The History of the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin

The history of the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin is intimately bound up with the political situation of Berlin and its development. After the founding of the GDR, the sole music academy in Berlin – along with all of its conservatories – was situated in the western part of the city. In 1949, the Ministry of Education resolved to establish a new music academy in the eastern sector of the city. The school, known as the “Deutsche Hochschule für Musik“ (German Academy for Music), located on Wilhelmstraße in Berlin-Mitte, was inaugurated on October 1, 1950. It has borne its current name, the “Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin,“ since 1964.

The school's founding director was the musicologist Georg Knepler. The inaugural faculty brought together notable artists, scholars, and teachers such as Rudolf Wagner-Régeny and Hanns Eisler (composition), Helmut Koch (conducting), Helma Prechter and Arno Schellenberg (voice), Carl Adolf Martienssen and Grete Herwig (piano), Bernhard Günther (cello), Werner Buchholz (viola), Ewald Koch (clarinet), Wilhelm Martens and Gustav Havemann (violin), the latter with a fraught political past dating from the National Socialist era.

In the course of German Reunification, the school was taken over by the Federal State of Berlin and is one of the state-supported academies of the Federal State of Berlin.

In 1955, the school became one of the first European academies to introduce advanced training in opera and music theater direction with the program in Direction. Founded in 2002 was the Kurt Singer Institute for Music Physiology and Musicians’ Health. This was followed in 2003 by establishment of klangzeitort, the Institute for New Music, and in 2005 by the establishment of the Jazz Institute Berlin (JIB). These three entities cooperate closely with the Universität der Künste/University of the Arts Berlin.

In 1987, the Hanns Eisler School moved into rooms in the current main building, located at Charlottenstraße 55 am Gendarmenmarkt. Inaugurated as a second location in 2005 was the Neuer Marstall, with its prominent location at Schloßplatz, situated on Museumsinsel – directly in the vicinity of the Stiftung Humboldt Forum im Berliner Schloss, currently under construction.