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Due to his Jewish heritage, he was dismissed from the Vienna Conservatory in 1938, the year of the Austrian Anschluss.[5] He relocated to the United States in 1939 and began teaching at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where his students included Leonard Bernstein and Eugene Bossart.[6][7] From 1941 to 1950, he taught at St. Michael's College in Vermont, and he remained as Professor Emeritus until 1960. He died in Montpelier in 1967.[8]
Stöhr was born as Richard Stern in Vienna, in 1874 to Jewish parents who had emigrated from Hungary. His father, Samuel Stern, was a professor of medicine at the University of Vienna. His mother, Mathilde, was a member of the Porges family; her brother, Heinrich Porges, was a close associate of Richard Wagner. Stöhr had a sister, Hedwig (birth date unknown), who died in Modliborzyce while in Nazi custody on 2 January 1942.[9]
Stöhr began composing at six and kept a diary from age 15.[1][10] He earned a degree in medicine in 1898 but later entered the Vienna Academy of Music to study composition with Robert Fuchs.[11][12] During this time, he changed his surname from Stern to Stöhr and converted to Christianity.[13]
"This was the year the big change occurred. Herewith, I have sealed the fate of my future life. Now I am a musician, and I carry this responsibility seriously, consciously, and without regret. At the same time came the actual change of my name to 'Stöhr,' on which I had decided already in the summer."
Heinrich Porges encouraged his musical activities, helping him navigate Viennese musical circles and introducing him to Gustav Mahler, among others.
After completing his studies with Fuchs and earning a Ph.D. in music in 1903, Stöhr worked at the Academy as a rehearsal pianist and choir director.[15] He soon began teaching theory, composition, and music history, as well as instructing in chamber music. His 1909 diary summary reflects his achievements as both an author and a composer:[14]
"Of even greater importance for me was the success of my 'Harmonielehre,' of which the first edition was already sold out in June and has therefore already appeared in the second edition. The critiques of this work were extremely positive from all sides. The performances of my compositions reached such frequency this season that some newspapers even commented that this was inappropriate."
When Fuchs retired in 1911/1912,[16] Stöhr took over his most advanced courses[17][18][19] and became a professor of music theory at the Academy in 1915.[20] In the same year, he was conscripted into the Austrian army as a physician, serving at a hospital in the suburbs of Vienna while continuing to reside at home and teach at the Academy.[20]
Stöhr married his first wife in 1904, a union that lasted three years. In 1909, he met his future second wife, Marie (“Mitzi”). Unable to secure a divorce from his first wife, the couple cohabited from 1909, until their marriage in 1923. Their children, Richard and Hedwig (“Hedi”), were born in the 1920s.
During this decade, Stöhr established himself as a prominent music theorist, publishing treatises and textbooks on counterpoint and musical form. He also performed frequently as a pianist, and nearly all of his compositions were issued in print. Prior to his exile, his works were performed hundreds of times each year throughout Europe.
By around 1930, Austria’s economic difficulties and the rise of antisemitism prompted Stöhr to begin studying English, possibly in anticipation of emigration. In 1954, Austrian journalist Hedy Kempny, a close friend of Arthur Schnitzler, wrote about her former teacher, Stöhr:[5][21]
Stöhr resided in a traditional “old Vienna” home, distinguished by a large music room housing two pianos. The walls were adorned with photographs of composers and notable acquaintances from various countries, along with snapshots of students and friends. Every two weeks, he hosted an informal “open house,” welcoming all who wished to attend. Guests typically gathered around seven o’clock, often accompanied by friends eager to meet him. On occasion, Stöhr would arrive later to find the apartment filled with thirty or more visitors. These gatherings frequently attracted distinguished guests such as Bruno Walter, Felix Weingartner, and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, and sometimes featured performances of Stöhr’s Lieder by opera singers.
After German troops marched into Austria as part of the Anschluss in March 1938, an SS intelligence unit was housed in the state academy. Over the next few days, the interim director suspended eleven teachers who, under the Nuremberg Laws, were ineligible to swear allegiance to Adolf Hitler due to their Jewish ancestry. A list of cuts dated May 1938 contains the names of 23 teachers who were no longer to be employed on the grounds of their "race". Stöhr was among those affected. Several teachers were allowed to emigrate; the fate of others is unknown.[22][23]
In February 1939, Stöhr emigrated to the United States. From this time until his death, he used the alternate spelling of his name: Stoehr. He was initially hired as a music librarian by the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia and later taught theory and composition courses there. Leonard Bernstein was among his students at Curtis.[24] Stöhr was also hired to translate a part of the Burrell Collection of the Letters of Richard Wagner. Curtis downsized its faculty in 1941 after the United States entered World War II, and Stöhr's position was eliminated. He quickly found another position at Saint Michael's College in Colchester, Vermont. There, he taught German language and music courses. At the college, Stöhr's salary was supplemented by assistance from the Oberlander Trust and the Emergency Committee in Aid of Displaced Foreign Scholars, a program of the Institute of International Education (IIE).[25] Stöhr continued to compose prolifically during his years in the US, in all major classical genres except opera, but none of the numerous compositions from this period were published.
Stöhr died in December 1967 in Montpelier and was buried in Merrill Cemetery in Colchester.[23]
Stöhr's diary, spanning more than six decades, is stored in the Austrian National Library, along with his published compositions. Copies of most of his published compositions, as well as manuscripts of his post-emigration compositions, are available at the Saint Michael's College Archive. His work encompasses choral music, chamber music, seven symphonies,[26] symphonic poems, two operas, an oratorio, and two cantatas.
While Schoenberg and others of the Second Viennese School were creating a new 20th-century compositional style, Stöhr seemed hardly influenced by them. However, contemporary critics respected his music, which maintained the tonal tradition of the 19th century.
In 2003, the City of Vienna dedicated a plaque at the site of his former residence at Karolinengasse 14.
In 2010, the Austrian National Radio (ORF) issued a recording (CD 3093) featuring Stöhr’s String Quartet in D minor, Op. 22 (1903), along with other works. His Flute Sonata has been recorded by David Shostac on the album Masterpieces Remembered.
The following is a list of Stöhr’s musical compositions, organized by genre. In general, opus numbers up to 70 were assigned by his European publishers and correspond to works printed and distributed in the sheet music trade in Europe prior to 1938. Opus numbers 71 and higher were assigned by Stöhr himself, denoting completed but unpublished compositions written in the United States after 1938. The list is adapted from Appendix 4 of Dr. Hans Sittner’s biography of Stöhr.[27]
^Hans Sittner (1965). Richard Stöhr: Mensch/Musiker/Lehrer. Vienna: Doblinger. pp. 60–62. 1911-12 - Nebenfach: Harmonielehre [..] Nebenfach: Harmonielehre, Formenlehre in den Meisterschulen [..] Nebenfach: Musikal. Fortbildung, Pädagogium [..] Nebenfach: Klavier-Kammermusik [..] Nebenfach: Akkompagnieren, Präludieren, Transponieren [..]
^Hans Sittner (1965). Richard Stöhr: Mensch/Musiker/Lehrer. Vienna: Doblinger. p. 49. Aus Stöhrs Personalakten: [..] 9. Dez. 1913 (MInisterium für Kultus und Unterricht, Zl. 46.251): Neubetrauung: Harmonielehre Hauptfach, Formenlehre Nebenfach, Klavier-Kammermusik ..
^ abHans Sittner (1965). Richard Stöhr: Mensch/Musiker/Lehrer. Vienna: Doblinger. pp. 15–16. Mehrmals droht Einziehung zur Kriegsdienstleitung [sic]. Vom 8. Juli 1915 ab musste Stöhr, der sich sehr ′fehl am Ort′ fühlte, fünf Monate lang im Hütteldorfer Reservespital 16 als Landsturmarzt Dienst machen, ehe er gänzlich freigestellt wurde. Ausgerechnet während dieses ärztlichen Intermezzos, des letzten Nachläufers seines einstigen ′Brotstudiums′, erreichte ihn die Verleihung des ′k.k. Professortitels′.
![Painting of Stöhr by Tom von Dreger [de]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Richard_St%C3%B6hr.jpg)
