Christoph Graupner (1683-1760)
- Sinfonia (D-Dur) | a | 2 Corn: | Tymp: | 2 Violin | Viola | e | Cembalo (1747)
Performers: Idées heureuses Ensemble
Further info: Christoph Graupner (1683-1760) - Ouverture in G (c.1733)
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German composer. The son of Christoph Graupner (1650-1721) and Maria
Hochmuth (1653-1721), he was born into a family of tailors and
clothmakers. He received his earliest musical training from the local
Kantor Michael Mylius (who early detected Graupner’s exceptional
abilities to sing at sight) and the organist Nikolaus Kuster. In 1694 he
followed Kuster to Reichenbach, remaining there under his guidance
until admitted as an alumnus of the Thomasschule in Leipzig, where he
remained from 1696 to 1704. His teachers there included Johann Schelle
and Johann Kuhnau, for whom he also worked as copyist and amanuensis.
His subsequent studies in jurisprudence at the University of Leipzig
were broken off in 1706 through a Swedish military invasion, and he
emigrated to Hamburg. In Leipzig he had already made firm and
artistically stimulating friendships with G.P. Telemann (then director
of the collegium musicum) and Gottfried Grünewald. At Hamburg in 1707 he
succeeded J.C. Schiefferdecker as harpsichordist of the Gänsemarktoper.
Between 1707 and 1709 Graupner composed five operas for this theatre
and possibly collaborated with Reinhard Keiser in the joint composition
of another three. His librettists included Hinrich Hinsch and Barthold
Feind, a jurist-satirist-aesthetician. In 1709, in response to an
invitation from Ernst Ludwig, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, he accepted
the position of vice-Kapellmeister to W.C. Briegel, whom he succeeded on
the latter’s death in 1712. In 1711 he was married to Sophie Elisabeth
Eckard, who bore him six sons and a daughter; her younger sister was
married to a Lutheran pastor, Johann Conrad Lichtenberg of Neunkirchen
in Odenwald, the author of the texts of most of Graupner’s subsequent
cantatas.
Under Graupner’s direction the Darmstadt Hofkapelle experienced a period
of vigorous expansion. At its peak (1714-18) the Kapelle employed 40
musicians, many of whom, in keeping with practices of the day, were
adept in several different instruments. In these early years of his long
incumbency, Italian operas were performed frequently and he centred his
activities on operatic compositions. Between 1712 and 1721 he also
renewed his early friendship with Telemann, then active in Frankfurt.
After 1719, however, financial pressures enforced a reduction in the
size of the Kapelle and Graupner composed no more operas, concentrating
instead on the cantata, orchestral and instrumental forms. During this
period most of the orchestral personnel were obliged to find subsidiary
employment, often in other court duties, and the relationship between
the Landgrave and his musicians deteriorated. In 1722-23 he successfully
applied (in competition with J.S. Bach) for the Thomaskirche cantorate
in Leipzig, on Telemann’s withdrawal, but when the Landgrave refused
acceptance of his resignation, granting him a significant increase in
salary and other emoluments, he decided to remain in Darmstadt. There
his reputation attracted a number of important composers, including J.F.
Fasch, as his students. Until his activities were restricted by failing
eyesight and eventually blindness in 1754, he remained extraordinarily
prolific, producing 1418 church cantatas, 24 secular cantatas, 113
symphonies, about 50 concertos, 86 overture-suites, 36 sonatas for
instrumental combinations and a substantial body of keyboard music.
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