Un portal on escoltar i gaudir de l'art musical dels segles XVI, XVII, XVIII i XIX. Compartir la bellesa de la música és l'objectiu d'aquest espai i fer-ho donant a conèixer obres de compositors molt o poc coneguts és el mètode.
German organist and composer. The youngest son of a smith, after study
at the Jesuit Gymnasium in Ellwangen, he obtained his only position, the
organist and schoolmaster (later choirmaster and Kantor) at the parish
church of St Maria, which he retained for over 40 years. After the
secularization of the foundation in 1802-03, he remained in his post as
organist and Kapellmeister. As a composer, his works include 24 sonatas
for organ, chamber sonatas, six Requiems, 24 vesper Psalms, six Tantum
ergos, 26 Masses (six published as “simple country Masses” as his Op.
2), six symphonies, three Marian antiphons, and six Misereres. His
music, little studied, is characterized by a studied simplicity and
nearby to Michael Haydn on style terms. He was one of the most
successful composers of sacred music of his time. His music was
distributed throughout Europe, Russia and North America. His sons,
Heinrich Dreyer and Johann Baptiste Dreyer, were also musicians.
German composer. Son of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) and Anna
Magdalena Bach (1701-1760), he was known as the ‘Bückeburg Bach’. He
received his musical education from his father and his cousin Johann
Elias Bach (1705-1755) at the Thomasschule. After leaving the
Thomasschule, he is thought to have studied law briefly, but there is no
record of his matriculation at Leipzig University. In 1750, upon the
death of his father, he was offered a position as harpsichordist with
Count Wilhelm von Schaumberg-Lippe in Bückeburg. In 1759 he was elevated
to concertmaster, a position he retained for the remainder of his life.
He did not travel, save for a visit to his youngest brother, Johann
Christian Bach (1735-1782), in London in 1778, preferring the calm
surroundings of his small town. He was able to create music that was
different from his brothers, thanks both to the intellectual stimulus of
people such as Johann Gottfried Herder and his patron’s penchant for
Italian music. His son, Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Bach (1759-1845), was
trained in this environment, becoming the third direct generation of the
family of Johann Sebastian to pursue a career in music. The arrival in
Bückeburg about 1793 of the Bohemian musician Franz Neubauer presented
Bach with unaccustomed competition in the last years of his life. It
inspired him to write new works (including a dozen large-scale
symphonies and several double concertos) but it also intensified the
latent depression from which he had been suffering since the death of
his half-brother Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788) and which may
have hastened the course of the chest ailment that brought about his
death on 26 January 1795. In his obituary his friend Karl Gottlieb
Horstig, superintendent at Bückeburg from 1793, described him as an
industrious composer, always ready to be of service, and praised his
upright character and ‘kindness of heart’. As a composer, his music,
cataloged by Hansdieter Wolfarth (and using BR numbers), includes eight
oratorios, a Miserere, nine sacred cantatas, 55 secular cantatas, odes,
or other similar works, 79 Lieder, 28 symphonies, 16 piano concertos,
three sinfonia concertantes (titled “concerto grosso” by Bach himself), a
septet, six flute quartets and six string quartets, 13 trio sonatas,
six piano trios, 22 sonatas (for flute, violin, or cello), 43 keyboard
sonatas, and around 92 miscellaneous pieces for the keyboard. He was
known for his ability to imbue drama into his works, particularly the
oratorios, as well as his adherence to sonata principles and a
progressive sense of harmony and orchestral color. Although much of his
music did not survive the Second World War, what is left demonstrates
that he was as innovative in his own way as his siblings. Among the
better known of his pupils, in addition to his son Wilhelm Friedrich
Ernst, were the future Thomaskantor August Eberhard Müller and perhaps
Adolf, Baron von Knigge. For teaching purposes he wrote a number of
pedagogically valuable keyboard works, including the 'Sechs leichte
Clavier-Sonaten', variations, concertos and sonatas for four hands.
Spanish composer. Born in Catalonia, he was trained as a choirboy at the
Cathedral of Sigüenza before moving to Madrid, where by 1707 he worked
as a composer and instructor for the Royal Chapel. After briefly
returning to Sigüenza as maestro de capilla following a competitive
examination (oposición), he was appointed maestro de capilla at the
royal monastery of Las Descalzas Reales in Madrid in 1711, working
alongside organist José de Nebra. In the musicological field, he
participated in the 'Valls controversy', writing a text that defended
Francisco Valls's use of an unprepared dissonance in the Missa Scala
Aretina. His surviving works, which include masses, villancicos, and
pastorelas, are preserved in Spanish archives such as Montserrat, El
Escorial, and the Sanctuary of Arantzazu, with some manuscript copies
dating up to 1751.
Bohemian composer, violinist and teacher. He received his early
schooling in Německý Brod, though his first musical instruction
doubtless came from his father. From 1728 to 1734 he attended the Jesuit
Gymnasium in Jihlava; the Jesuits of Bohemia, whose pupils included the
foremost musicians in Europe, maintained high standards of musical
education during this period. Stamitz is known to have spent the
following academic year, 1734-35, at Prague University. His activities
during the next six years, however, remain a mystery. It seems logical
to assume that his decision to leave the university was prompted by a
desire to establish himself as a violin virtuoso, a goal that could be
pursued in Prague, Vienna or countless other centres. The precise
circumstances surrounding Stamitz’s engagement by the Mannheim court are
unclear. The date of his appointment was probably 1741, for he remarked
in a letter of 29 February 1748 to Baron von Wallbrunn in Stuttgart
that he was in his eighth year of service to the elector. The most
likely hypothesis is perhaps that Stamitz’s engagement resulted from
contacts made late in 1741 during the Bohemian campaign and coronation
in Prague of the Bavarian Elector Carl Albert (later Carl VII), one of
whose closest allies was the Elector Palatine. In January 1742 Stamitz
no doubt performed at Mannheim as part of the festivities surrounding
the marriage of Carl Theodor. At Mannheim Stamitz advanced rapidly: in
1743, when he was first violinist at the court, he was granted an
increase in salary of 200 gulden; in payment lists from 1744 and 1745
his salary is given as 900 gulden, the highest of any instrumentalist at
Mannheim; in 1745 or early 1746 he was awarded the title of
Konzertmeister; and in 1750 he was appointed to the newly created post
of director of instrumental music.
The latter promotion came almost two years after the offer of a position
at the court of Duke Carl Eugen in Stuttgart with an annual salary of
1500 gulden, an offer that the Elector Palatine probably saw fit to
match, as Stamitz remained in Mannheim. In court almanacs for 1751 and
1752 Stamitz is also listed as one of the two Kapellmeisters, but after
the arrival of Ignaz Holzbauer in 1753 he appears as director of
instrumental music alone. Stamitz’s principal responsibilities at court
were the composition and performance of orchestral and chamber music,
although he seems also to have composed some sacred music for the court
chapel. As leader of the band and conductor Stamitz developed the
Mannheim orchestra into the most renowned ensemble of the time, famous
for its precision and its ability to render novel dynamic effects.
Stamitz was also influential as a teacher; in addition to his sons Carl
and Anton, he taught such outstanding violinists and composers as
Christian Cannabich, the Toeschi brothers, Ignaz Fränzl and Wilhelm
Cramer. In 1744 Stamitz married Maria Antonia Lüneborn. They had five
children: the composers Carl and Anton, a daughter Maria Francisca
(1746-1799) and two children who died in infancy. In 1749 Stamitz and
his wife journeyed to Německý Brod to attend the installation of
Stamitz’s younger brother Antonín Tadeáš as dean of the Dean’s church.
In February 1750, while the family was still in Bohemia, Stamitz’s
brother Václav Jan or Wenzel Johann (1724-after 1771), also a musician,
was in Mannheim. Johann Stamitz returned to Mannheim in March 1750, but
his wife remained temporarily in Německý Brod, where Anton Stamitz was
born on 27 November 1750. Probably in late summer 1754 Stamitz undertook
a year-long journey to Paris, appearing there for the first time at the
Concert Spirituel on 8 September 1754. He presumably returned to
Mannheim in autumn 1755, dying there less than two years later at the
age of 39.
German organist and composer. He first learnt music with his grandfather
Johann Michael Agthe, Kantor at the Rathsschule, and his great-uncle
Andreas Agthe, a local organist; he later continued his musical studies
as a choirboy and as a member of the local Stadtpfeiferei. From 1776 to
1782 he was director of music with the Hündelberg theatrical company in
Reval (now Tallinn), where he composed his first Singspiele 'Martin
Velten' (1778). He then moved to Ballenstedt to join the court orchestra
of Prince Friedrich Albrecht of Anhalt-Bernburg as an organist and
harpsichordist. There he became known as one of the best organists of
his time and, after further studies with Friedrich Wilhelm Rust, as an
active composer of Singspiele, songs and instrumental pieces. His
best-known work is a setting of August Friedrich Ferdinand von
Kotzebue’s 'Der Spiegelritter' (1795), which was first performed by an
amateur society in Ballenstedt and several times revived. He also left
11 symphonies, two concertos, and 14 Dances. His son Albrecht Wilhelm
Johann Agthe (1790-1873) was a pianist, teacher and composer.
