German composer and writer on music.

Career Summary

Having first studied zoology, Wetzel turned to music after 1901 and taught at the Riemann Conservatory in Stettin 1905–07, then at the Klindworth-Scharwenka Conservatory in Berlin until 1926, and then at the Royal Music Institute of Berlin from 1926. In 1945 he became a professor at the Berlin University of the Arts. As a composer he wrote twelve collections of Lieder; he also wrote two books on aspects of music theory and also articles and reviews for music journals.

Wetzel and Schenker

Schenker's scrapbook (OC 2) contains reviews by Wetzel of many of his works, including Ein Beitrag zur Ornamentik (OC 2/p. 4: Die Musik 9/7, January 1909); Harmonielehre (p. 22: Rheinische Musik- und Theater-Zeitung n.d.); Kontrapunkt I (pp. 24, 26, 27: Rheinische Musik- und Theater-Zeitung, March?‒August, 1911); Die letzten fünf Sonaten von Beethoven: Op. 109 (p. 40: Die Musik, 13/12 (March 15, 1914, of which Schenker remarked in his diary “This idiot won't leave me alone!“); Das Meisterwerk in der Musik II (p. 78: Zeitschrift für Musik, May 1928). — In his diary for October 1, 1912, Schenker accused Wetzel of plagiarizing his Harmonielehre in an article about Brahms’s harmonic style in Die Musik.

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