Hugo Wolf (1860-1903); AUT

Hugo Wolf (1860–1903) was an Austrian composer born in Windischgrätz, now Slovenj Gradec in Slovenia. He briefly attended the Vienna Conservatory but was largely self-directed as a composer and critic. A fervent admirer of Wagner, Wolf became known in Vienna both for his uncompromising music criticism and for periods of extraordinary creative intensity. His productive career was curtailed by severe illness in the 1890s, and he spent his final years in an asylum.

Wolf is remembered above all as one of the supreme composers of the German Lied, bringing voice and piano into an unusually close relationship with poetic language. His major song collections include the Mörike-Lieder, Eichendorff-Lieder, Goethe-Lieder, Spanisches Liederbuch, and Italienisches Liederbuch. In these works the piano often carries psychological and dramatic meanings equal to those of the vocal line. His concentrated harmonic language and acute responsiveness to poetry extended the traditions of Schubert and Schumann into the late Romantic era.

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Read biography at allmusic.com.