Adolf Arenson
Adolf Arenson was born on 4 May 1855 in Altona (Germany). He came from a family of merchants and so made a commercial training himself although his main interest was music. Adolf Arenson then moved to a brother-in-law in Santiago de Chile and and took over the business dealings. Beside his work Adolf Arenson also found the time to improve his musical abilities.
In 1885 Adolf Arenson sold his business in South America which made him financially independent. He moved back to Germany, first to Hamburg, then in 1892 to Bad Cannstatt and focused completely on music. In the next ten years Adolf Arenson composed 5 operas of which two were premiered already in 1888 and 1889, his last opera "Claudio Monteverdi" in Strasbourg in 1901.
Around the turn of the century Adolf Arenson became interested in the Theosophical Society and in 1904 a member of the managing board of the German branch. At a convention of the society in 1903 Adolf Arenson attended a lecture by Rudolf Steiner for the first time and became his esoteric student shortly afterwards. Arenson supported Marie von Sivers, the second wife of Rudolf Steiner, in her publishing work. This led to Adolf Arenson's own work, a campanion through the lectures of Rduolf Steiner ("Führer durch 50 Vortragszyklen Rudolf Steiners"). He also became the leading figure of the Antroposophic Society in the Stuttgart area. in 1909 Rudolf Steiner asked Adolf Arenson to compose the music to the play "The children of Luzifer" by Edouard Schure as well as for Steiner's mystery dramas. In the following years Adolf Arenson more and more retired from activities of the anthroposophical society because a more socio-political movement got stronger and questioned Arenson's perspectives. Adolf Arenson died on 26 December 1936 in Bad Cannstatt (Germany).
The work catalogue of compositions by Adolf Arenson contains 5 operas, an operetta, many songs, music for the play "The Children of Luzifer" by Edouard Schure, music for the four "Mystery dramas" by Rudolf Steiner and the "7 children's pieces for Eurythmy".
Scores of compositions by Adolf Arenson are hard to find. So when I came across the original score of the "7 Kinderstücke für Eurythmie" I decided to publish the work here for information purposes. I could not trace a second copy in public libraries, so an extremely rare score:
