Centre
de Musique Hindemith
The Hindemith Foundation in Blonay Switzerland
The history and, above all, the birth
and emergence of the
Hindemith Music Centre, formerly Chalet
de Lacroix, are
intimately connected with the American
musician couple
Helen and Howard Boatwright and with
Marius Décombaz, a
notary in Vevey.
The owners of the Chalet, the daughters
of Victor Lacroix,
who were very closely involved with
music, made their large
house available to musicians of the region
as a working site
on certain occasions. Courses, concerts,
chamber music
weekends and much more took place here.
Many young music
students who are today recognized
musicians and successful
in the world of music took their first
steps into concert
life in this house or prepared to do so.
The Boatwrights
were informed of this by their friend,
the singer Hugues
Cuenod, who lived in Vevey.
In the summer of 1968 the Boatwrights,
both professors at
the University of Syracuse, USA, visited
Blonay for the
first time in order to seek out the
grave and final
residence of Paul and Gertrud Hindemith.
Howard Boatwright
had been a pupil and later a university
colleague of
Hindemith's. Consequently he knew his
extraordinary
abilities as a teacher and intended to
continue Hindemith's
pedagogical concerns in summer courses.
Twenty further stays
in Blonay, in the form of "Summer
Academies" at which the
Boatwrights' own and other students took
part, were to
follow this first one. In this
unofficial way, their desire
to establish Blonay as the European
branch office of the
University of Syracuse was fulfilled.
The first courses of
the Boatwrights, carried out together
with Hugues Cuenod as
singing instructor in 1969, were called
Ecole Hindemith.
Accordingly the concerts held in the
church La Chiésaz in
the neighboring community of St.-Légier
were named Concerts
Hindemith, and subsequently Journées
Paul Hindemith.
All these activities were known at
the beginning to the
lawyer Marius Décombaz mentioned above,
for the Boatwrights
and Hugues Cuenod contacted him
immediately. As executor of
the estate of Paul and Gertrud Hindemith
as well as their
long-term friend and confidant, these
courses naturally
interested him very much, and the idea
gradually ripened in
him to acquire the Chalet de Lacroix for
the Foundation. In
this way the "practical area"
of activities mentioned in the
will could find its own house: in 1974
an initial first part
of the house was bought from one of the
owners; on 12 August
1976 the second part was likewise turned
over to the
Hindemith Foundation and with it the
entire Chalet de
Lacroix complete with the large
17,000-square-metre park
with its old stock of trees and
incomparable view over Lake
Geneva. The second decisive step of the
still young
Foundation, following the opening of the
musicological
Institute in Frankfurt, was thus
accomplished. After the
purchase of the house followed an
extensive phase of
construction, remodeling and
enlargement: bathrooms,
showers, a kitchen and above all three
working studios were
installed on the ground floor, in order
to offer the guests
optimal accommodation and to make a
period of work in a
peaceful and inspiring atmosphere possible.
During the following years the
activities of the house truly
flourished; the members of the
Foundation Council encouraged
the coming of many famous musical
personalities. The
Journées Paul Hindemith, in their second
decade, with
concerts, lectures, courses and other
events were led by the
aforementioned Helen and Howard
Boatwright and Hugues
Cuenod, as well as the Melos, LaSalle,
Kreuzberger and
Buchberger Quartets, the Quartet Sine
Nomine, Bruno
Giuranna, Siegfried Palm, Saschko
Gavriloff, Johannes
Goritzki, and Karl Engel; the
musicologists included Andres
Briner, Alfred Rubeli, Bernhard
Billeter, Theo Hirsbrunner,
Kurt von Fischer and Dieter Rexroth.
Outside of the
Journées, the following musical
personalities were also
active in Blonay: Igor Ozim, Walter
Levin, Giacinto Caramia,
Rocco Filippini, Bruno Canino, Thomas
Hengelbrock, Gidon
Kremer and Edison Denisov. Orchestras
that came to Blonay
include the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra,
the Concerto
Cologne, the Young German Philharmonic,
the German Chamber
Philharmonic and the Ensemble
Contrechamp from Geneva.
Alongside these important activities of
international
renown, chamber music groups, choirs,
orchestras and singing
classes for amateur musicians from all
over Switzerland and
abroad were guests at the Centre from
the very beginning,
completely in tune with the spirit of
Hindemith, for
weekends, study weeks or for concert
preparation. Thus the
beautiful house became an edifying and
relaxing place to
many people from far and wide, where one
could work
remarkably well; many of them gladly
returned to Lacroix.
This new designation is significant: he
is not only
responsible for the direction and
upkeeping of the house but
also, above all, for the artistic
content of the courses. In
addition to these duties, he is to
expand the offerings of
the Music Centre and thereby bring new
groups to Blonay.