Czerny, Carl
- Stephan D. Lindeman
- and George Barth
Extract
(b Vienna, Feb 21, 1791; d Vienna, July 15, 1857). Austrian piano teacher, composer, pianist, theorist and historian. As the pre-eminent pupil of Beethoven and the teacher of many important pupils, including Liszt, Czerny was a central figure in the transmission of Beethoven's legacy. Many of his technical exercises remain an essential part of nearly every pianist's training, but most of his compositions – in nearly every genre, sacred and secular, with opus numbers totalling 861, and an even greater number of works published without opus – are largely forgotten. A large number of theoretical works are of great importance for the insight they offer into contemporary musical genres and performance practice.
The primary source of information about Czerny is his autobiographical sketch entitled Erinnerungen aus meinem Leben (1842). In it, he describes his paternal grandfather as a good amateur violinist, employed as a city official in Nimburg (Nymburk), near Prague. Czerny's father, Wenzel, a pianist, organist, oboist and singer, was born there in ...
