Heinrich Schiff, a cellist whose lyrical, understated style and singing tone made him a profound interpreter of music from Bach through a long list of contemporary composers, died on Friday in Vienna. He was 65.
Ludwig Müller, the concertmaster of the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, announced Mr. Schiff’s death to the Austrian Press Agency but did not specify the cause.
Mr. Schiff performed and recorded nearly all the standard works of the cello repertory. His fastidious, historically sensitive renditions of Bach’s unaccompanied suites were widely acclaimed. He won the German equivalent of a Grammy Award for his recording of the Brahms Double Concerto, with the violinist Frank Peter Zimmermann, in 1997, and the Grand Prix du Disque of the Académie Charles-Cros in France for his recordings of the two Shostakovich cello concertos conducted by the composer’s son, Maxim. With Till Fellner, he recorded the complete Beethoven works for cello and piano in 2000.
He was equally well known as a tireless explorer of new material for the instrument, starting with Witold Lutoslawski’s Cello Concerto, which he performed at its premiere in Warsaw in 1973, with the composer conducting. Over the years he introduced works written for him by Hans Werner Henze, Friedrich Gulda, Richard Rodney Bennett, John Casken and other composers.
“Cellists always say, ‘We don’t have the repertoire,’ instead of really looking at what’s out there,” Mr. Schiff told The Chicago Tribune in 1990. “Even in the older literature, as far back as the Baroque, there is a wider repertoire than cellists are willing to admit.”
In the mid-1980s he embarked on a second career as a conductor, after studying with Hans Swarowsky. He quickly became a favored guest conductor for leading orchestras around the world and in 1990 was named artistic director of the Northern Sinfonia, then based in Newcastle, England. Five years later he was appointed chief conductor of the Winterthur Musikkollegium in Switzerland and the Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra. From 2005 to 2009 he was the chief conductor of the Vienna Chamber Orchestra.
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“Schiff looks and moves like a born leader, his confidence and authority occupy a high level, and he commands an irrepressible personality in front of an orchestra,” the music critic Daniel Cariaga wrote in The Los Angeles Times in a review of Mr. Schiff’s American conducting debut, with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, in 1994.
Until health problems forced his retirement as a cellist in 2012, Mr. Schiff held a revered place among the instrument’s modern masters. “Schiff is a true cello animal,” the British cellist Natalie Clein, who studied with him, wrote in The Guardian in 2012. “His hands seem to be molded around the instrument, as if he were born playing it.”
She added: “He strikes the balance between individuality and faithfulness to a composition perfectly, maintaining a deep integrity and old-school seriousness. There is a high-voltage electricity in his vibrato, a breathlessness that keeps you endlessly listening; but his playing also has a sensitivity and a generosity of spirit that makes his sound instantly recognizable.”
Heinrich Schiff was born on Nov. 18, 1951, in Gmunden, Austria. His father, Helmut, and his mother, Helga Riemann, were both composers.
He began playing the piano at 6 and the cello at 10. After studying with Tobias Kühne at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna and with the French cellist André Navarra at the Detmold Music School, he made debuts in Vienna and London in 1971.
A busy performing and recording career followed, as he became a favored soloist with major orchestras and at prestigious festivals. He played on two historically important instruments, the 1711 Stradivarius known as La Mara and a 1739 Montagnana known as the Sleeping Beauty.
Mr. Schiff taught at the Cologne University of Music and Dance, the University of Basel, the Mozarteum in Salzburg and the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna.
Information on survivors was not immediately available.
Source: NY Times62
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