Alois Hába was born 1893 June 21 in the small village of Vizovice in Moravia (then part of the Austrian Empire). He had 6 brothers and 3 sisters. At age 5 it was discovered that he had absolute ('perfect') pitch. He and his family played and sang their native Wallachian folk-songs at church and social functions. In school he became very interested in the musical aspects (pitch, rhythm, accent, dynamics, timbre) of Czech speech.

At age 15 (1908) he entered the teacher's training college in Kromeríz, began to develop an interest in Czech nationalism, and heard the works of Smetana and Wagner for the first time. After finishing his studies, he got a job as teacher in Bílovice, a small town near the Hungarian border. He continued his musical studies independently and in 1913 wrote his first compositions, displaying an unwillingness to 'follow the rules' that he maintained all his life.

Hába was dissatisfied by small-town life, and when World War 1 began in 1914, he moved to Prague and became a pupil of Novák at the Conservatory. Here he analyzed Debussy, Reger, Scriabin, and Strauss, and studied non-functional harmonization of Moravian folk-melodies.

He was drafted into the Austrian Army in 1915, went to the Russian front, to the Italian front in 1917, and then to Vienna in early 1918, where he was assigned the collection of Slovakian soldier's songs.

Inspired by recitals given by Willi von Möllendorff on his quarter-tone (24-tET) harmonium, Hába wrote his first quarter-tone piece, Suite in the quarter-tone system, for two pianos tuned a quarter-tone apart. He studied with Jan Brandts-Buys, then Richard Stöhr, and becoming dissatisfied with these strict counterpoint lessons, in the spring of 1918 became a student of Franz Schreker, who brought out his more radical tendencies.

Remaining in Vienna after the war, Hába attended the Private Society concerts held by Schönberg and studied Schönberg's works, and became particularly influenced by the 'athematic' style used by Schönberg in Erwartung. He got a job as proof-reader at Universal Edition, which enabled him to study many of the most recent scores by Schönberg and his students, resulted in the first publication of his compositions (including the 2nd Quartet, his first major quarter-tone work), and began his life-long friendship with Hanns Eisler, with whom he shared political as well as musical opinions. Hába became an ardent Communist at this time.

Schreker moved to Berlin in 1920 and Hába followed. He found his first success as a composer in Berlin, studied Stumpf's and Hornbostel's work in Oriental (i.e., near-eastern) music at their phono-disc archives, and published his first theoretical treatise (in Czech), the small booklet Harmonické základy ctvrttónové soustavy ['Harmonic foundations of the quarter-tone system']. In 1923 he met Ferrucio Busoni, who had advocated the sixth-tone (36-tET) system (altho he never composed in it himself), and who encouraged Hába to continue his work in microtonality. Hába began to attempt the establishment of a school of microtonal music, but as the Nazis gained power he came under attack and was driven out of Berlin.

He returned to Prague but was not welcomed there either, as Czech officials considered him to be 'of the German school'. He managed to get a job teaching workshops at the Prague Conservatory, and designed and got built two quarter-tone pianos by early 1924 and a third in 1925. In 1927, Förster built for him a sixth-tone harmonium, patterned mostly after the design by Busoni. These instruments were bought by and installed in the Conservatory. He also wrote several theoretical articles on microtonality, athematicism, and church modes at this time. In 1925 he wrote his major theoretical work and translated and published it in German, Neue Harmonielehre des diatonischen, chromatischen, viertel-, drittel-, sechstel-, und zwöftel-tonsystems ['New harmony-textbook of the diatonic, chromatic (12-ET), quarter- (24-ET), third- (18-ET), sixth- (36-ET), and twelfth-tone (72-ET) systems'].

After the première of his quarter-tone opera Matka ['Mother'] (probably his most important work) in 1931, Hába emerged as a leader in Czechoslovakian and international modern music. Two quarter-tone clarinets and two quarter-tone trumpets were built especially for this work. Hába also expressed a bold socialist viewpoint in his three operas and became politically active.

Finally, in 1933, when Joseph Suk became director of the Prague Conservatory, Hába became a full professor and established the Department of Quarter-tone and Sixth-tone Music, teaching a complete 3-year curriculum. Here he had much influence over his many students.

In 1939 the Nazis occupied Czechoslovakia and banned performance of Hába's work, then in 1941 closed down the Prague Conservatory and prevented him from teaching. In 1945 the Soviet Union 'liberated' Czechoslovakia and he resumed teaching and had several administrative positions.

An important event was Hába's attendance of a lecture by Adriaan Fokker at the International Society of Contemporary Music in 1948; under the influence of this, he engaged in a long study of the fifth-tone (31-tET) system, finally using it in his 16th Quartet in 1967.

Stalin and the Communist Party took over Czechoslovakia in 1948 and this affected both Hába's life and work. His style became simplified, much more 'thematic' and tonal, and he began integrating folk melodies into his work, and also set texts projecting Communist ideology. He also composed much less in microtonal tunings after this. In 1951 his Department of Quarter-tone and Sixth-tone Music was dissolved by the government.

After Stalin's death in 1953, Hába slowly regained his status. He was prolific and continued to compose almost to the end of his life. He died in relative obscurity in 1973.

Hába's earliest published microtonal piece was the 2nd Quartet (1920) and last was apparently the 16th Quartet (1967).

'semitone' refers to the usual 12-tET scale
'quarter-tone' refers to 24-tET
'5th-tone' refers to 31-tET (not 30-tET)
'6th-tone' refers to 36-tET
'12-tone' refers to Schoenberg's '12-tone method'

I'm not sure how much Hába discussed 'three-quarter-tones' (8-tET) in his theoretical works, but he used scales in this tuning in sections of some of his compositions.

AGE	DATE	OPUS
Prague 21-22	1914-15	1	Sonata for violin and piano
			[3-year break in output / World War 1]
Vienna 24-25	1917-18	2	Deux Morceaux pour piano [2 pieces for piano]
25	1918	1a	Fugue-suite (3 fugues) for piano
		1b	Variations on a canon of Robert Schumann, for piano
		3	Sonata for piano
26	1919	4	1st String Quartet (semitone)
		5	Overture for orchestra
27	1920	6	6 Piano Pieces
		7	2nd String Quartet (Hába's 1st published quarter-tone composition)
Berlin 27-28	1920-21	8	Symphonic Fantasy for piano & orchestra
28	1921	9a	Fantasy in quarter-tones for violin solo
29	1922	9b	Music in quarter-tones for violin solo
	1922	10	1st Suite for quarter-tone piano [revised 1932 as op. 11a]
	1922	11	2nd Suite for quarter-tone piano [revised 1932 as op. 11b]
29	1922	12	3rd String Quartet (quarter-tone)
		13	Vocal-suite in quarter-tones (choir)
		14	4th String Quartet (quarter-tone)
30	1923	15	5th String Quartet (Hába's 1st 6th-tone composition)
Prague		16	3rd Suite for quarter-tone piano
		17	1st Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
31	1924	18	Fantasy in quarter-tones for cello solo
		19	2nd Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		20	3rd Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		22	4th Suite for quarter-tone piano
32	1925	21	Fantasy for violin & quarter-tone piano
		23	5th Suite for quarter-tone piano
		24	1st Suite for quarter-tone clarinet & quarter-tone piano
		25	4th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		26	5th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		--	Neue Harmonielehre (treatise on microtonal theory)
33	1926	27	6th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		28	7th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		29	8th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		30	9th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		31	10th Fantasy for quarter-tone piano
		32	Fantasy for viola & quarter-tone piano
34	1927	33	Fantasy for cello & quarter-tone piano
		39	4 Modern Dances for piano
34-35	1927-28	34	Fantasy for flute (or violin) & piano
		34	Suite (arr. J. Horák) (bass-clarinet & piano)
35	1928	36	Já [I] (quarter-tone men's choir)
		37	6 Pieces for 6th-tone harmonium or string quartet
34-36	1927-29	35	Matka [Mother] (quarter-tone opera in 10 scenes)
37	1930		[1-year break in output]
38	1931	38	Toccata quasi una Fantasia (semitone piano)
		40	Fantasy for Nonet Nr. 1 (12-tone)
39	1932	41	Fantasy for Nonet Nr. 2 (7-tone)
		42	5 Choruses (3 quarter-tone boy's or women's voices)
		43	Children's Play (quarter-tone children's voices: soli and choir)
		44	5 Mixed Choruses (quarter-tone choir)
		45	Pracující den [The working day] (10 quarter-tone men's choruses)
40	1933	46	Cesta zivota [The Path of Life], Symphonic Fantasy (orchestra)
		--	Mass Songs (choir)
41-43	1934-36	47	Nová zeme [The New Earth] (12-tone opera in 3 acts & 6 scenes)
43	1936	48	Children's rhymes (medium voice & piano)
44	1937	49	Duo (6th-tone violins)
	1938		[Nazi annexation of Czechoslokavia]
44-49	1937-42	50	Prijd Království Tvé (Nezamestnaní) [Thy Kingdom Come (The Unemployed)] (6th-tone musical drama in 7 scenes)
50	1943	51	Detské nálady [Children's Moods], 8-song cycle (middle voice & quarter-tone guitar)
		52	Sonata for guitar
		53	Poesie zivota [Poetry of Life], 12-song cycle (soprano & quarter-tone guitar)
		54	1st Suite for quarter-tone guitar
		55	2nd Suite for quarter-tone clarinet (solo)
51	1944	56	Suite for quarter-tone trumpet & trombone
		57	Milenci [The Lovers], 7-song cycle (soprano & piano)
		58	5 Moravian Love-songs (mezzo-soprano, guitar or piano accompaniment)
		59	Sonata for Chromatic Harp
		60	Sonata for Diatonic Harp
51-52	1944-45	61	Intermezzo and Praeludium for diatonic harp
53-54	1946-47	62	Sonata for quarter-tone piano
54	1947	63	2nd Suite for quarter-tone guitar
			[Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia]
55	1948	64	Ústava 9. kvetna [Constitution of May 9th] (men's choir)
		65	3 Men's Choruses
		66	Meditace [Meditation] (men's choir)
		67	Mír [Peace] (men's choir)
		67a	Soviet Songs (choir)
	1948-50	--	Mass Songs (choir)
56	1949	68	Za mír [For Peace], cantata (choir & orchestra)
57	1950	69	Suite for bassoon solo
		70	6th String Quartet (quarter-tone)
		71	3 Men's Choruses (men's choir)
		72	Suite in quarter-tones for 4 trombones
57-58	1950-51	73	7th String Quartet ("Christmas") (semitone)
58	1951		[forced retirement - Department of quarter-tone and Sixth-tone Music eliminated]
		74	Quartet for 4 bassoons
		75a	Fantasy for organ
		75b	Fantasy and Fugue "HABA" for organ
		75c	6 Polish Folksongs for harp
		76	8th String Quartet (semitone)
59	1952	78	Sonata for clarinet (solo)
		79	9th String Quartet (semitone)
		80	10th String Quartet (6th-tone)
58-60	1951-53	77	Valasská suita [Wallachian Suite] (orchestra)
60	1953	82	3rd Nonet
52-62	1945-55	84	Slovanské mudrosloví [Slovakian Proverbs] (boy's or women's choir & piano)
61-62	1954-55	83	Violin Concerto
62	1955	81a	Suite for violin solo
		81b	Suite for cello solo
		85a	Suite in 6th-tones for violin solo
		85b	Suite in 6th-tones for cello solo
62-64	1955-57	86	Viola Concerto
64-65	1957-58	87	11th String Quartet (6th-tone)
64-66	1957-59	88	Suite Nr. 6 (quarter-tone piano)
		89	Fantasy Nr. 11 (quarter-tone piano)
66-67	1959-60	90	12th String Quartet (quarter-tone)
67	1960	91	Suite (cymbal)
68	1961	92	13th String Quartet (semitone)
68-69	1961-62	93	Suite in quarter-tones for violin
70	1963	94	14th String Quartet (quarter-tone)
71	1964	95	15th String Quartet (semitone)
		96	Suite for bass-clarinet
72-73	1965-66		[2-year break in output]
74	1967	98	16th String Quartet (5th-tone)
75	1968	99	Suite for saxophone solo
		99a	Praha [Prague] (choir)
76	1969	100	Suite for bass-clarinet with piano
77	1970	101	Poznámky z deníku [Diary-notes], melodrama (speaker & string-quartet)
69-70, 77-78	1962-63, 1970-71	97	4th Nonet
		102	6 Moods for piano
79	1972	103	Suite for violin & piano

For many more diagrams and explanations of historical tunings, see my book. If you don't understand my theory or the terms I've used, start here or try some definitions.

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