DOCSLIB.ORG

Carl Friedrich Zelter's Kantate Auf Den Tod Friedrichs

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Carl Friedrich Zelter's Kantate Auf Den Tod Friedrichs University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Theses and Dissertations 2015 Carl Friedrich Zelter’s Kantate Auf Den Tod Friedrichs: An Historical Overview, Conductor’s Guide, And Modern Edition Dustin C. Ousley University of South Carolina Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd Part of the Music Commons Recommended Citation Ousley, D. C.(2015). Carl Friedrich Zelter’s Kantate Auf Den Tod Friedrichs: An Historical Overview, Conductor’s Guide, And Modern Edition. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/3714 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you by Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CARL FRIEDRICH ZELTER’S KANTATE AUF DEN TOD FRIEDRICHS: AN HISTORICAL OVERVIEW, CONDUCTOR’S GUIDE, AND MODERN EDITION by Dustin C. Ousley Bachelor of Arts Furman University, 2003 Master of Music University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 2005 Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Musical Arts in Conducting School of Music University of South Carolina 2015 Accepted by: Ellen Exner, Major Professor Larry Wyatt, Committee Member Alicia Walker, Committee Member Andrew Gowan, Committee Member Lacy Ford, Senior Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies © Copyright by Dustin C. Ousley, 2015 All Rights Reserved. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The inspiration for this document grew out of a conversation with Dr. Ellen Exner, Assistant Professor of Music History at the University of South Carolina. She presented this composition and challenged me to take the project. I am indebted to Dr. Exner for "throwing down the gauntlet” and providing me with such an interesting avenue for exploration. I would also like to express my gratitude to Dr. Larry Wyatt for his patience, trust, and professional guidance throughout my time in the DMA program. I have learned so much from rehearsals, classes, and spontaneous chats. Thanks, also, to Dr. Alicia Walker, who has shown equal patience in her mentorship, always gracious and willing to be a “listening ear.” Thanks to both of you for the amazing and enriching opportunities you have provided for me during this degree program. Additional thanks goes to Dr. Andrew Gowan for his significant feedback as a committee member for both my comprehensive exam and document. I also would like to gratefully acknowledge the work of all involved in the preparation and performance of Kantate auf den Tod Friedrichs: To the Coker Singers, Stephanie Beinlich, Johnnie Felder, Dan Cole, and the faculty and students at USC, for bringing just the right combination of experience, professionalism, finesse, and drama to the performance. Finally, I owe more than a word of thanks to my wife, Lee Whittington Ousley: thank you for your love, your support, for always finding a way to make life easier for me, and for being my life companion. iii ABSTRACT This study of Carl Friedrich Zelter’s Kantate auf den Tod Friedrichs marks the first scholarly and musical exploration of the piece since the eighteenth century. A hand- copied score of the cantata was converted into modern notation in 2009 using the program Sibelius. This version of the score, as well as instrumental parts, was used for the lecture-recital that grew from the study of this work. The manuscript’s present-day owner, Renate de La Trobe of Hamburg, Germany, granted access to a fair copy of the original score with a dedication in Zelter’s own hand. A member of Mrs. de La Trobe’s family received a copy of the score from Zelter himself in the eighteenth century. Carl Friedrich Zelter was a German composer, conductor, and pedagogue who spent his entire life in the city of Berlin and played a central role in shaping public musical life in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. Kantate auf den Tod Friedrichs represents a pivotal moment in Zelter’s life. Prior to the funeral cantata’s composition, Zelter’s father had no enthusiasm about his son’s artistic pursuits; a relationship oddly parallel with that of Frederick the Great and his father, but less violent. Kantate auf den Tod Friedrichs may not have received the acclaim Zelter had hoped for at the time of its premiere in 1786, but it found favor with his father, who counted Frederick as his greatest hero. Georg Zelter did not live to hear his son’s speech at the 1809 commemoration of Frederick’s death, but the pride, passion, and love that Carl Friedrich Zelter poured into his cantata most definitely convinced Georg that his son’s musical talents were put to productive use. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... iii ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................... iv LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................... vi FOREWORD ................................................................................................................... viii INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................1 CHAPTER 1. FREDERICK THE GREAT (THE INSPIRATION) ..................................6 CHAPTER 2. CARL FRIEDRICH ZELTER (THE COMPOSER) .................................15 CHAPTER 3. SCORE ANALYSIS ..................................................................................21 CHAPTER 4. PERFORMANCE CONSIDERATIONS ..................................................44 CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSION .........................................................................................57 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..............................................................................................................59 APPENDIX A: ENGLISH TRANSLATION ...................................................................61 APPENDIX B: FORM CHARTS .....................................................................................65 APPENDIX C: DMA RECITAL PROGRAMS ...............................................................71 APPENDIX D: PREFACE TO MODERN EDITION .....................................................77 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1 - New Grove Dictionary (Carl Friedrich Zelter’s List of Works) ....................13 Figure 1.2 - Opening of Kantate auf den Tod Friedrichs ..................................................13 (Hand-Copied Score) Figure 1.3 - Map of Prussia Before and After Frederick the Great’s reign .......................14 (1740-1786) Figure 3.1 – Opening movement—Sonata form ................................................................32 (Movement 1, first page) Figure 3.2 - Abrupt shift in modulation .............................................................................33 (Movement 1, mm. 29-30) Figure 3.3 - Delaying the harmonic resolution (“Avoiding reality”) .................................33 (Movement 1, mm. 47-48) Figure 3.4 - 4-3 suspension (viola part) .............................................................................34 (Movement 1, mm. 1-2) Figure 3.5 - Other examples of harmonic/melodic suspensions ........................................35 (Movement 1, m. 32, mm. 36-40, m. 44) Figure 3.6 - Descending soprano “sobbing” sequence ......................................................37 (Movement 4, mm. 45-58) Figure 3.7 - Rhythmic pattern of Frederick’s descent into the grave ................................38 (Movement 4, mm. 60-69) Figure 3.8a - Melismatic passage—Tenor Aria .................................................................39 (Movement 7, mm. 34-38) Figure 3.8b - Melismatic passage—Soprano Aria .............................................................40 (Movement 9, mm. 72-76) Figure 3.9a - Tenor recitative with cadence following text ...............................................41 (Movement 2, mm. 18-23) vi Figure 3.9b - Tenor recitative with cadence following text ...............................................42 (Movement 6, mm. 12-15) Figure 3.10a - Bass recitative with simultaneous cadence and text ...................................43 (Movement 3, mm. 24-26) Figure 3.10b - Soprano recitative with simultaneous cadence and text .............................43 (Movement 8, mm. 19-24) Figure 4.1 - The Prussians’ “Stunned Silence” ..................................................................56 (Movement 2, mm. 41-48) vii FOREWORD This dissertation is part of the document requirement for the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Choral Conducting. The requirement also consisted of four recitals whose programs are included in Appendix C. The content of this document focuses on a work by Carl Friedrich Zelter that was composed in the late-eighteenth century to commemorate the death of Frederick the Great. The work, in private possession from the late-eighteenth century and then tucked into storage before the outbreak of World War II, was reintroduced through a North American premiere performed in excerpt on Sunday, February 22, 2015 in the recital hall of the University of South Carolina’s School of Music in Columbia, South Carolina. The program featured the Coker Singers from Coker College in Hartsville, South Carolina, and the orchestra featured faculty and students from the University of South Carolina. Stephanie Beinlich, Johnnie Felder, and Daniel Cole served as soprano, tenor, and bass
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Germany from Luther to Bismarck
    University of California at San Diego HIEU 132 GERMANY FROM LUTHER TO BISMARCK Fall quarter 2009 #658659 Class meets Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2 until 3:20 in Warren Lecture Hall 2111 Professor Deborah Hertz Humanities and Social Science Building 6024 534 5501 Readers of the papers and examinations: Ms Monique Wiesmueller, [email protected]. Office Hours: Wednesdays 1:30 to 3 and by appointment CONTACTING THE PROFESSOR Please do not contact me by e-mail, but instead speak to me before or after class or on the phone during my office hour. I check the mailbox inside of our web site regularly. In an emergency you may contact the assistant to the Judaic Studies Program, Ms. Dorothy Wagoner at [email protected]; 534 4551. CLASSROOM ETIQUETTE. Please do not eat in class, drinks are acceptable. Please note that you should have your laptops, cell phones, and any other devices turned off during class. Students do too much multi-tasking for 1 the instructor to monitor. Try the simple beauty of a notebook and a pen. If so many students did not shop during class, you could enjoy the privilege of taking notes on your laptops. Power point presentations in class are a gift to those who attend and will not be available on the class web site. Attendance is not taken in class. Come to learn and to discuss. Class texts: All of the texts have been ordered with Groundworks Books in the Old Student Center and have been placed on Library Reserve. We have a systematic problem that Triton Link does not list the Groundworks booklists, but privileges the Price Center Bookstore.
    [Show full text]
  • Bach's St. Matthew Passion
    “It was an actor and a Jew who restored this great Christian work to the people.” - Felix Mendelssohn Bach’s Great Passion: A Reintroduction In 1829, a young Jewish musician (already on the path to create his own compositional legacy) reintroduced Berlin to Johann Sebastian Bach’s masterpiece, the Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi secundum Evangelistam Matthæum, also known as the Matthäus-Passion, The Passion According to St. Matthew, or simply, The St. Matthew Passion. Ten years earlier, that musician - Felix Mendelssohn - began taking composition lessons from the director of the Berlin Singakademie, Carl Friedrich Zelter. Through this relationship, Mendelssohn would learn to love the music of Bach. Zelter himself had conducted quiet performances of a handful of the German master’s choral works at the Singakademie: a motet here, some cantata movements there. Even some of the choruses from the Passion were read at his rooms at the Singakademie. He was, however, of the opinion that these larger works were not suitable for public performance in their entirety. Still, running against the predominant tastes of the day, that Bach’s music was, according to one early 20th-century scholar, as “dry as a lesson in arithmetic,” the self-taught Zelter (he was a mason by trade), infused his love of Bach in his favorite student. In 1820, Mendelssohn joined the Singakademie as a choral singer and accompanist. His father, Abraham, had given a collection of Bach scores to its library and had been an earlier supporter of the Berlin musical institution. Earlier, Felix’s grand-aunt, Sarah Levy (who studied with J.
    [Show full text]
  • Maria Szymanowska and the Evolution of Professional Pianism by Slawomir Dobrzanski
    Maria Szymanowska and the Evolution of Professional Pianism by Slawomir Dobrzanski Today's pianists, preoccupied with a grueling daily regimen of scales, arpeggios, etudes, etc. and equipped with an enormous piano repertoire ranging from Rameau through Chopin to Ligeti, rarely spend much time thinking about who created their profession. In fact, most piano connoisseurs and historians rarely venture beyond the early 20th century, or, more specifically, beyond the start of the Recording Era. Nevertheless, the evolution of professional pianism remains a fascinating area of inquiry. For instance, what, we may ask, are the differences and similarities between early 19th century pianists and the pianists of our time? The life and career of Maria Szymanowska (1789-1831), one of the first pianists "(to take) Europe by storm," provides surprisingly good source material for the making of such comparisons. In contrast to that of today's pianists, Maria Szymanowska's musical education did not take place at any official music school. There are several reasons for this. Firstly, public music education in Warsaw was still in its infancy (the first professional music school there opened only in 1809); secondly, such education was at the time inaccessible to women. Given such circumstances, Szymanowska's piano instruction took place at her home in Warsaw, with two unknown piano teachers, Lisowski and Gremm. It is widely assumed that she took advice from Chopin's teacher, Józef Elsner, from Karol Kurpinski, conductor of the National Theatre, and from Chopin's organ teacher Franciszek Lessel, a student of Haydn. Maria's parents, following their daughter's unusual interest in music, began inviting renowned musicians into their home whenever such artists performed in Warsaw.
    [Show full text]
  • Frederick the Great: King of Prussia Free Ebook
    FREEFREDERICK THE GREAT: KING OF PRUSSIA EBOOK Tim Blanning | 672 pages | 01 Oct 2015 | Penguin Books Ltd | 9781846141829 | English | London, United Kingdom Biography of Frederick the Great, King of Prussia Frederick I(German: Friedrich I.; 11 July – 25 February ), of the Hohenzollerndynasty, was (as Frederick III) Electorof Brandenburg(–) and Duke of Prussiain personal union(Brandenburg-Prussia). The latter function he upgraded to royalty, becoming the first King in Prussia(–). Frederick the Great of Prussia examines the potato harvest () On 24, March, , Prussian king Frederick the Great passed the circular order that should ensure the cultivation and deployment of potatoes in his country. Actually, citizens received this only rather refusing, because this subterranean vegetable seemed rather suspicious to them. Frederick II, byname Frederick the Great, German Friedrich der Grosse, (born January 24, , Berlin, Prussia [Germany]—died August 17, , Potsdam, near Berlin), king of Prussia (–86), a brilliant military campaigner who, in a series of diplomatic stratagems and wars against Austria and other powers, greatly enlarged Prussia’s territories and made Prussia the foremost military power in Europe. Frederick the Great’s Cunning Plan to Introduce the Potato Few figures loom as large in European history as Frederick the Great. When he inherited the Prussian crown in , he ruled over a kingdom of scattered territories, a minor Germanic backwater. By the end of his reign, the much larger and consolidated Prussia ranked among the continent’s great powers. Frederick II, byname Frederick the Great, German Friedrich der Grosse, (born January 24, , Berlin, Prussia [Germany]—died August 17, , Potsdam, near Berlin), king of Prussia (–86), a brilliant military campaigner who, in a series of diplomatic stratagems and wars against Austria and other powers, greatly enlarged Prussia’s territories and made Prussia the foremost military power in Europe.
    [Show full text]
  • Ex·Libris·P·O·Et·Amicorum B · R · H · L · D · W · I · K
    RIDERICI F AN A A C E H T O I L B I B t n e n a m scripta EX·LIBRIS·P·O·ET·AMICORUM B · R · H · L · D · W · I · K Vorderseite: Abbildung des Marmorvorsatzpapieres aus Friedrich-Einband (Kat. 70.3) mit Exlibris des Sammlers P. O. Umschlagabbildungen: Bücherschrank Friedrichs im Schloß Charlottenburg Porträt Friedrichs des Großen von Anton Friedrich König (Kat. 65.1) Die Bücher des Königs 80.4 Die Bücher des Königs FRIEDRICH DER GROSSE Schriftsteller und Liebhaber von Büchern und Bibliotheken Eine Ausstellung mit der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz Kurator Wolfgang J. Kaiser EDITION KAISER MMXII »Weder dem Eroberer noch dem Gesetzgeber, sondern dem Schriftsteller und Philosophen widme ich dieses Werk.« Algarottis Widmung seiner Werke an Friedrich den Großen (Kat. 33.2) Kabinettsausstellung einer bibliophilen Fridericiana-Privatsammlung aus Anlaß des 300. Geburtstages des Königs In der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz 8. bis 18. Februar 2012 In der Französischen Botschaft in Berlin 8. bis 30. März 2012 Im Preußen – Museum Nordrhein-Westfalen, Minden 6. Mai bis 1. Juli 2012 Brandenburg – Preußen Museum, Wustrau 20. Oktober bis 24. November 2012 6 Inhalt 9 Zum Geleit Georg Friedrich Prinz zu Preußen 10 Grußwort Barbara Schneider-Kempf 11 Grußwort Maurice Gourdault-Montagne 12 Grußwort Carsten Reuss 13 Vorwort Wolfgang J. Kaiser I 19 Der junge Friedrich – Freund der Bücher 20 Einführungstafel 1 21 Zwischen Pflicht und Neigung 27 Bücher und Jugendbibliotheken in Berlin und Rheinsberg II 31 »Frédéric
    [Show full text]
  • Zelter Wird Musik-Professor
    Zelter wird Musik-Professor In der Chronik der 1696 kraft kurfürstlichen Erlasses gegründeten Königlichen Akademie der Künste zu Berlin verdient der 17. Mai 1809 besondere Erwähnung. An diesem Tage nämlich wurde Carl Friedrich Zelter, seit 1806 Ehrenmitglied des erlauchten Gremiums, zum Professor für Musik ernannt. So prominente Zeitgenossen wie Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) und Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835) hatten sich mit Nachdruck für diese Professur eingesetzt. Humboldt war Leiter des damals neu geschaffenen "Departements für Kultus und öffentlichen Unterricht" bei der preußischen Regierung. Einen Musikprofessor hatte es bis dato noch nicht gegeben. Die Ernennung Zelters war die Ehrung einer Persönlichkeit, die das Musikleben in Berlin und weit über Preußens Grenzen hinaus entscheidend prägte, und zugleich ein geschickter Schachzug, mit dem man einen erfahrenen Mann in die Pflicht nahm. Wer war nun dieser Zelter, woher kam er, worin bestehen seine Verdienste und warum ist sein Wirken noch heute für uns von Bedeutung? Carl Friedrich Zelter wurde am 11. Dezember 1758 in Berlin geboren. Einige Biographen nennen Petzow bei Werder als Geburtsort. Diese Angabe beruhte aber auf militärdienstlichen Gründen und entspricht nicht der Wahrheit. Sein Vater stammte aus der Dresdener Gegend und war ein wohlhabender Bauunternehmer, dessen Firma sich in der Münzstraße 1, nahe dem Alexanderplatz, befand. Carl Friedrich erhielt bis zu seinem 14. Lebensjahr Hausunterricht, besuchte dann das Joachimsthalsche Gymnasium, absolvierte eine Maurerlehre und ging gleichzeitig auf die Königliche Zeichenakademie. 1787 übernahm er nach dem Tode des Vaters dessen Geschäft. Das von Zelter junior umgebaute Haus Brüderstraße 13 im Stadtbezirk Mitte hat den 2. Weltkrieg überstanden und ist Zeugnis seines handwerklichen Könnens.
    [Show full text]
  • King in Prussia
    King in Prussia By Rafael Sabatini King In Prussia BOOK 1—THE PRINCE Chapter 1. Domestic Scene Charles Stuart-Dene, Marquess of Alverley, looked at humanity, and wondered why it was. You conceive the pessimism prompting this spirit of philosophic inquiry. How far it was justified you may gather from the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth, a lady who was no more curbed by discretion in the glimpses she affords us of her family, and particularly of her abominable sire, than in other matters that are commonly accounted intimate. Through the bright, prominent eyes that stared out of her young face, which would have been winsome had it not been pockmarked, you may view the scene that is to be regarded as the prelude to all this mischief. It was set in the Porcelain Gallery of the Palace of Monbijou. Music was being made by the flute of the Crown Prince of Prussia, to an accompaniment by his sister Wilhelmina, the future Margravine, on the lute, and the young Rittmeister von Katte on the clavichord. The three were rendering a sugary composition which the Prince claimed for his own, but which Katte believed would never have been written but for the previous existence of a melody of Scarlatti's. Monbijou with all its choice contents had been a gift to Queen Sophia Dorothea from her father-in-law, Frederick, the first King in Prussia; and this spacious Porcelain Gallery, so called because of the immensely tall and valuable Chinese vases that were the most conspicuous objects in its subdued and impeccable appointments, was one of the pleasantest of the palace's chambers.
    [Show full text]
  • Carl Schurz Was in the Pledge Class of 1870
    Appendix Gamma2: The Breslau Intellectual Line Connecting brothers of Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity at Cornell University, tracing their fraternal Big Brother/Little Brother line to the tri-Founders and their Pledges . Brother Carl Schurz was in the Pledge Class of 1870. . Carl Schurz was friends with Gottfriend . Felix Mendelssohn studied under Kinkel years . Carl Friedrich Zelter . . Gottfried Kinkel was spouse to . Carl Friedrich Zelter studied under Carl Johanna Kinkel. Friedrich Christian Fasch . . Johanna Kinkel studied music under . Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach studied Jewish musician, under Sylvius Leopold Weiss. Felix Mendelssohn . Below we present short biographies of the Breslau intellectual line of the Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity at Cornell University. “Who defends the House.” We begin with brother Carl Schurz (1870), tapped into Phi Kappa Psi at Cornell in the first class after the Founding: Carl Schurz (March 2, 1829 – May 14, 1906) was a German revolutionary, American statesman and reformer, and Union Army general in the American Civil War. He was also an accomplished author, newspaper editor and journalist, who in 1869 became the first German-born American elected to the United States Senate. His wife Margarethe Schurz and her sister Bertha von Ronge were instrumental in establishing the kindergarten system in the United States. During his later years, Schurz was perhaps the most prominent Independent The University of Bonn in American politics, noted for his high principles, his avoidance of political partisanship, and his moral conscience. Brother Schurz is famous for saying: "Our country right or wrong. When right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right." Many streets, schools, and parks are named in honor of him, including New York City's Carl Schurz Park.
    [Show full text]
  • The Intersection of Gender, Religion, and Culture in Nineteenth-Century
    THE INTERSECTION OF GENDER, RELIGION, AND CULTURE IN NINETEENTH‐ CENTURY GERMANIC SALONS Jennifer Lauren Psujek A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF MUSIC August: 2010 Committee: Mary Natvig, Advisor Eftychia Papanikolaou ii ABSTRACT Mary Natvig, Advisor Modern salons began as gatherings for conversation among the French aristocracy in the seventeenth century. By the eighteenth century it had become a bourgeois tradition, with its importance cumulating in the French Revolution. The French salon moved to Germany and Austria in the late eighteenth century, however, its heyday in those lands was in the nineteenth century. The salon became a place where women in both France and the Germanic lands could gain an education and power. What has yet to be discussed in scholarship is the extent to which the salon in the Germanic lands moved away from its French roots and Became its own unique tradition. First, purely musical salons began during the Biedermeier period, as will be seen when examining the German salons of Sara Levy, Amalie Beer, Lea Mendelssohn, Fanny Mendelssohn‐Hensel, and Clara Wieck‐Schumann. Second, Germany and Austria saw the first salons hosted by Jewish women. This thesis highlights those of Henriette Herz, Rahel Levin‐Varnhagen, Fanny von Arnstein, Sara Levy, Amalie Beer, Lea Mendelssohn, Fanny Mendelssohn‐Hensel, Berta Zuckerkandl, and Salka Viertel. Finally, to demonstrate the benefits of Germanic salon culture, the last chapter focuses on Johanna Kinkel’s involvement with the Berlin salon tradition. Kinkel was a composer, writer, and political activist.
    [Show full text]
  • In Pursuit of a Single Flame: Fanny Hensel's 'Musical Salon'
    In Pursuit of a Single Flame: The Biedermeier Years (1815–30) Fanny Hensel’s ‘Musical Salon’ Following the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna 1814–15, the German Restoration (more popularly known as the © Copyrighted Material and social restraint. The alliance of individual monarchial states in Vienna by no means compensated for the failure to create the national states demanded by the liberal middle class. Such revolutionary calls for liberalism gave rise to a period of censorship internationally known as ‘The Age of Metternich’, and by the term for the cultural epoch, the ‘Biedermeier’. The prescribed peace in Europe during these Chapter 4 years, which was essentially a renewal of conditions before the French Revolution of 1789 and the Napoleonic era, could not prevent ideas of national independence Lorraine Byrne Bodley from broadening the predominant values of middle-class life. Parallel to this social transformation, concert life began to be transformed and music making began to flourish in domestic circles in the larger German cities. Within this cultural milieu the musical salon developed rapidly. Such salons, maintained solely in private circles, were a symbiosis of readings, musical performance and cultured conversation. Not only did they embrace the German Lied in its many facets but they also provided a forum for discussion of political and social processes. one of the most active and vibrant cities. It was here in 1810 that Wilhelm von Humboldt foundedWith regardthe first to salon‘modern’ culture university in early (to nineteenth-century which women and Germany, Jews were Berlin was not admitted) and it was against this cultural backdrop that a particular type of ‘salon’ was born in Berlin.
    [Show full text]
  • Open Sjhornbergerrevised.Pdf
    The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School IN THE SHADOW OF GREATNESS: WOMEN COMPOSERS AND THEIR FLUTE SONATAS AT THE PRUSSIAN COURT, 1730-1771 A Thesis in Music by Sheila Joy Hornberger © 2020 Sheila Joy Hornberger Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts May 2020 ii The thesis of Sheila Joy Hornberger was reviewed and approved* by the following: Marica S. Tacconi Professor of Musicology Thesis Advisor Mark C. Ferraguto Associate Professor of Musicology R J David Frego Director of the School of Music iii ABSTRACT The Prussian Court at Berlin during the reign of Frederick the Great (1740-1786) was well known as an epicenter of musical activity during the Enlightenment; it attracted many famed composers such as Johann Sebastian Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, and Johann Hasse. Composers Johann Joachim Quantz, CPE Bach, Johann Kirnberger, and Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg wrote their famous treatises while working at this court, which helped to further knowledge of music and music theory. Frederick the Great was also widely known for his musicality, and he left over one hundred compositions for posterity. While historians have credited the flute-playing king for creating this musical renaissance in Prussia after the death of his philistinian father, the contributions of his musical sisters, Wilhelmine von Bayreuth and Anna Amalia of Prussia have been largely ignored. The presence of a third woman composer, Anna Bon di Venezia, also remains largely unrecognized in musicological circles. It should be of little surprise, however, that this newly enlightened Prussian court enabled the musical advancement of these talented women.
    [Show full text]
  • Goethe, Zelter and Spohr
    GOETHE, ZELTER AND SPOHR by Peter Skrine N 16th December 1825 Zelter wrote to Goethe about a new translation of Macbethby the Prussian royal librarian, Dr.Samuel Heinrich Spiker (1786-1858), which had been grven its first performance in Berlin the previous day with an overture and stage music by Spohr and entr'actes by Peter von Lindpaintner: 'The perfotmance lasled nearlyfour hours, one hour or so being taken up by the entr'actes ... bur tke audience entered arld W the theatre with little more than-afrissoi at all the supernatural goings-on. Wl7at ulas particularly striking was an overtare specially composedfor thi occasion, togethervth chontscs and dancesfor thewitches. The compow (Kapeltneistei Spohr of Kassel) is a skilful man, unci if it hadn't all been too much o.f a giod thing, everything might have 3een better. The intention u'as laudabte in itself, because if ;rou happen to have att-orciestra to hand it mightiu.st as well play some.thing appropriate. But w,hat is appropriate is quite another matter. There is no teedfor onvone to paint the night black- and tiit may be the root of the problem. The play itselJ'is rough company aml requires a rough-hew*n stlle. But this was-lackiig, so we were only toa happy when the murderers resumed their dastardly deeds on stage. Bits oid pier", selectedfrom tlrc latest cookery boolcs - in short, a so-called ihamber stvle-- just won't work here; daubing it with colour won't help either: the drama unfolds ai its owrt poi"; ,uq Birnam Wood has to play its part, and all those lovely crotchets and qaavers ie lefi lying by the wayside.' Zelter then goes on to describe earlier impressions of lulacbethwhtchhe had never forgotten: 'Adminedly, in those ciays we acceptcd things ,nore easil.v*, and Shakespeare's pla1,s shattered us youngfellctws antl made the sparla fly; back in those days thingiwere not so sentimentaliserl and sugary.
    [Show full text]