor of the Berlin Philharmonic.

Instead, the management chose Herbert von Karajan.

It took 37 years before a collaboration could once again take place: the concert of Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 happened only at the instigation of the West German president at the time, Richard von Weizsäcker.

Celibidache later worked with radio orchestras in Stockholm, Stuttgart and Paris.

pianist

He also worked in Britain in the late 1940s and 1950s, due partly to the promotional efforts of the pianist Eileen Joyce and her partner, an artists' agent.

Joyce said that Celibidache was the greatest conductor she had ever worked with: "he was the only one who got inside my soul".

1970

In 1970 he was awarded Denmark's Sonning Award.

1979

director

From 1979 until his death he was music director of the Munich Philharmonic.

1984

He regularly taught at Hochschule für Musik Mainz in West Germany and in 1984 taught at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Teaching was a major focus throughout his life and his courses were frequently open to all without any fee.

Among his notable students are Enrique García Asensio, Konrad von Abel, Françoys Bernier, Raffaele Napoli, Rony Rogoff, Bernhard Sieberer, Markand Thakar, and Nils-Göran Areskoug.

He appeared in the film Ambassadors of Music (1952), conducting the Berlin Philharmonic in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven's Egmont overture.

Later, he was the subject of two major documentaries: "Celibidache, let it evolve" by Jan Schmidt-Garre and "Celibidache's Garden" by his son Serge Ioan Celebidachi.

trombonist

A controversy arose over discriminatory behaviour that came to light during a 12-year legal battle during his tenure at the Munich Philharmonic with trombonist Abbie Conant.

Celibidache claimed Conant lacked the "necessary strength" and "emotional empathy" to lead the trombone section.

She was asked to sit in the second chair.

Celibidache was not invited to give testimony at the trials.

Finally, the courts found in favour of Conant.

As a consequence, Conant was paid the same as her male colleagues.

After 37 years of absence, Celibidache was asked by Federal President Richard von Weizsacker to return to West Berlin and conduct the Berlin Philharmonic one more time, in order to symbolise the end of communism in Europe and the German Reunification.

31 March 1992

Celibidache conducted Bruckner 7th, on 31 March 1992 with the Berlin Philharmonic.

Celibidache died at the age of 84 on 14 August 1996 at Nemours, near Paris.

He was buried in the Cimetière de Neuville sur Essonne.

Celibidache's approach to music-making is often described more by what he did not do instead of what he did.

For example, much has been made of Celibidache's "refusal" to make recordings even though almost all of his concert activity actually was recorded – having accepted live radio broadcasts – with many released posthumously by major labels such as EMI and Deutsche Grammophon with the consent of his family.

In his view, music is made of the cumulation of thousands of "Nos" and one final "yes" when the conditions are eventually all gathered during a concert.

It was all about the live experience, the ability to be "in the now".

Celibidache's focus was indeed on creating, during each concert, the optimal conditions for what he called a "transcendent experience".

Aspects of Zen Buddhism, such as ichi-go ichi-e, strongly influenced his music making.

He believed that transcendental experiences were extremely unlikely to ensue when listening to recorded music, so he eschewed them.

critic

As a result, some of his concerts did provide audiences with exceptional and sometimes life-altering experiences, including, for example, a 1984 concert in Carnegie Hall by the Orchestra of the Curtis Institute that New York Times critic John Rockwell described as the best of his 25 years of concert-going.

Celibidache was well known for his demands for extensive rehearsal time with orchestras.

An oft-mentioned feature of many of his later concerts, captured in the live recordings of them, is a slower tempo than what is considered the norm, while in fast passages (especially in his earlier performances) his tempi often exceeded metronome markings by far.

In Celibidache's own view, however, criticism of a recording's tempo is irrelevant, as it is not (and cannot be) a critique of the performance but rather of a transcription of it, without the ambience of the moment, for him, a key factor in any musical performance.

As Celibidache explained, the acoustic space in which one hears a concert directly affects the likelihood of the emergence of his sought-after transcendent experience.

The acoustic space within which one hears a recording of one of his performances, on the other hand, has no impact on the performance, as it is impossible for the acoustic features of that space to stimulate musicians to play slower or faster.

collector

That his recorded performances differ so widely from the majority of other recordings has led them to be seen by some as collector's items rather than mainstream releases and 'one-offs' rather than reference recordings.

1965

1924

2012

In 1965, Celibidache married Ioana Procopie Dumitrescu (1924–2012).

19 June 1968

They had one son, Sergiu Ioan Celibidache ("Serge"), born 19 June 1968.

2025

Serge directed his father's 2025 biopic The Yellow Tie, in which he is portrayed by Ben Schnetzer, as well as Ewan Horrocks and John Malkovich.

Most of his music compositions are not performed and not published.

1978

Der Taschengarten (ca.1978) – published by Schott Music

1992

Haz de Necaz (ca. 1992) – published by Schott Music

1995

Hommage to Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (ca.1995) – unpublished

Requiem Mass – unpublished

4 Symphonies – unpublished

Notable releases have been his Munich performances of Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, Anton Bruckner, Robert Schumann, Johann Sebastian Bach, Gabriel Fauré and a series of live performances with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra:

1945: Debussy/Roussel: Petite Suites, with Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra (Naxos)

1945: Prokofiev: Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Prokofiev Symphony in D major, Op.

3729

25 "Classical" (HMV C 3729-30) 78 rpm

1948

1948: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op.

2036

64 LPO (Decca AK 2036–41 78 rpm)

1949

1949: Mozart: Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K.

183

2197

183 (Decca AK 2197-9 78 rpm)

1951

1951: Mozart: Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K.

2558

183 (Decca LXT 2558)

1951: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op.

2545

64 LPO (Decca LXT 2545)

1969

1969: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op.

833

64 LPO (Decca Eclipse ECM 833)

1985

1985: Beethoven: Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (Electrecord)

1988

1988: Mendelssohn: Sinfonia N. 4 "Italian"; Dvořák: Sinfonia N. 9 Dal Nuovo Mondo (Frequenz)

1990

1990: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5; Nutcracker Suite (London)

1991

1991: Mozart: Requiem; Vivaldi: Stabat Mater (Arkadia)

1991: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 "Pathetique"; Roméo et Juliette (Arkadia)

1994

1994: Brahms: Symphony No. 2 & Haydn Variations, Op.

56a (Fonit-Cetra Italia)

1994: Brahms: Symphony Nos.

3 & 4 (Fonit-Cetra Italia)

1994: Bruckner: Symphony No. 7 (Andromeda)

1994: Mozart: Grand Mass, K.

427

427 (Cetra)

1995: Beethoven: Symphony Nos.

2 & 4 (Nas)

1997

1997: Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Beethoven: Symphony Nos.

4 & 5 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Debussy: La Mer; Iberia (EMI Music Distribution)

103

104

1997: Haydn: Symphony Nos 103 & 104 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Mozart: Symphony No. 40; Haydn: "Oxford Symphony" (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Ravel: Ma Mère l'Oye; Bolero, Le tombeau de Couperin; Alborada del Gracioso (Fonit-Cetra Italia)

1997: S. Celibidache Conducts Beethoven & Brahms (Tahra)

1997: Schubert: Symphony No. 9 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Schumann: Symphonies 3 & 4 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Tchaikovsky: Romeo and Juliet Fantasy–Overture; Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 (EMI Music Distribution)

1997: The Young Celibidache, Vol.

II (Tahra)

1997: Wagner: Orchestral Music (EMI Music Distribution)

1998

1998: Bruckner 3 (EMI Music Distribution)

1998: Bruckner 4 (EMI Music Distribution)

1998: Bruckner 6 (EMI Classics)

1998: Bruckner 7; Te Deum (EMI Music Distribution)

1998: Bruckner 8 (EMI Classics)

1998: Bruckner 9 in Concert and Rehearsal (EMI Classics)

1998: Bruckner: Mass in F minor (EMI Music Distribution)

1998: Bruckner: Symphonies No. 3-9; Mass in F minor, Te Deum (EMI Classics)

1998: Shostakovich: Symphonie No. 7 (Magic Talent)

1999

1999: Beethoven: Symphonies No. 2 & 4 (EMI Music Distribution)

1999: Beethoven: Symphony No. 3 (EMI Music Distribution)

1999: Beethoven: Symphony No. 6; Leonore (EMI Music Distribution)