||boek: Indonesië|Kunst en kultuur van Java, Sumatra, Bali en Sulawesi|Cantecleer Kunst-Reisgidsen

||door: Hans Helfritz

||taal: nl
||jaar: 1981
||druk: 1e bijdruk
||pag.: 247p
||opm.: softcover|zo goed als nieuw

||isbn: 90-213-0310-8
||code: 2:000068

"Tourism in general is one of the most destructive industries on the planet... and it moves even more money than the arms industry. Responsible tourism is an infinitesimal minority - ninety nine percent of tourists don't give a toss - but thank heavens there is somebody who does care. I think, though, that when it boils down to it 'responsible tourism' is staying at home and reading a book about it." [source: https--www.responsibletravel.com/folk-we-love/chris-stewart]

--- Over het boek (foto 1): Indonesië ---

Indonesië - een rijk van 125 miljoen mensen, die op ruim 3000 eilanden meer dan 250 talen spreken - kan bogen op een indrukwekkende geschiedenis. Voordat de Portugezen als eerste Europeanen zich vestigden in de Molukken (1522), had dit gebied al een lange kultuurhistorische ontwikkeling achter de rug, waarin met name invloeden uit China en India een grote rol speelden.

Na de Nederlandse kolonisatieperiode van ca. 350 jaar werd de archipel als een staatkundige eenheid onafhankelijk. Deze gids, die u meevoert naar Sumatra, Sulawesi, Java en Bali, geeft van de grote verscheidenheid van de kunst en kultuur van dit immense land een uitstekend beeld.

[bron: flaptekst]

--- Over (foto 2): Hans Helfritz ---

For Hans Helfritz (1902-1995), applying himself to only one field of study started causing problems for him early in life. He grew up in Greifswald and Berlin (the photo shows him with his parents and his sister Marlene). After his school-leaving examinations, and at the urging of his parents, he started vocational training in a bank.

"I dreamt only of numbers. It was nearly the death of me," noted Hans Helfritz, 1990, in his autobiography 'Neugier trieb mich um die Welt' ('Curiosity drove me 'round the world'). He ended his training shortly thereafter and was allowed to start studying music in Berlin, which he financed himself with various different jobs. Since his family was not wealthy, Helfritz was forced to support himself with various jobs.

From 1926 to 1929 Hans Helfritz studied contrabass and composition at the University for Music in Berlin, taught by Paul Hindemith, among others, and also studied comparative musicology with Professor Erich von Hornbostel.

Alongside his music studies, he also developed an active, multifaceted ability - as shown in his later life - to combine personal interests with work. He was an accompanist to silent films at the cinema and also earned his keep by working as an extra at the State Opera. It was his work as a répétiteur at the Vera Skoronel and Berte Trümpy Dance Studio that led to his first commissions to compose, like the music for the 1930 ballet 'Der Kreuzzug der Maschinen' (The Crusade of the Machines), for which the score has been lost.

His first success was also in 1930, the premiere of the 'Konzertes für Cembalo (Harpsichord) mit kleinem Orchester' at the music festival in Bad Pyrmont. However, the first, great expedition to the Near East in 1930 provided Helfritz's life the first of its many, completely new leaves.

His return from the Near East (1930) did nothing to extinguish Hans Helfritz's new-found passion for travel. He brought back photographs and sound recordings and published his first book.

His most important expedition took place in Saudi Arabia. On the suggestion of Professor von Hornbostel, Helfritz found himself on three occasions in Hadramaut and what was then the Kingdom of Yemen (1931-1935), where he was the first person to record the songs of the Bedouin peoples. He also managed to become the first European to set foot in the legendary and heavily guarded city of Shabwa, which brought him a measure of international acclaim. Along with books and photos, he also released two documentary films.

Between 1935 and 1939 Hans Helfritz was traveling almost constantly, visiting, among other locations, the Near East and the American continent. He feared being denounced and persecuted in Nazi Germany due to his homosexuality and thus, with
the outbreak of war, he found himself in Bolivia where he was researching for a new book. He did not to return to Germany, but instead went into exile in Chile.

Exile in Chile meant that Hans Helfritz had to first eke out a living as a postcard photographer. But it was not long before he started getting offers to participate in scientific expeditions as photographer and cameraman. He traveled through Chile, which is over 4,000 km long, into Antarctica and also landed on the far away Easter Island. Several of his books were published in Germany soon after the war.

In Santiago, especially during the Second World War, Hans Helfritz met many well-known musicians and conductors, among them the pianist Walter Gieseking and the conductor Hermann Scherchen. This marked the beginning of his second intensive creative period as a composer. But it was not until after he became a citizen of Chile in 1948 that Helfritz could take part in the national music competitions. On his first attempt, he achieved first place with his 'Konzert für Tenorsaxophon und Orchester'.

Due to the changing political and economic situation in Chile, Hans Helfritz returned to Europe for good in 1959 and settled down on the Balearic Island of Ibiza.

Since he no longer had a strong connection to the German world of music, he put more focus on his traveling, books and lectures. During this time, he only occasionally composed music.

The 1960's and 70's were years of intensive traveling, whereby curiosity connected seamlessly with his work. He used his activity as a tour guide, which he began after the war, for book research. Travel guides about Indonesia, Mexico and Ethiopia were published. As he had made several journeys to Africa in the late 1950's and early 60's, he returned with impressive photos and a travelogue (Schwarze Ritter. Zwischen Niger und Tschad (Black Knights. Between Niger and Chad), 1958).

Hans Helfritz continued to pursue his various interests into old age.

After his autobiography, 'Neugier trieb mich um die Welt (Curiosity Drove Me 'Round the World)' was published in 1990, in which he wrote down his anecdote-rich life story, three documentary films about Hans Helfritz were made. One of these was with the American author and composer Paul Bowles. For the film, Helfritz traveled to Morocco and as a 92-year-old also visited Guatemala, Chile and California.

Helfritz was unfortunately unable to attend the 1995 celebration at Berlin's Academy of the Arts, where the Hans Helfritz Archive was inaugurated, as he lay critically ill in a hospital in Duisburg. A mere day later, on October 21, 1995, the 93-year-old Helfritz died. The urn with his ashes was interred in Sant Agustí on Ibiza in February 1996.

[source: http--www.hanshelfritz.de/englishversion/index.html]

Hans Helfritz (25 July 1902, Chemnitz - 21 October 1995, Duisburg) was a German composer and photographer.

Owing to pressure from his parents, Helfritz originally began an apprenticeship as a banker, a career path he soon gave up in order to study music and composition in Berlin and Vienna. Inspired by his teacher Erich von Hornbostel in 1930, he travelled to Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Iraq to collect samples of folk music for his research. In 1935 he continued his travels to India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, the Republic of China and Singapore.

Helfritz also made films about Yemen and Mexico as an assignment for Ufa. In these films he deliberately evaded the right-wing line of Joseph Goebbels of presenting foreign ethnicities as culturally inferior.

In 1939 Helfritz fled Germany because of his homosexuality and political beliefs which meant he was labelled an enemy of the Nazi state. He fled first to Brazil and Bolivia, before settling in Chile. He continued to work, taking part in the Chilean Antarctic Expedition as the official photographer. At the end of the 1940s he received Chilean citizenship. Throughout the 1950s Helfritz explored Central America and West Africa from an archaeological perspective. Later he changed profession, working first as a tour guide in these regions, then as travel lecturer. In 1959 he settled down in Ibiza.

[source: wikipedia]

Hans Helfritz - Komponist und Reiseschriftsteller zum 100.Geburtstag (25. Juli 1902) [2002-00-00]

Der Komponist, Reiseschriftsteller, Kameramann und Photograph Hans Helfritz (1902-1995) führte ein abenteurliches und vielfältiges Leben.

Seine Reisen nach Südarabien brachten ihm während der frühen dreissiger Jahre internationale Aufmerksamkeit. Als erstem Europäer war es ihm gelungen die schwer bewachte Stadt Shabwa zu betreten, unter der die Schätze der Königin von Saba vermutet wurden. Er drehte unter Lebensgefahr einen Film für die Ufa und photographierte die Ruinenstadt. Von diesen Reisen brachte er auch Musik mit, die frühesten erhaltenen musikethnologischen Aufnahmen aus dem Jemen, die heute zum Memory of the World Programm der Unesco gehören.

Ab den 1930er Jahren wurden seine Abenteuer- und Forschungsreisen von der Öffentlichkeit aufmerksam verfolgt. Helfritz drehte Kulturfilme, verfaßte an die 25 Bücher über seine Reisen durch alle möglichen Erdteile, darunter Südostasien, China, Japan, Mexiko, Guatemala, Bolivien und die USA.

Hans Helfritz war aber auch Komponist. Er schrieb zahlreiche Werke, vor allem vor dem Krieg in Deutschland und sehr erfolgreich während seines Exils in Chile von 1939-59.

Er starb am 21. Oktober 1995 in Duisburg.

Jean-Claude Kuner [Quelle: http--jean-claude-kuner.de/index.php/musik/hans-helfritz]