Mayer-Serra, Otto

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Mayer-Serra, Otto

Mayer-Serra, Otto , eminent Spanish musicologist; b. Barcelona (of German-Catalan parents), July 12, 1904; d. Mexico City, March 19, 1968. He studied in Germany with H. Abert, Curt Sachs, J. Wolf, and E. von Hornbostel; received his Ph.D. in 1929 with the diss. Die romantische Klaviersonaten from the Univ. of Greifswald. He returned to Spain in 1933, and was music critic of the Catalan weekly Mirador .In 1936, at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he was appointed head of the music division of the propaganda ministry of the Catalan government; served in the Loyalist army in 1938–39; after its defeat, he fled to France. In 1940 he reached Mexico, where he became active as a writer, editor, lecturer, and manager.

Writings

(all publ, in Mexico City):El romanticismo musical (1940); Panorama de la musica mexicana desde Ia independência hasta la actualidad (1941); Música y músicios de Latino- América (2 vols., 1947); Breve diccionaria de Ia música (1948); La música contemporânea (1954).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire