Uccelli [née Pazzini], Carolina Uccellini, Marco

Ulrich [Uolrich] von Liechtenstein [Liehtenstein, Lichtenstein]

(b Styria, c1200; d 26 Jan 1275). German poet and Minnesinger from a famous Styrian family. His political career is amply documented; the rest of his life is described in his principal work, Frauendienst (completed 1255; ed. K. Lachmann and T. von Karajan, Berlin, 1941/R; ed. F.V. Spechtler, Göppingen, 1987). This long strophic poem also includes his 57 songs (which are also contained in the Manessesche Liederhandschrift) and his one Leich, but no music survives. Frauendienst contains numerous important references to music, to the art of composition, to methods of making contrafacta and to the use and performance of secular music, both vocal and instrumental. Less attention has been paid to his Frauenbuch (ed. F.V. Spechtler, Göppingen, 1989), which was written in the mid-13th century and is transmitted only in one manuscript of the early 16th century.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MGG1 (U. Aarburg)

U. Aarburg: Ulrich von Lichtenstein: Autobiographie und Persönlichkeit (diss., U. of Frankfurt, 1965)

J.D. Müller: ‘Ulrich von Liechtenstein’, Die deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters: Verfasserlexikon, ed. K. Ruh and others (Berlin, 2/1977–)

A.H. Touber: ‘Ulrichs von Liechtenstein unbekannte Melodie’, Amsterdamer Beiträge zur älteren Germanistik, xxvi (1987), 107–18

For further bibliography see Minnesang.

BURKHARD KIPPENBERG/LORENZ WELKER

Ulster Orchestra.

Orchestra founded in 1966 in Belfast.

Ultraphon.

German and Dutch record company. It was founded in Berlin in 1921 by the scientist Heinrich J. Kuechenmeister. Initially it was concerned with instruments and sound reproduction; in 1925 it marketed, through its subsidiary Tonapparate, a record player with paired pickup arms, soundboxes and horns working with a time lapse of one-sixth of a second. From 1927, working with Herbert Grenzebach of Elektrophon, it set new standards of recorded quality, and in 1929 it began issuing records. For orchestral recordings, Grenzebach used multiple microphones including one at 20 metres' distance for echo effects. Records of standard groovecut were 30 and 25 cm, 78 r.p.m. but 20 cm discs with narrow groove were also made (on the Orchestrola label), as were 40cm discs at 33 r.p.m. with an inside start, for use with films.

Soon after its first records were issued, the firm merged with Orchestrola-Vocalion (including the Clausophon, Adler and Orchestrola labels). The firm set up numerous subsidiaries abroad, including the group of firms in Czechoslovakia that in 1946 were amalgamated as Supraphon. More than 2000 titles were produced in two and a half years, but the policy of high quality and cost led to the firm's being unable to weather the economic crisis and in 1932 it went out of business and its stock was taken over by Telefunken, who abandoned the Ultraphon label in 1933.

The company had access to salon and dance music through Orchestrola-Vocalion. Its own recordings covered a wide spectrum, with artists including Paul Bender, Paul Schöffler, Erich Kleiber, Carl Schuricht, Alexander von Zemlinsky, Georg Kulenkampff and Moriz Rosenthal; Die Dreigroschenoper was recorded in 1930 with its original cast, including Lotte Lenya, and sacred music recorded in churches was issued on the Musica Sacra label. There were also recordings of dance music and cabaret.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

H. Sieben: Herbert Grenzebach: ein Leben für die Telefunken-Schallplatte (Düsseldorf,1991)

B. Englund and M.Elfström: Ultraphon: Telefunken/Pallas, Svenska Diskografier, ix (Stockholm, 1994)

N. Nitsche and A.Sieghardt: Telefunken-Firmendiscographie, (Bonn and Vienna, 1999)

RAINER E. LOTZ

Umělecká Beseda

(Cz.: ‘Artistic Society’).

Prague society of musicians and other artists, founded in 1863. See Prague, §§3–4.

Umfang

(Ger.).

See Range.

Um-Kalthoum, Ibrahim.

See Umm Kulthum.

Umkehrung

(Ger.).

See Inversion.

Umlauf, Carl Ignaz Franz

(b Baden, nr Vienna, 19 Sept 1824; d Vienna, 25 Feb 1902). Austrian zither player, composer and teacher. After completing a tradesman's training to comply with his father's wish he studied the violin with Jansa and music theory with Sechter and made music his career. Inspired by popular enthusiasm for the zither he became absorbed in designing as well as playing the instrument and, together with the zither manufacturer Anton Kiendl, developed the ‘Viennese zither’, distinguished from other, usually Bavarian, instruments by its tuning and number of strings. He also drew attention to the bowed zither and to the Elegiezither, a larger instrument particularly suited to concert performance because of its fuller tone. In Vienna he directed the first public zither school, and from 1844 made concert tours throughout Europe; he was appointed Hofmusikus by the Austrian imperial court. His 18 volumes entitled Salon-Album für Zitherspieler, containing original compositions and transcriptions, were popular in his day. Although his ‘Viennese tuning’ has been replaced by so-called ‘normal tuning’, his zither method, Neue vollständige theoretisch-praktische Zitherschule (Vienna, 1859), superseded other famous zither methods of his time (Weigel, 1838; Ruthardt, 1846 and Buchecker, 1854), and has held its place to the present day.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

J.E. Bennert: Illustrierte Geschichte der Zither (Luxembourg, 1881) [incl. Umlauf's autobiography, pp.44–6]

J. Brandlmeier: Handbuch der Zither (Munich, 1963)

HORST LEUCHTMANN