Cuclin, Dimitrie (EN)

Cuclin Dimitrie, *24 March 1885 Galați, †7 II 1978 Bucharest, Romanian composer, music theorist and teacher. Between 1903 and 1907, he studied at the Bucharest Conservatoire under D.G. Kiriac (theory, harmony), A. Castaldi (counterpoint, composition), R. Klenck (violin) and in the chamber music class of D. Dinicu and the orchestral class of C. Dimitrescu. n 1907 he left for Paris, where he studied composition at the Paris Conservatoire under Ch.M. Widor, and from 1908 to 1914 at the Schola Cantorum under V. d’Indy and A. Sérieyx. Upon his return to Romania, he took up a teaching post at the Bucharest Conservatoire. From 1918 to 1919 he served as A. Castaldi’s assistant, and from 1919 to 1922 as a professor of music history and aesthetics. Between 1924 and 1930, he was a professor of violin at the City Conservatory of Music and Brooklyn College of Music in New York. From 1930, he returned to Bucharest to teach counterpoint, musical forms and aesthetics, and from 1939 to 1948 also composition at the local conservatoire; from 1932 to 1933, he published the journal “Foaia volanta”, devoted to artistic and philosophical matters. He was extremely active as a music critic and promoter; he hosted radio broadcasts, music conferences, and concert lectures. He published treatises, essays, and dialogues on art and philosophy, as well as short stories, novels, plays, and poetry in Romanian, French, and English. He also produced many translations, including rendering into Romanian the libretto of the opera Samson and Delilah by Camille Saint-Saëns, as well as texts of vocal works by Bach and Handel. In addition, he translated a number of poems by M. Eminescu into English. He received many awards for his compositional activity, including the G. Enescu Prize (1913) and twice (1939, 1955) the State Prize. In 1969, he was awarded the Order “Meritul Cultural.”

Along with G. Enescu, Cuclin belongs to a generation that had a fundamental impact on the stimulation and development of Romania’s contemporary musical culture, introducing the achievements of European compositional technique. Unlike Enescu, Cuclin worked mainly in his own country, gaining respect rather than popularity there, perhaps because the stylisation of Romanian folklore, present in some of his chamber and vocal works, played a secondary role in his compositions. The core of Cuclin’s oeuvre consists of his symphonic works. Cuclin’s musical language is a compromise between tonality and tendencies towards modality, to which he devoted considerable attention in his theoretical writings. Of some significance was his exploration of keys not generally used in orchestral music (Symphonies Nos. 6–11), which, through its sonic and intonational consequences, aimed to uncover new possibilities within the established musical convention.

Literature: V. Tomescu Drumul creator al lui Dimitrie Cuclin (“The Creative Path of Dimitrie Cuclin”), Bucharest 1956 (includes a catalogue of Cuclin’s works and writings); R. Susanu, Dimitrie Cuclin Analyzing the Modes in the Romanian Folk Music, “Artes. Journal of Musicology” 2016.