Badische Staatskapelle Karlsruhe

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The Badische Staatskapelle Karlsruhe is the concert and opera orchestra of the Badisches Staatstheater in Karlsruhe .

history

Beginnings

The origins of the orchestra go back to a court orchestra of the margraves of Baden-Durlach mentioned in 1662 .

From 1712 to 1718 the Venetian Giuseppe Beniventi was court conductor in Durlach. His successor, who became the first court conductor there after moving to Karlsruhe, was Johann Philipp Käfer (1672–1726), who was dismissed in 1722 because of quarrels about his salary. His successor was Johann Melchior Molter (1669–1765), who had been a member of the band as a violinist since 1717. In order to promote Molter, the margrave financed a two-year study trip to Italy, where he stayed from 1719 to 1721 and was with Alessandro Scarlatti , among others . As court conductor, Molter wrote numerous compositions, almost all of which have been preserved in the autograph in the Karlsruhe library to this day. In Molter's time, the composer Sebastian Bodinus (~ 1700–1759) was a member of the court orchestra.

In 1733 the court orchestra was closed because the margrave moved to his court in Basel because of the War of the Polish Succession . All musicians including the conductor were dismissed. After Molter initially found a job in Eisenach , he applied again in Karlsruhe and was again Kapellmeister of the newly formed court orchestra in 1743. He held this position until his death in 1765. Many of his compositions for smaller ensembles date from this time, as the court orchestra consisted of only a few musicians for financial reasons, including the flutist, oboist and clarinetist Johann Reusch, the trumpeter Friedrich Pfeifer and the viol virtuoso Johann Gottlieb Bendorf, Molter's son-in-law.

After 1750

Molter's successor as court conductor was Giacinto Sciatti from Ferrara in 1765 . After the court chapel there was dissolved in 1771 due to the extinction of the margraves of Baden-Baden with the residence in Rastatt, its members were taken over into the Karlsruhe chapel together with their conductor Joseph Aloys Schmittbaur (1718–1809). During this time, Margravine Karoline Luise was a member of the band as a harpsichordist. The orchestra was particularly encouraged during the reign of Margrave Karl Friedrich and Margravine and patroness Karoline Luise.

Schmittbaur, who did not want to work under the direction of Sciatti, went to Cologne in 1775 to take over the management of the Badische Hofkapelle after Sciatti's death in 1777. Under his direction were among others the composer Friedrich Schwindl (1737–1786) and the Mozart student Christian Franz Danner (1757–1813) Kapellmeister of the court orchestra.

After the Margraviate of Baden was elevated to the status of a Grand Duchy , the orchestra was incorporated into the newly founded Grand Ducal State Theater in Karlsruhe in 1808 under the name of the Grand Ducal Badische Hofkapelle and became the leading orchestra in the state. Since Bruchsal also came under his rule, the prince-bishop's chapel of Bruchsal was incorporated into the Karlsruhe court chapel in 1805. From there, the violinist and composer of operas, church and chamber music and songs, Johann Evangelist Brandl (1760–1837) came to Karlsruhe and was initially together with Danner, later sole director of the court orchestra.

In 1812 Franz Danzi (1763–1826) became court conductor. Well-known members of this period were the concertmaster and composer Friedrich Ernst Fesca (1789–1826). Danzi's successor was the Moravian violinist Joseph Strauss (1793–1866), a student of Johann Georg Albrechtsberger . Operas, symphonies, chamber music and songs also come from Strauss, who led the court orchestra until 1863. During his time, the court orchestra experienced numerous artistic highlights, such as the performance of works by Weber , Meyerbeer and, above all, the three Wagner operas Tannhauser , Lohengrin and The Flying Dutchman together with the artistic director Eduard Devrient . Kapellmeister from 1826 to 1840 was the Bohemian composer violin virtuoso Franz Pecháček (1793–1840).

Since 1850

In 1853 Franz Liszt conducted Beethoven's 9th Symphony in Karlsruhe, in 1863 Richard Wagner conducted the Badische Staatskapelle and conducted his own works.

A year later, namely in 1864, Hermann Levi became court conductor in Karlsruhe together with the music director Wilhelm Kalliwoda, who had been active since 1853 . Levi was a close confidante of Richard Wagner and later directed the world premiere of Parsifal . Levi moved to Munich in 1872. After an interim with the conductor Max Zenger , who led the court orchestra for a year together with Kalliwoda, Felix Otto Dessoff took over the chapel in 1875 . In 1876 the 1st Symphony by Johannes Brahms was premiered by the court orchestra under the direction of Dessoff. Josef Ruzek (1834–1891), who became known as a composer of male choirs, was second Kapellmeister in Dessoff's era.

Dessoff's successor was Felix Mottl , who, as a Wagnerian, particularly cultivated the work of his master and thus earned the court theater the reputation of " Klein-Bayreuth ". During this time about a third of the Karlsruhe musicians played regularly in the festival orchestra of the Bayreuth Festival . He also performed works by Bruckner , Chabrier , Cornelius and Liszt. Berlioz's opera Les Troyens (The Trojans) premiered in Karlsruhe in December 1890 under Mottl's direction . In 1913 Richard Strauss conducted his own operas and orchestral works in Karlsruhe.

In 1926, at the age of 24 , the Austrian conductor Josef Krips became Mottl's successor, making him the youngest general music director in Germany. Karl Böhm , Otto Klemperer , George Szell and others had also contended for the post in Karlsruhe . a. applied, obviously this position in Karlsruhe was very popular in the 1920s. Krips continued the Wagner and Bruckner tradition of his predecessor, but also played many contemporary works by Béla Bartók , Paul Hindemith and Hans Pfitzner . Works and operas by Richard Strauss , who repeatedly performed his own works as a guest conductor in Karlsruhe in the 1920s, were also played often .

In 1933, Krips returned to Vienna for political reasons and because of hostility from the National Socialists (one parent was Jewish), where he was banned from performing by the National Socialists between 1938 and 1945. After 1945 he played a key role in the reorganization of the Vienna State Opera .

In 1933 the orchestra was given its current name and has since played under the direction of important guest conductors such as Werner Egk , Wolfgang Fortner and Michael Tippett . From 1935 to 1940, Joseph Keilberth , born in Karlsruhe, was GMD , who later headed the Saxon State Opera in Dresden and the Bavarian State Opera in Munich . After the Badische Staatsoper and the Badisches Staatstheater were destroyed in the war in 1944, the Staatskapelle had its provisional venue in the Karlsruhe Concert Hall from 1945/46 until the new building opened in 1975 .

In 1975 the new building of the Badisches Staatstheater was inaugurated with the performance of Beethoven's 9th Symphony. At the same time, a new concept of festival culture was introduced. The Handel Festival has been taking place in Karlsruhe since 1978, and the European Culture Days since 1983 . In 1989 Günter Neuhold became the new GMD. In the following years the Staatskapelle made CD recordings under Neuhold. E.g. the 1st symphony by Johannes Brahms in the original version, which was premiered in Karlsruhe in 1876 , the 1st symphony by Gustav Mahler (also in the rarely played original 5-movement version), Le Sacre du Printemps by Igor Stravinsky and one of the music critics was very positive recorded complete recording of the opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen by Richard Wagner . His successor Kazushi Ōno (GMD from 1996 to 2002) made CD recordings of rarely performed works by Masataka Matsuo , Sofia Gubaidulina and Wolfgang Rihm .

From 2002 to 2008 the British conductor Anthony Bramall held the office of GMD, who also recorded excerpts from Richard Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung on a double CD. After working in Glasgow as Kapellmeister of the Scottish Opera , Justin Brown has been GMD since 2008 , who also performs in a double function as concert pianist and conductor with the Staatskapelle, on November 29, 2010 with the Jazz Suite No. 1 , the concerto for piano , Trumpet and string orchestra and the 10th symphony by Dmitri Shostakovich .

In 2012 the Badische Staatskapelle celebrated its 350th anniversary. In the anniversary year, a highly acclaimed CD recording of Mahler's 9th Symphony, conducted by Justin Brown, was released. An extensive anniversary publication should appear in October 2012, although it has not yet been published (July 2014).

Head since 1904

Since 1935 the chief conductor is no longer the court conductor , but the general music director of the Badisches Staatstheater .

literature

  • Joachim Draheim: Karlsruhe Music History . Ed .: Friedrich Georg Hoepfner. Info-Verlag, Karlsruhe 2004, ISBN 3-88190-357-7 .
  • Joachim Draheim, Kathrin Ellwardt: Badische Staatskapelle. From one of the oldest orchestras in the world (=  Lindemanns Bibliothek . No. 156 ). Info-Verlag, Karlsruhe 2012, ISBN 978-3-88190-674-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Friedrich von Weech : Karlsruhe: History of the city and its administration. 1904, pp. 457f , accessed December 30, 2016 .