Johann Adolph Scheibe (1708-1776)
- Passions Cantata (1769)
Performers: Bonna Søndberg (soprano); Ole Hedegård (tenor); Ulrik Cold
(1939-2010, bass);
The Royal Opera Choir; Collegium Musicum; Lavard
Friisholm (1912-1999, conductor)
Further info: Passions-Cantata
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German composer, theorist, and organist. Son of Johann Scheibe
(c.1680-1748), an organ builder, he was forced to teach himself music
around 1725 due to economic difficulties, at the same time as he was
attending Leipzig University in law and philosophy. By 1736 he had moved
to Hamburg when applications for posts in Leipzig proved unsuccessful,
coming into contact with Georg Philipp Telemann and Johann Mattheson.
During this period he published three volumes of his most important
treatise on music, 'Der critische Musicus'. In 1739 he had obtained a
post as Kapellmeister to Margrave Friedrich Ernst of
Brandenburg-Kulmbach in the town of Itzehoe, and through his connections
a year later he was appointed to the same post at the Danish court of
Christian VI in Copenhagen. When the king’s successor reopened the Royal
Theatre, he came into conflict with Paolo Scalabrini over the viability
of Italian opera, moving to the city of Sønderborg to teach music. He
later returned to Copenhagen, where he was celebrated as a teacher and
theorist. In 1740 he published an autobiography in a work by Mattheson,
claiming that he had written over 150 flute concertos, 30 violin
concertos, and 60 to 70 symphonies, none of which are verifiable. His
extant works include 13 concertos, 15 symphonies, three woodwind
quartets, five trio sonatas, 10 violin sonatas, 14 keyboard sonatas,
several Masses, two Magnificats, six Lutheran cantatas, five Passions,
eight secular cantatas, and numerous songs. His music reflects galant
North German styles, while his sonatas and keyboard pieces are firmly
rooted in the Baroque. As a theorist, he published no fewer than nine
works, ranging from composition to proposed German opera (1742), for
which he gained a reputation as a rationalist.
