Ziehn, Bernhard (1845-1912)

German-born US musical theorist. His pioneering work on developing a twelve-tone system is thought to have influenced the composer Arnold Schoenberg, who, in the early 1920s, was the first to apply such a system to musical composition. Ziehn first formulated his ideas in Harmonie- und Modulationslehre/Theory of Harmony and Modulation, in 1888.

Ziehn was born in Erfurt, Germany. He undertook a systematic treatment of chromatic harmonies and explained previously ‘inadmissible’ harmonic relationships in terms of a twelve-note chromatic scale rather than a seven-note diatonic scale.