Joachim Kaiser (18 December 1928 − 11 May 2017) was a German music, literature and theatre critic and senior editor in the feuilleton of the Süddeutsche Zeitung (from 1959). Starting 1977 to 1996 he held a seat as a professor of history of music at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart.
Life
Kaiser was born in Milken, East Prussia (Miłki, Poland) in 1928. He was the son of a country doctor. Literature and music began to interest him at an early age, and at age eight he began to play the piano. After the flight and expulsion of Germans from Central and Eastern Europe 1945–1950, he attended the Wilhelm-Gymnasium (Hamburg). He then studied musicology, German studies, philosophy and sociology at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main and the Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen. Among his fellow students were the musicologists Carl Dahlhaus and Rudolf Stephan.
Kaiser's career as a critic began in 1951. On his review of the Theodor W. Adorno publication: Music and Catastrophe. About the "Philosophy of New Music", Mathias Döpfner described him as one of "the best known and most successful Adorno students ever". Beginning in 1953, Kaiser took part in events of Group 47. In 1958 he was awarded a doctorate in German Studies at the University of Tübingen on the subject of Franz Grillparzer's dramatic style.
Kaiser worked in the cultural editorial department of the Süddeutsche Zeitung from 1959. He was a member of the writers' association PEN-Zentrum Deutschland.
Besides ground-breaking pianists such as Artur Rubinstein, Vladimir Horowitz, Glenn Gould, Sviatoslav Richter and Friedrich Gulda he introduced young interpreters and explained developments in the art of piano playing.
Kaiser felt a special connection to the work of Richard Wagner and supported and accompanied the new beginning of the Bayreuth Festival in 1951 under the direction of Wagner's grandchildren, Wieland and Wolfgang.
Kaiser married the translator and novelist Susanne Kaiser in December 1958. They had two children: the director Henriette Kaiser and the sports editor Philipp Kaiser. He lived in Munich on the edge of the Englischer Garten.
In 2009 he handed over his extensive private archive to the Deutsches Literaturarchiv Marbach as a Nachlass. Besides letters from Theodor W. Adorno and Alfred Andersch, it contains correspondence with Ingeborg Bachmann, Ernst Bloch and Heinrich Böll. From May 2009 onward, Kaiser answered readers' questions weekly in his video column Kaiser's Classic Customer on the website of SZ-Magazin which he had to give up two years later, due to ilness. The series has not been continued since.
Kaiser died in Munich, aged 88.
Work
Kleines Theatertagebuch. Rowohlt, Reinbek 1965 (with preface: Kritik als Beruf). Große Pianisten in unserer Zeit. Piper Verlag, Munich 1965; New edition 1996, . Beethovens 32 Klaviersonaten und ihre Interpreten. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1975, . Erlebte Musik. Von Bach bis Stravinsky. Hoffmann und Campe, Hamburg 1977, . Erlebte Musik. Teil 2. Von Wagner bis Zimmermann. DTV, Munich 1982, . Mein Name ist Sarastro. Die Gestalten in Mozart's Meisteropern von Alfonso bis Zerlina. Piper, Munich 1984, . Wie ich sie sah … und wie sie waren – Zwölf kleine Porträts. List, Munich 1985, . Erlebte Literatur. Deutsche Schriftsteller in unserer Zeit. Piper, Munich 1988, . Leben mit Wagner. Knaus, Munich 1990; New edition: Siedler, Munich 2013, . „Vieles ist auf Erden zu thun.“ Imaginäre Gespräche (…). Piper, Munich 1991, . Was mir wichtig ist. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart 1996, . Kaisers Klassik. 100 Meisterwerke der Musik. Schneekluth, Munich 1997, . Kaisers Klassik. Da Capo. Schneekluth, Munich 1999, . Von Wagner bis Walser. Neues zu Literatur und Musik. Pendo, Zürich 1999, . "Ich bin der letzte Mohikaner". (autobiography, with Henriette Kaiser). Ullstein, Munich 2008, .
Catalogue of works
Gesa Anssar, , : Kaiser-Verzeichnis. Allitera, Munich 2003, .