The prominent German composer wasborn on March 20, 1918 in Bliesheim near Cologne; he studied music education at the Cologne Music Academy and attended lectures at Cologne University. After two years of service in the Wehrmacht, Bernd Alois Zimmermann resumed his studies in the autumn of 1942 and attended the composition class of Busoni pupil Philipp Jarnach; he was unable to take his music education examinations until 1947 because he had been forced to interrupt his studies to return to military service. In the following period Bernd Alois Zimmermann worked as a free lance composer and instructor. He however turned down offers to give instruction in composition because of what he referred to as his ?restless spirit?. Then, however he did become the successor of Frank Martin at the Cologne Music Academy, and a year later he received a professorship. Because of a severe, incurable illness, he chose to take his life in August of 1970. A composer between two eras: born in 1918, he was too young to have been decisively influenced during the Weimar Republic, yet seemed to old at the end of the Second World War to partake fully in the critical attitude of the younger generation toward the generation of composers during the Weimar Republic. This led to a remarkably autonomous work style, marked by the concept of a ?pluralistic? composition and use of collage-like techniques.