Franziska Romana Koch

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Franziska Romana Koch as a milkmaid. Engraving from Liebe after G. Kraus (1778)

Franziska Romana Koch , née Gieraneck , Giwraneck , Giraneck or Jiránek , (* 1748 in Dresden ; † 1796 there ) was a German opera singer (soprano), dancer and actress.

Life

Koch, daughter of the composer Antonín Jiránek , made her debut as a dancer in 1765 in the company of Heinrich Gottfried Koch . She married the ballet master Friedrich Karl Koch in 1766 and turned to drama and operetta from 1769 . She and her husband went to Weimar in 1771 , where she received singing lessons from Anton Schweitzer and was engaged at the court theater . In Weimar Schweitzer composed his opera Alceste for Koch . The libretto was written by Christoph Martin Wieland . The portrayal of the Alceste by Koch at the first performance of the play on February 16, 1773, impressed Wieland so much that he celebrated it in his poem To Madam Koch . Duchess Anna Amalia , who was hostile to Koch, disapproved of the opera and subsequently forbade Wieland to continue lyrical work.

After a theater fire in Weimar and the subsequent closure of the theater in 1774, Koch went to Gotha in 1775 , where she was engaged at the newly founded Hofbühne . In Gotha, Koch played “the entire subject of the first roles in opera and the first lovers in drama” and the composer Georg Anton Benda wrote his opera Romeo and Julie for her in 1776 . In 1777 Koch left Gotha and became a member of the Bondini Society in Leipzig , where she was active as a singer until 1782 and as an actress until she left the stage in 1787.

Koch was praised by contemporaries for her “wonderful figure, a voice that is as full as it is melodious and extraordinary grace”. The gallery of German actors also highlighted their “advantageous education” and “engaging expression”.

Koch's sister Karoline Krüger (1753–1831) was also an actress, through whose marriage to Karl Friedrich Krüger she was his sister-in-law. Koch's daughter Sofie Friederike Krickeberg (1770–1842), married to actor Karl Ludwig Krickeberg († 1818), was a successful actress and writer. Two other daughters, Sophie Koch (* 1781) and Marianne Koch (* 1783), also became actresses. Her niece was the actress Anna Feodorowna Krüger (1792-1814), who died early .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Kneschke names Leipzig as the place of death. Cf. Emil Kneschke: On the history of theater and music in Leipzig . Friedrich Fleischer, Leipzig 1864, p. 56.
  2. Robert Eitner: Giranek, Anton , in: Biographical-bibliographical source lexicon of musicians and music scholars . 4th volume. Leipzig 1901, p. 266 ( digitized version )
  3. ^ Joseph Kürschner:  Koch, Franziska Romana . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 16, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1882, p. 375 f.
  4. Ulrike Leuschner (Ed.): Johann Heinrich Merck - Correspondence . Volume 2. Wallstein, 2007, p. 295.
  5. ADB, p. 375.
  6. ADB, p. 358.
  7. Philipp Stein: German actors: 1. The XVIII. Century . Society for Theater History, Berlin 1907, p. 11.