composer
Dick Kattenburg was born in Amsterdam on November 11, 1919, the second child of Louis and Heleen Kattenburg. He had an older sister Daisy, and brother Tom was born in ...
related works
Complete Works for Piano II : 2 players four hands or two pianos / Dick Kattenburg
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Piano 4 hands
Scoring:
pf 2pf
Suite : voor blazers / Reine Colaço Osorio-Swaab
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Wind Quintet
Scoring:
fl ob cl h fg
First wind quintet : op. 13 / W.F. Bon
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Wind Quintet
Scoring:
fl ob cl h fg
Dance Scene : for woodwind quintet / Michael Fine
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Wind Quintet
Scoring:
fl ob cl h fg
composition
Divertimento : voor vijf blazers / Dick Kattenburg; edited by Troy Bennefield
Other authors:
Bennefield, Troy
(editor)
Leo Smit Stichting
(curator)
Description:
Dick Kattenburg studied violin and composition with Hugo Godron (composer and teacher at the local music school in Bussum) and in 1941, he passed his state exams in theory and violin. During the war, Kattenburg followed lessons in orchestration with Dutch composer Leo Smit – at first in private sessions at Smit’s home address, later on, when Kattenburg was in hiding and Smit was forced to move to a ghetto, via secret correspondence.
Many of Dick Kattenburg’s compositions breathe an optimism of the new era, but are also downright romantic. He imbued jazz rhythms and polytonality, French music (Ravel) and Stravinsky's Neoclassicism in several of his works. Captivating, lyrical melodies (his trademark) are often interspersed with energetic rhythmical passages. The Divertimento for wind quintet was found more than sixty years after his death in a pile of documents handed down to his niece Joyce Bergman-van Hessen by Dick’s sister Daisy, who survived the war in hiding. Only a comprehensive set of sketches exists of this piece, composed in 1937, when he was 23. This Divertimento was meant to have four movements, Kattenburg started to write out the first two movements in ink. The sketch of the third movement ‘Andante con moto’ stops after 33 bars, for the last movement ‘Finale. Allegro molto e con spirito’ only some rough ideas and a theme survive.
Dick Kattenburg was arrested end of April, early May 1944, possibly during a raid in a movie theater. From transit camp Westerbork, he was deported to Auschwitz on 19 May 1944. According to his death certificate, he died ‘somewhere in Central Europe’ on 30 September that same year.
Carine Alders