Hába, Alois (EN)

Hába Alois, *21 June 1893 Vizovice (Moravia), †18 November 1973 Prague, composer, theorist and teacher

Between 1908 and 1912, he studied at the teacher training college in Kroměříž, where he took violin lessons; between 1912 and 1914, he taught at a primary school in Bílovice, Moravia. Between 1914 and 1915, he studied composition with V. Novák at the Prague Conservatory; he continued his compositional studies with F. Schreker at the Musikakademie in Vienna (1917–20) and the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin (1920–22). During his studies in Vienna, he became associated with the Verein für musikalische Privataufführungen and Universal Edition, where he worked as a proofreader; it was then that he met B. Bartók, A. Schoenberg and F. Busoni, who had a strong influence on him. Between 1923 and 1945, Alois Hába was a professor of microtonal composition at the Prague Conservatory, where he established his own school of composition: his pupils included K. Ančerl, V. Dobiáš, K. Hába, R. Kubín, S. Osterc, M. Ponc and K. Reiner. From 1945, he was a professor of microtonal composition at the Akademie Musických Umění in Prague; the department was closed in 1951. Between 1945 and 1948, he directed the Divadlo 5. Května (later renamed the Smetanovo Divadlo) in Prague. From 1956, he lectured at the International Summer Courses for New Music in Darmstadt. In the final years of his life, he devoted himself exclusively to composition. He was an honorary member of the International Society for Contemporary Music, of which he had been a member since 1931; he was also a member of the Česká Akademie Věd a Umění in Prague (from 1929) and the Akademie der Künste in Berlin (from 1961). 

Alois Hába’s early compositions, written under the guidance of F. Schreker (Op. 1b – Op. 5), are characterised by strongly chromatic harmony and loose tonal relationships. The shift in the 1920s towards microtonal and athematic music was influenced by: A. Schönberg, who drew Alois Hába’s attention to musical thinking beyond the tonal principle, F. Busoni, who – alongside R. Stein and W. Möllendorf – inspired his exploration of a microchordal system, and B. Bartók, who sparked Alois Hába’s interest in the synthesis of folk elements with contemporary compositional techniques. Alois Hába himself emphasises that the direct impetus for the creation of microtonal systems came from his own studies of the folk music of Eastern Moravia, which features intervals smaller than a semitone.

In the early 1920s, Alois Hába’s compositional and theoretical interests focused on the subject of quarter-tone music; this resulted in the String Quartet No. 2, which marked the beginning of a series of quarter-tone works, and the theoretical treatise Harmonické základy…. These experiments became the starting point for the further development of quarter-tone music theory, including a distinct notation system. In 1923, influenced by Busoni, Alois Hába devised a new division of the tone into six parts (String Quartet No. 5). Quarter-tone and ⅟₆-tone divisions formed the basis of the tonal system of his compositions from those years, although in his most important theoretical work (Neue Harmonielehre) Alois Hába also formulated the foundations for a further systematisation of microchordal divisions of the octave. In this work, Alois Hába classified microtonal intervals based on the criterion of their perception. From this perspective, the difference between the quarter-tone and ⅟₆-tone systems lies in the fact that the former ‘neutralises’ the major and minor modes, whilst the latter, whilst maintaining their opposition, significantly enriches it (e.g. lowering the minor third by a ⅟₆ tone deepens the ‘minor’ quality, whilst raising the major third by the same amount emphasises the ‘major’ quality). Seeking in his compositions to break the conventions of “tempered hearing”, Alois Hába also collaborated with instrument builders in order to create an ultrachromatic set of instruments. At his inspiration, the following were built: a quarter-tone clarinet (1924) and trumpet (1931), quarter-tone and sixth-tone harmoniums (1928, 1936), three types of quarter-tone piano (1924–31, Förster company), as well as a quarter-tone guitar. The second important concept connected with Alois Hába’s microtonal work of the 1920s was the term “athematicism” in composition. This concept (as imprecise and already as established as “atonality”) did not mean the elimination of themes in composition, but rather referred to the absence of thematic development in the sense of transformational and variation techniques, transposition, repetition, or evolutionary development. The athematic nature of Alois Hába’s music is linked to the principle of textural variability, which is not based on any unifying concept that brings together formal categories. The crowning achievement of this phase of Alois Hába’s career was the quarter-tone opera Matka, which brought him international fame following its world premiere in Munich in 1931. In the 1930s, Hába also composed in the semitone system. In the 1950s, Alois Hába abandoned his experimental explorations and joined the trend of socio-realist artistic creation. This reorientation is reflected in his quartets VI–IX, and particularly in his vocal-instrumental works (the cantata Za mír).

From the perspective of the theory and aesthetics of new music, Alois Hába’s work from the 1920s is of paramount importance, as it was in this period that the composer developed the original principles of microtonal and athematic music. Despite the considerable fame that Alois Hába’s innovations gained during the interwar period, their reception in the first half of the 20th century did not extend beyond the composer’s narrow circle of students. However, had Alois Hába not overcome the barrier of equal temperament, it would be difficult to imagine the instability of octave divisions, characteristic of many different trends in contemporary music.

Literature: H. H. Stuckenschmidt, Neue Musik zwischen den beiden Kriegen, Berlin 1951; P. Collaer, La musique moderne, Paris 1955; B. Pilarski, Alois Hába w kręgu swych wspomnień (conversation with Alois Hába), “Ruch Muzyczny” 1958, No. 21; J. Vysloužil, Alois Hába als Kompositionslehrer, in: Sborník prací filosofické fakulty brněnské university, Brno 1965; J. Vysloužil, Alois Hába, A. Schönberg und die tschechische Musik, in: Aspekte der Neuen Musik, Festschrift for H. H. Stuckenschmidt, ed. W. Burde, Kassel 1968; J. Vysloužil, Alois Hába, Brno 1970; R. Stephan, H. H. und Schönberg Zum Thema: Die Wiener Schule und die tschechische Musik des 20. Jahrhunderts, Festschrift for A. Volka, Cologne 1974; J. Vysloužil, Alois Hába. Život a dílo, Prague 1974.