Bekker, (Max) Paul (Eugen)

Bekker, (Max) Paul (Eugen), eminent German writer on music; b. Berlin, Sept. 11, 1882; d. N.Y., March 7, 1937. He studied violin with Rehfeld, piano with Sormann, and theory with Horwitz. He began his career as a violinist with the Berlin Phil. He was music critic of the Berliner Neueste Nachrichten (1906–09) and of the Berliner Allgemeine Zeitung (1909–11). In 1911 he became chief music critic of the Frankfurter Zeitung. His polemical exchanges with Pfitzner brought him wide recognition. In 1925 he became Intendant of the Kassel City Theater, and in 1927 in Wiesbaden. In 1933 he left Germany, being unable to cope with the inequities of the Nazi regime. He publ. biographies of Oskar Fried (1907) and Jacques Offenbach (1909). His other writings included Das Musikdrama der Gegenzvart (1909); Beethoven (1911; Eng. tr., 1926); Das deutsche Musikleben, Versuch einer soziologischen Musikbetrachtung (1916); Die Sinfonie von Beethoven bis Mahler (1918); Franz Schreker (1919); Kunst und Revolution (1919); Die Weltgeltung der deut-schen Musik (1920); Die Sinfonien G. Mahlers (1921); Richard Wagner (1924; Eng. tr., 1931); Von den Naturreichen des Klanges (1924); Musikgeschichte als Geschichte der musikalischen Formwandlungen (1926); Das Operntheater (1930); Briefe an zeitgenóssische Musiker (1932); Wandlungen der Oper (1934; Eng. tr., 1935, as The Changing Opera); The Story of the Orch. (1936).

Bibliography

B. Cherney, The B.-Pfitzner Controversy: Its Significance for German Music Criticism During the Weimar Republic (diss., Univ. of Toronto, 1974); V. Bauer, P. B.: Line Untersuchung seiner Schriften zur Musik (Aachen, 1998).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire