Conrad Baden

Conrad Baden (31 August 1908 - 11 June 1989) was a Norwegian organist, composer, music educator, and music critic.

Baden graduated with a diploma from Oslo’s Music Conservatory in 1931. He continued his studies in composition at the Conservatory in Leipzig with Günter Raphael and Kurt Thomas. From 1934 to 1936 he studied counterpoint with Per Steenberg, and from 1940 to 1942 he studied instrumentation and composition with Bjarne Brustad. 1950 saw Baden travelling to Paris to study with Jean Rivier and Arthur Honegger. In 1965, Baden studied with Hanns Jelinek in Vienna.

Baden’s earliest works were penned in a national-romantic style, while his church music works display a close bond to the prevalent Palestrina style of the period. His works from 1950 onwards, were heavily influenced by French Neo-classicism, and in the 60s Baden would also employ twelve-tone techniques, with an increasing use of dissonance. Spring 1965 saw Baden travelling to Vienna to meet Hanns Jelinek, a student of Schönberg and Berg – a visit that led to a stylistic liberation for the Norwegian composer. The following year, this liberation came into fruition in his sole twelve-tone work Hymnus per alto, flauto, oboe e viola with a text from the Latin hymn Vexilla Regis.

Baden composed works in a number of forms, bar opera and electronic music. As a composer, he was highly active. In addition to his vocation as a professional organist through 47 years, he composed a mass for soloists, choirs and orchestra, 200 songs for soloists and choirs, suites and sonatas for piano and other instruments, motets and 11 cantatas. In Baden’s compositional output, his church music occupies an equal role to that of his orchestral works – he would write five concertos and smaller orchestral works as well as six symphonies. In addition to his career in composition and as an organist, he taught counterpoint, harmony and composition at the Music Conservatory in Oslo. As a music critic, Baden’s reviews were featured in newspapers Drammens Tidende, Vårt Land and Morgenbladet.

Baden was on the advisory council of The Norwegian Society of Composers, (1963-69) founder and chairman of the Drammen Organist Society (1947-52), and chairman of the music section of the Norwegian Theatre and Music-Critics Society(1973-76).

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