Larry Sitsky

Lazar Sitsky AM, known generally as Larry Sitsky, born 10 September 1934, is an Australian composer, pianist, and music educator and scholar. His longterm legacy is still to be assessed, but through his work to date he has made a significant contribution to the Australian music tradition.Cotter (2004) p. 6]

Life and career

Larry Sitsky was born in Tianjin (formerly Tientsin), China, of Russian-Jewish emigré parents. They were forced to leave China during Mao's ruleCotter (2004) p. 5] and they came to Australia in 1951 where they settled in Sydney. He studied piano from an early age, but his first studies at university were in engineering. This was not successful and "he convinced his parents to allow him to pursue his passion, music". He obtained a scholarship to the New South Wales Conservatorium of Music, where he studied piano and composition, graduating in 1955. In 1959, he won a scholarship to the San Francisco Conservatory, where he studied with Egon Petri for two years. Returning to Australia, he joined the staff of the Queensland Conservatorium of Music. His Australian studies with Winifred Burston, who had studied with Ferruccio Busoni and Egon Petri herself, and his subsequent studies in the USA with Petri, "combined with the Russian heritage from his early studies in China, [make] him a unique repository of piano techniques and tradition which is acknowledged internationally".

A grant from the Myer Foundation in 1965 enabled him to conduct research into the music of Ferruccio Busoni, on whom he has written extensively. In 1966 he was appointed Head of Keyboard Studies at the Canberra School of Music, was later Head of Musicology and was Head of Composition Studies. He is currently Emeritus Professor of the Australian National University in Canberra.

Sitsky has always performed as well as composed, and as a student won performance awards. He believes that composers should perform, believing that "without this communion with a live audience, music-making all too easily becomes over-intellectualised, sterile and arid". As a performer, he champions twentieth century repertoire.

In terms of composition, Sitsky has regularly changed his musical language in order to "express himself in ways that are not familiar and 'easy'".

A biography of Sitsky was published in the USA in 1997.

Awards and honours

Larry Sitsky was the first Australian to be invited to the USSR on a cultural exchange visit, organised by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs in 1977. He has received many awards for his compositions, including the A H Maggs Award (twice), the Alfred Hill Memorial Prize for his String Quartet in 1968, a China Fellowship in 1983, a Fulbright Award in 1988-89, and an Advance Australia Award for achievement in music (1989). He has been awarded the inaugural prize from the Fellowship of Composers (1989), the first National Critics' Award, and the inaugural Australian Composers' Fellowship presented by the Music Board of the Australia Council. This last award gave him the opportunity to write a large number of compositions (including concerti for violin, guitar, and orchestra), to revise his book Busoni and the Piano, and to commence work as a pianist on the Anthology of Australian Piano Music.

In recognition of his various achievements, he was made Professor (Personal Chair)fact|date=September 2007; the Australian National University also awarded him its first Higher Doctorate in Fine Arts in 1997. In 1998, he was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.

He was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2000 for service to music as a composer, musicologist, pianist and educator. In 2000, he also received the Centenary Medal for service to Australian society through music.

Work

Sitsky has published the two-volume "The Classical Reproducing Piano Roll" and "Music of the Repressed Russian Avant-Garde", 1900-1929, and has recorded a number of CDs of Australian piano music, including the complete sonatas of Roy Agnew.

He has had works commissioned by many leading Australian and international bodies, such as the ABC, Musica Viva Australia, the International Clarinet Society, the Sydney International Piano Competition, Flederman and the International Flute Convention. His collection of teaching pieces, Century, has been published by Currency Press, and he also has an open contract to publish anything he wishes with his New York publisher, Seesaw Music Corporation.

Selected works

Operas

*"The Fall of the House of Usher", 1965, Libretto: Gwen Harwood.
*"Lenz", 1970, Libretto: Gwen Harwood.
*"Fiery Tales", 1975, After Chaucer and Boccaccio.
*"Voices in Limbo", 1977, Libretto: Gwen Harwood.
*"The Golem", 1980, Libretto: Gwen Harwood.
*"De Profundis", 1982, Libretto: Gwen Harwood.

Other works

*"Three scenes from Aboriginal life: 1. Campfire scene, 2. Mathina, 3. Legend of the Brolga", 1988
*Incidental music to "Faust" for solo piano and three sopranos, 1996

External links

* [http://www.amcoz.com.au/ Australian Music Centre]
* [http://www.apra.com.au/default.asp/ Australasian Performing Right Association]

Notes

References

* Cotter, Jim (2004) "Larry Sitsky and the Australian musical tradition", "National Library of Australia News", XIV (12), September 2004, pp. 3-6