Career Summary

Carl Czerny was taught first by his father Wenzel Czerny, then by Wenzel Krumpholtz and Antonio Salieri, and in 1800–03 by Beethoven himself. He gave his first public performance as a pianist in 1800, and came to be considered the authoritative interpreter of the piano works of Beethoven.

As a teacher, Czerny wrote a large number of didactic piano pieces (exercises, studies, etc.), many of which are still in use today, in volumes such as The School of Velocity, Op. 299, The Art of Finger Dexterity, Op. 740, and the Complete Theoretical and Practical Pianoforte School, Op. 500 (1839). He also wrote important treatises on improvisation, of which the Systematic Introduction to Improvisation (Fantasieren) at the Piano (1829) is highly informative for performance practise purposes. He also wrote a School of Embellishments, Turns, and Shakes, Op. 335, which it is unlikely that Schenker knew when writing his Ein Beitrag zur Ornamentik . Among the many pupils that Czerny taught were Beethoven’s nephew, Karl, Sigismond Thalberg, Theodor Leschetizky, Stephen Heller, and Franz Liszt.

As a composer, Czerny produced sonatas, sonatinas, variation sets, and shorter pieces for piano two hands and four hands, much chamber music (piano and string trios and quartets), orchestral music (symphonies, concertos, and concertinos), and sacred choral music (masses, requiems, offertories, etc.). He was one of the first composers to use “étude” ("study") as a title. His opus numbers (which included didactic and theoretical works as well as compositions) number well over 800. Many of his treatises were translated into English in the 19th century.

Czerny was also a significant music theorist, notably with his School of Practical Composition, Op. 600, and he edited and translated into German four treatises by Antonín Reicha, as his Complete Textbook of Musical Composition.

Czerny was also active as an editor of works by J. S. Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, and others.

In his will, he divided his estate between the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde and three other institutions in Vienna.

Czerny and Schenker

In 1912–13, Schenker used “Czerny Etudes” (for which there are many possible candidates among Czerny’s didactic works) for two of his pupils (Mrs. Stirling and Miss Newlov), alongside studies by Brahms (“Czerny-Brahms Etüden”). In 1920 Schenker twice went into the archives of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde to consult Czerny’s treatises.

Among the extant editions of Bach’s Well-tempered Clavier, Book II that Schenker rejected in 1908 was that by Czerny (OC 52/399–401).

No works by Czerny appear in the list of books in Schenker’s library at his death (Musik und Theater enthaltend die Bibliothek des Herrn †Dr. Heinrich Schenker, Wien (Vienna: Heinrich Hinterberger, [1936])), but there may have been some among Schenker’s sheet music, of which no list survives.