Carl Bergmann (conductor)

Carl Bergmann

Carl Bergmann (born April 12, 1821 in Ebersbach bei Döbeln , † August 10, 1876 in New York City ) was a German-American cellist and conductor .

Life

Bergmann began studying with Adolph Zimmermann in Zittau in 1827 and later studied with the organist and composer Adolph Hesse in Breslau . In 1842 he can be traced back to Breslau as a cellist as well as a conductor. In the following years Bergmann also conducted orchestras in Vienna , Budapest , Warsaw and Venice .

Due to his involvement in the Vienna Revolution of 1848, Bergmann came to the United States in 1850 as the first cellist of the Germania Orchestra . The Germania Orchestra was a group of young German musicians, mostly refugees ( Forty-Eighters ). When the conductor of this orchestra resigned in the same year, Bergmann took over his post. The Germania Orchestra then settled in Boston before disbanding in 1854. In the course of its history, the orchestra has given 800 concerts, often together with the Handel and Haydn Society , the largest and most important choir in Boston . The high point was the Boston premiere of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony on February 5, 1853. The concert was so successful that it had to be repeated on April 2.

After that, Bergmann went to Chicago and was immediately asked to head the Chicago Philharmonic Society . However, after only giving two concerts, he left the orchestra because the Chicago musicians intrigued against him.

In 1854 he went to New York City to lead the Arion men's choir, a choir of men of German origin. When Theodore Eisfeld , conductor of the New York Philharmonic Society , fell ill shortly before the last concert of the 1854/55 season, Bergmann replaced him and conducted the concert on April 21, 1855, in which he performed Richard Wagner's Tannhauser overture . This concert was so successful that Bergmann became the sole conductor for the 1855/56 season. In 1859 he conducted the American premiere of Tannhäuser at the Bowery Amphitheater, which was also the first performance of a Wagner opera in America.

He also played the cello in a renowned piano quintet, which included Theodore Thomas on first violin and William Mason on piano. In addition to the Philharmonic, he also led a choral group, the New York Harmonic Society, which later renamed itself the Mendelssohn Union. Bergmann organized and directed a German music festival held in the Winter Garden Theater in 1855, and in 1856 he established German opera in Niblo's Garden, a theater on Broadway . He conducted both an Italian and a German opera in New York.

Eisfeld returned to the New York Philharmonie Society in 1856/57 and 1857/58, but Bergmann returned to the podium the next season, sharing the podium with Eisfeld from 1859 to 1865. Eisfeld returned to Europe in 1865, and Bergmann led the orchestra alone until his death.

Bergmann's life and career stalled from 1870 onwards as he suffered from alcoholism . Since 1864 there was also a competing orchestra conducted by Theodore Thomas. The stock market crash of 1873 exacerbated the Philharmonic's financial problems. In 1876 the board of directors of the Philharmonic called for his resignation, and his wife died.

Theodore Thomas describes Bergmann in his autobiography as "a talented musician and a fair cello player" and criticizes him as follows:

"He gave the impression that he never worked much, or cared to do so. He lacked most of the qualities of a first-rank conductor, but he had one great redeeming quality for those days which soon brought him into prominence. He possessed an artistic nature, and was in sympathy with the so-called " Zukunft Musik ". "(" He gave the impression that he never worked or tried to do much. He lacked most of the qualities of a conductor first class, but he had a great quality of redemption for those days, which soon moved him to the fore. He had an artistic nature and sympathized with the so-called "music of the future". ")

The journalist and music critic George P. Upton (1834-1919) wrote: “With all his ability and his scholarship, however, Bergmann was not an industrious worker, nor was he regardful of his duties. If his associates took the initiative in such periods of neglect, it angered him. At last he gave himself up to an indolent, pleasure-loving manner of life, and this alienated many of his musical associates. Near the end of his career he became very despondent. Friends abandoned him, and he died at last in a New York hospital in 1876, almost alone and forgotten. But he was a great musician, and greatly advanced the cause of music in his earlier and happier days. ”(“ Despite all his skill and learning, Bergmann was not a hard worker and did not pay attention to his duties. When his colleagues in such phases of neglect Taking the initiative, it annoyed him. Eventually he indulged in a sluggish, pleasure-seeking lifestyle that alienated many of his musical collaborators. Towards the end of his career he became very discouraged. Friends left him and he eventually died in a New York hospital in 1876 , almost alone and forgotten. But in his earlier and happier days he was a great musician and was a great force in the cause of music. ")

literature

• Charles C. Perkins & John S. Dwight, History of the Handel and Haydn Society, of Boston, Massachusetts , 2 volumes, Boston, 1883–1893 ( digitized version )
• Theodore Thomas, A Musical Autobiography , Chicago 1905, Volume 1 ( digitized )
• George P. Upton, Musical Memories: My Recollections of Celebrities of the Half Century: 1850–1900 , Chicago 1908 ( digitized )
• Hugo Riemanns Musik-Lexikon , 10th edition, edited by Alfred Einstein , Berlin 1922, p. 112
• Carl Wittke, Refugees Of Revolution: The German Forty-Eighters In America , University of Pennsylvania Press, 1952
• H. Earle Johnson, Hallelujah Amen! The Story of the Handel and Haydn Society , Boston: Bruce Humphries, 1965

Individual evidence

1. ^ Perkins & Dwight (1883), pp. 157f. ( Digitized version )
2. ↑ Thomas (1905), p. 36 ( digitized version )
3. ↑ Upton (1908), p. 55 ( digitized version )