Karlheinz Stockhausen

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German composer and pianist whose career has generated excitement and controversy. Through world wide tours, Stockhausen is hailed as an avant garde composer with music that is said to be impenetrable and disruptive. Between 1947 and 1951 he studied at the National Conservatory of Music taking piano and music education, and at the Cologne University, majoring in German philology, philosophy and musicology. Since 1950 he has composed an impressive number of works, and conducted or worked as sound director on numerous recordings. Constantly composing. he played piano in bars while handling various other jobs and completing his studies. In 1953 he became a regular associate of the Studio for Electronic Music at the West German Radio (WDR) in Cologne, and from 1963 to 1973 he was artistic director of the studio. For 23 years he has taught composition at the International New Music Courses in Darmstadt; in 1962-63 at the Musik-Akademie in Basel; in 1965 at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia; and in 1966-67 at the University of California in Davis. In 1963 he founded the Kölner Kurse für Neue Musik, of which he was artistic director until 1969. From 1970 to 1977 he taught composition at the Musikhochschule in Cologne. In 1966 at the invitation of the Japanese Radio (NHK) he composed two works in Tokyo. Since 1977 Stockhausen has worked on his music drama cycle "Licht," (Die sieben Tage der Woche), which is scheduled to be completed in 2002. Stockhausen has had two marriages with six children. He died of sudden heart failure in Kürten, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany on the morning of 5 December 2007. Link to Wikipedia biography