Georges I. Gurdjieff/Thomas de Hartmann

Philosopher-guru Georges Ivanovich Gurdjieff and composer Thomas de Hartmann formed a symbiotic music romantic relationship in the 1920s; Gurdjieff, searching for music to make use of in the dance components of his teachings, would present melodies to Hartmann, who then convert them into completed parts for piano. The effect sounds a little like proto-minimalism, and quite a bit like the afterwards music of Alan Hovhaness, because of the distributed Armenian motivation. Gurdjieff was created on January 13 or 14 in 1877 in Alexandropoi, Armenia; he passed away on Oct 29, 1949, in Paris. He afterwards obscured the facts of his early lifestyle, although his supporters tend to respect his book Conferences with Remarkable Guys as a reasonably reliable guide. What’s certain is certainly that he resulted in in Moscow in 1913 and dropped along with avant-garde performers and philosophers. There he begun to develop his mystical idea of “Esoteric Christianity,” that was highly affected by Buddhist and Hindu customs. The Russian trend drove him back again to Armenia in 1917, whereupon he founded some short-term camps for himself and his fans on the Dark Sea coastline. In 1920 the group resolved in Constantinople, where Gurdjieff required particular desire for the Sufi mystic ceremonies from the Whirling Dervishes. Within a yr he was on the highway again, now providing lecture-demonstrations in European countries. By 1922 he previously permanently resolved in Paris, where he continuing to create and educate. Thomas de Hartmann was created in Khoruzhevka, Ukraine, on Sept 21, 1885; he passed away in Princeton, N.J., on March 26, 1956. Hartmann analyzed in the St. Petersburg Conservatory, learning structure from Taneyev and Arensky. The trend drove him towards the Caucasus, where he trained in the Tiflis Conservatory from 1919 to 1921 and 1st fulfilled Gurdjieff. Hartmann’s wife, Olga, became Gurdjieff’s personal secretary, and, as fellow “Seekers of the reality,” the few followed the mystic on his moves, finally settling with him in Paris. (The few would relocate to NY in 1951.) Hartmann supplied invaluable help Gurdjieff, transforming the melodies the mystic would hum to him into piano parts to accompany Gurdjieff’s “actions,” some dance exercises for focus on self-observation. Hartmann’s very own music was quite different; originally, it honored the Russian nationalist college and sounded something similar to Mussorgsky, but after 1925 it indulged in even more modernistic techniques, specifically polytonality and polyrhythm. His catalog contains four symphonies, many concertos, and different works for key pad and for tone of voice.