Paul Hindemith

Paul Hindemith

Paul Hindemith was a composer who, on one hand, was very traditional: his orchestration style is reminiscent of late Romanticism, and his forms are deeply rooted in contrapuntal writing, giving his music a familiar flavor. On the other hand, he developed his own musical system, which allowed him to approach harmony in a unique way, effectively blending tonality and atonality. His music balances consonance and dissonance, placing it somewhere between Béla Bartók’s extended tonal harmonic language and Schoenberg’s twelve-tone theory. Hindemith left behind a highly visible legacy of works and ideas, demonstrating that both tradition and innovation can coexist and matter.

Early Life and Musical Beginnings

Hindemith was born in 1895 in Hanau, Germany, to a family that struggled financially. Music entered his life early: he picked up the violin, showed immediate promise, and soon entered the local conservatory. At first he supported himself by playing in dance bands and musical-comedy groups. He became deputy leader of the Frankfurt Opera Orchestra in 1914 and was promoted to concertmaster in 1916. After his father was killed in World War I, Hindemith was drafted in 1917. Though stationed as a sentry rather than a frontline soldier, he experienced his share of danger, including close encounters with grenades. Remarkably, he managed to remain musically active during the war, playing bass drum in a regimental band and performing string quartets with fellow soldiers.

The Viola, Amar Quartet, and Expressionist Works

Up until 1919, Hindemith had been primarily a violinist. But when he turned to the viola, something changed. His Sonata in F for viola and piano, alongside early string quartets, began to gain attention. When one quartet refused to play his work at a festival, he formed his own ensemble, the Amar Quartet, and became its violist. The group flourished, championing new music and elevating the viola alongside artists like Lionel Tertis and Frank Bridge. Hindemith’s early works were bold, expressionist, and intense—operas like Sancta Susanna and Mörder, Hoffnung der Frauen pushed boundaries. The Nazis later labeled these early works “degenerate,” even though his newer music aligned more with their aesthetic. Politics doesn’t care about nuance: Joseph Goebbels’ disapproval alone banned Hindemith in Germany.

Exile, Major Works, and Mature Style

By the 1930s, staying in Germany was impossible. His wife was part-Jewish, and the regime’s censorship was suffocating. Hindemith left for Turkey, modernized music education there, and trained a generation of young musicians. Later, he moved to Switzerland and the United States. Switzerland saw the premiere of Mathis der Maler in 1938, and the orchestral Mathis Symphony, composed before the opera itself, became a staple of the 20th-century repertoire. Hindemith’s mature style, often called Neue Sachlichkeit or New Objectivity, is clear, logical, and grounded in a personal tonal system. He used all twelve chromatic tones but rejected strict atonality or serialism. Dissonance and consonance became tools rather than rules. The result is instantly recognizable: structured, intelligent, and completely his own.

Hindemith wrote for almost every instrument imaginable, from standard orchestral forces to unusual or forgotten ones:

• viola d’amore

• trautonium (early electronic instrument)

• heckelphone (bass oboe)

• harpsichord within modern orchestras

He could compose extraordinarily quickly, sometimes drafting entire pieces on a train ride to a rehearsal or recording session. Even in the U.S., Hindemith kept surprising. He wrote monumental piano works, orchestral pieces, choral settings, and music for unusual instruments. Ludus Tonalis stands as a 20th-century counterpart to Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, exploring contrapuntal mastery, tonal centers, and his unique harmonic system. He never suffered writer’s block—he simply sat down and composed.

After World War II, Hindemith returned to Europe, continuing to teach and write until his death in 1963. His legacy is vast: a harmonic language wholly his own, a massive output across nearly every genre and instrument, and a philosophy of music as craft as much as inspiration.

Listening:

Ludus Tonalis – I would personally recommend starting here. Paul is a masterful orchestrator which sometimes smoothens out the edges from his bold style; in Ludus Tonalis we see the same structure of works as in Bach’s famous 12 pieces for Well-Tempered Clavier but we are met with a very different approach to sound, to harmony and to the material. As with many other composers, Hindemith’s piano works are very intimate. They don’t require same compromises that his orchestral works might sometimes require.

Mathis der Maler – Perhaps, most famous works of him. Here we can see how his style shines in orchestral music: we meet with both familiar sounds and structures which would be well-known for anyone familiar with Late Romantic music, and unexpected harmonic moves which suddenly take you to a very unexpected territory.

Sonata for Viola and Piano in F major, Op. 11 No. 4 – The first Sonata for viola and piano, shows very early example of Hindemith’s work. We can hear glimpses of his later approach to music even here; at the same time we hear the heart of tradition here, and simply great writing for viola.

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