Gustav Jacobsthal

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Gustav Jacobsthal

Gustav Jacobsthal (born March 14, 1845 in Pyritz , † November 9, 1912 in Berlin ) was a German musicologist , university professor , choir director and composer . He was one of the music historians who scientifically researched the music of the Middle Ages at the end of the 19th century and made it accessible again.

Life

Jacobsthal came from a Pomeranian Jewish family, attended the Marienstiftsgymnasium in Stettin until he graduated from high school and was given preferential training there by the grammar school teachers Carl Loewe in music and Hermann Grassmann in mathematics. From 1863 to 1870 he studied music, history and philosophy in Berlin at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität and privately. a. Composition and choir direction with Heinrich Bellermann and Eduard Grell , the then director of the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin , as well as piano with Carl Tausig . Under the influence of the Berlin Vocal School, he initially regarded the vocal polyphony of the 16th century as the absolute climax of music history, but then also researched its medieval prehistory and its baroque and classical-romantic post-history in the field of opera and instrumental music. 1870 Jacobsthal was with a thesis on the mensural the 12th and 13th century doctorate . He supplemented his historical research methods (palaeography, chronology, diplomatics) learned from Philipp Jaffé in 1871/72 at the Institute for Austrian Historical Research in Vienna with Theodor von Sickel . Here he also wrote an exemplary work on the music theory of Hermann von Reichenau based on the Viennese manuscripts that he submitted in Strasbourg as a habilitation thesis. In Vienna he also made a formative friendship with the German scholar Wilhelm Scherer .

In 1872 he was at the newly founded Kaiser Wilhelm University of Strasbourg habilitation and taught there first as a lecturer in history and theory of music, in 1875 as an associate , from 1897, is the only full professor of musicology in the German Reich . At that time, an ordinariate was an extremely rare position for a scholar who had given in to the pressure to assimilate the Christian-German majority culture, but never left the synagogue. He founded and directed the Academic Choral Society at the university as a training institute for singing and music education until 1898, and at times he was also the director of the town. Of the choral society in Strasbourg. In 1905 Jacobsthal retired early due to overwork . His students included u. a. Albert Schweitzer , Peter Wagner and Friedrich Ludwig . Traces of Jacobsthal's Bach seminars can be seen in Schweitzer's Bach book. Wagner was Jacobsthal's only doctoral student and worked with him on the secular madrigals of Palestrina. Since the Strasbourg chair for musicology had been abolished after Jacosbthal's retirement (or relocated to Berlin), Ludwig initially represented musicology in Strasbourg as a private lecturer after 1905. Wagner and Ludwig went their own way, sometimes with questionable appeal to the authority of their teacher, which were incompatible with Jacobsthal's ethos of science.

Jacobsthal, who was unable to recover from the consequences of a bacterial infection and his overexertion even after retiring and died in Berlin in 1912, is buried in the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Weissensee.

The estate is in the music department of the Berlin State Library and contains extensive lecture and study material that has been cataloged since 2000. Register: A: book manuscripts; B: Lecture sketches (early Middle Ages to Beethoven); C: Studies and notes, collations and commentaries on medieval treatises; D: Copies, transcriptions and annotations of medieval codices; E: annotated editions of the Micrologus Guidonis and the Coussemaker Scriptores; Q: letters.

plant

Jacobsthal pursued a unity of historical research, music theory and composition. In addition to his oral teaching in Strasbourg, his music-historical work includes only a few works that have arisen in long preparation. So he gave the Latin and old French texts with the help of the Romance friends motets Code Montpellier H196 out completely. His planned main work, the musical analysis of this codex as an example of the vocal leading methods in early polyphony, remained a torso and could only be published as a fragment in 2010. In his work, The Chromatic Alteration in the Liturgical Chant of the Western Church (1897), which prepares the analysis of polyphony , he was able to solve some hitherto unsolved problems of melody formation in chorale, including the deciphering of the horseshoe-shaped tone scales from the medieval enchiridion. Another preparatory work on the secular monody of the Trobadors and Trouvères , which he wanted to give as part of a commission to write the chapter on the music of the novels for Gröber's Encyclopedia of Romance Philology, also remained a fragment and could only be published in part in 2003. But also on the vocal polyphony of the 16th century (Palestrina's secular madrigals), on opera history (both Monteverdi's L'Orfeo and Mozart's childhood operas and Idomeneo) and on instrumental music (Haydn's, Mozart and Beethoven's string quartets; Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's Württemberg sonatas) Analyzes that cross the zeitgeist and were published in 2010 from his estate in the music department of the Berlin State Library. Jacobsthal worked for the Allgemeine Musical Zeitung (AmZ) from 1871 to 1874 and was a reviewer for the Deutsche Literaturzeitung (DLZ) and for the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB) in the eighties . In terms of the theory of science, Jacobsthal was an empiricist and skeptic and protested against hasty generalizations. He methodically defended the historical validity of several variants in the face of a diverse tradition and criticized the subjectivist avant-gardism of the new German school.

Jacobsthal's compositional oeuvre mainly comprises choral works in the epigone style of the Berlin Vocal School, composed on the occasion of academic occasions, but also a string quartet and several piano songs (including Goethe's Harpner- und Mignon-Lieder).

Publications

  • The mensural notation of the 12th and 13th centuries , dissertation, Berlin 1871.
  • The beginnings of polyphonic singing in the Middle Ages . In: Allgemeine Musikzeitung Volume VIII (1873), p. 625 ff.
  • About the musical education of the master singers . In: Journal for German Antiquity and German Literature Volume XX (1876), p. 69 ff.
  • The texts of the song manuscript of Montpellier H 196 . Diplomatic reprint in: Journal for Romance Philology Volume III (1879), p. 526 ff. And Volume IV (1880), p. 278 ff.
  • The chromatic alteration in the liturgical chant of the Western Church . Berlin 1897.

Posthumously:

  • “The composer's most intimate intentions are obscured by all sorts of secondary considerations” . Fragments from a Mozart lecture (Strasbourg in the summer of 1888), from the handwritten estate, ed. by Peter Sühring, in: Idomeneo program of the Salzburg Festival and the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, June 2000, pp. 70–72.
  • The music theory of Hermann von Reichenau , edited with a preliminary remark by Peter Sühring . In: Musiktheorie 16 (2001), pp. 3–39.
  • Preliminary thoughts on improving the musical conditions at the Prussian universities . Memorandum to the Prussian Ministry of Culture in 1883, as well as the reports by Heinrich Bellermann and Philipp Spitta, with a preliminary remark, published by Peter Sühring. In: Yearbook of the State Institute for Music Research , Stuttgart 2002, pp. 295–322. Also online, together with a commentary on ideas and music education: [1] , accessed on April 6, 2020.
  • Transitions and detours in music history , Strasbourg lectures and studies: Codex Montpellier - Palestrina - Monteverdi - Emanuel Bach - Haydn - Mozart. , edited by Peter Sühring, Olms-Verlag, Hildesheim 2010. Review.
  • The Codex Montpellier. Description and investigation , edited by Peter Sühring, only online: [2] or [3] , accessed on April 16, 2019.
  • The operas from Mozart's childhood. Lecture sketches , Strasbourg 1888 , edited by Peter Sühring, online only: [4] , accessed on August 15, 2019.

literature

  • E. Krüger, review. The mensural notation, in: Göttingische learned advertisements 44, 1871, 1729–1735 u. AmZ 6 (1871), col. 826-829.
  • W. Scherer, Der Sophokleische Aias mit Bellermann's Musik, in: AmZ 9 (1874), Sp. 210-212 u. 225-227.
  • H. Riemann, Die Tetrachorden-Mutation Hucbald's, in: Musikalisches Wochenblatt 28 (1897), Hefte 44-47, S. 589f., 605f., 617f. and 683f.
  • H. Gaisser, Les altérations chromatiques dans le plaint-chant, in: Revue bénédictine 14 (1897), pp. 511-524, 554-564 u. 15 (1898), pp. 35-43.
  • P. Bohn, review. The chromatic alteration, in: Monatshefte für Musikgeschichte 30 (1898), p. 40f.
  • J. Combarieu, La musique au Moyen-âge, in: Revue de synthese 1 (1900), pp. 84-110.
  • Funeral service for Gustav Jacobsthal (documentation of the speeches by E. Schmidt, Friedl Born and F. Ludwig) Berlin 1912.
  • F. Ludwig, Gustav Jacobsthal, in: Journal of the International Music Society 14 (1912), pp. 67–70.
  • F. Ludwig, The older musical works of the library founded by Gustav Jacobsthal of the "Academic Singing Association" Strasbourg, Strasbourg 1913.
  • FX Mathias, memories of Prof. Dr. Gustav Jacobsthal, in: Caecilienvereinsorgan 48 (1913), pp. 23-26.
  • J. Wolf, transfer of the hs. Estate of Professor d. Musicology Gustav Jacobsthal, in: Zbl. for Libraries 33 (1916), p. 382.
  • U. Bomm, The change of the modality determinations in the tradition of the mass chants in the 9th to 13th centuries and its influence on the tradition of their melodies, Göttingen 1928.
  • F. Gennrich, The Strasbourg School of Musicology. An experiment or a guide? Suggestions for clarifying fundamental questions, Würzburg 1940.
  • H. Besseler, Art. Jacobsthal, Gustav, in: MGG1, vol. 6, Kassel 1957, col. 1615-1619.
  • Fr. K. Praßl, Chromatic Changes in Choral Melodies in Theory and Practice, in: Contributions to Gregorian chant 13/14, Cantando praedicare, ed. by Stefan Klockner, Regensburg 1992, pp. 157–168.
  • P. Sühring, The Unraveled Middle Ages. Gustav Jacobsthal and his fates, in: Concerto 17 (2000), Issue 152, pp. 16–22.
  • J. Haines, Généalogies musicologiques aux origines d'une science de la musique vers 1900, in: Acta musicologica 73 (2001), pp. 21-44.
  • P. Sühring, Participate and Resist. On the unsuccessful double strategy of Friedrich Gennrich in 1940, in: I. v. FOERSTER, CHR. HUST, CH.-H. MAHLING (ed.), Music Research Fascism National Socialism, Mainz 2001, pp. 405–414.
  • P. Sühring, The single expression with its force. A Beethoven criticism by Gustav Jacobsthal from 1889, in: Musikforschung 55 (2002), pp. 373–385. Online: [5] , accessed February 25, 2020.
  • A. Kreutziger-Herr, A dream from the Middle Ages. Rediscovery of medieval music in modern times, Cologne 2003.
  • P. Sühring, The Rhythm of the Trobadors. On the archeology of a history of interpretation, Berlin 2003.
  • P. Sühring, Realization of Humboldt's ideal of education. Gustav Jacobsthal - an almost forgotten founder of modern German musicology, in: Forum Humanwissenschaften, Frankfurter Rundschau No. 116, May 20, 2003, p. 11.
  • P. Sühring, article Jacobsthal, Gustav, in: MGG2, Person Teil, Vol. 9, Kassel 2003, Col. 815-817.
  • P. Sühring, Gustav Jacobsthal as a critic of the modal theory avant la lettre. Results of archival studies, in: Acta Musicologica 75 (2003), pp. 137–172.
  • AM Busse Berger, Medieval music and the art of memory, Berkeley 2005.
  • P. Sühring, Mozart's earliest operas. Studies following Jacobsthal's Strasbourg lectures, Kassel 2006.
  • P. Sühring, Gustav Jacobsthal's Mozart Reception, in: Min-Ad, Israel Studies in Musicology, 2006 / II. Mozart in Context: Special issue of Min-Ad: Israel Studies in Musicology Online, Vol. 6 / II, December, 2006, accessed on September 24, 2014 . And: Collection of literature on music from the electronic documents of the Frankfurt / Main University Library, accessed on September 24, 2014 .
  • P. Sühring, The Nachlass Gustav Jacobsthal - a Zimelium in the music department of the Berlin State Library. A tour, in: FORUM MUSIKBIBLIOTHEK 2007/1, pp. 17–27.
  • P. Sühring, First attempt to understand the historical instruments in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo. Gustav Jacobsthal, Strasbourg 1903, in: CONCERTO No. 219, April / May 2008, pp. 24-27. Online: Collection of literature on music from the electronic documents of the Frankfurt / Main University Library, accessed on September 24, 2014 .
  • P. Sühring, Jacobsthal's position in Mozart research in the 19th century, in: Mozarts Welt und Nachwelt (Vol. 5 of the Mozart Handbook), ed. v. G. GRUBER and CM KNISPEL, Laaber 2009, pp. 545-552.
  • O. Huck, Tonkunst und Tonwissenschaft. Musicology between the Conservatory and the University, in: Concert and Competition. The arts and their sciences in the 19th century, ed. by Christian Scholl, Sandra Richter and Oliver Huck, Göttingen 2010, pp. 3–57.
  • P. Sühring, “Lupe und Ohr”. The scientific culture established by Gustav Jacobsthal at the Strasbourg Institute from 1872 to 1905 and its hidden precursor role for historicizing performances of older music, in Basler Jahrbuch für Historische Musikpraxis 2008, Winterthur 2010, pp. 133–144.
  • P. Sühring, Arithmetic and Sensing - Rationality and Fantasy in Music Analysis. About some of Hermann Graßmann's mathematical-physical elements in Gustav Jacobsthal's methodology, in: MusikTheorie 26 (2011), pp. 235–244; in English: Calculation and emotion - rationality and imagination in music analysis. Hermann Graßmann and the mathematics of Gustav Jacobsthal's musicology, in: Hermann Grassman - From Past to Future: Grassmann's Work in Context, Grassman Bicentennial Conference Potsdam / Szczecin September 2009, Basel 2010, pp. 391-400.
  • P. Sühring, On the bondage of instruments. Eduard Grell and Gustav Jacobsthal, in: JSIMPK 2011, Mainz 2011, pp. 105–124.
  • P. Sühring, music as a university subject - technical and scientific. Gustav Jacobsthal's conception of the subject of music in his memorandum from 1883, in: Die Musikforschung 65 (2012), pp. 231-253. Together with Jacobsthal's memorandum and the reports by Heinrich Bellermann and Philipp Spitta also online: [6] , accessed on April 6, 2020.
  • P. Sühring, "Teacher, helper and well-meaning friend". The working relationship and friendship between the Germanist Wilhelm Scherer and the musicologist Gustav Jacobsthal between 1872 and 1886, in: Geschichte der Germanistik, Bd. 41/42, Göttingen 2012, pp. 87-101.
  • P. Sühring, Gustav Jacobsthal - a musicologist in the German Empire. Music in the midst of nature, history and language. A biography of the history of culture and ideas with letters and documents, Olms 2012, ISBN 978-3-487-14712-3 . review
  • P. Sühring, Gustav Jacobsthal. Happiness and misery of a music researcher, Berlin 2014 (Jewish miniatures, 149) ISBN 978-3-95565-042-1 . review
  • P. Sühring, The Power of Refrains in the Codex Montpellier. Hidden Franco-German lines of interpretation between Jacobsthal and Rokseth. With a letter from Heinrich Besseler from 1934, in: Die Musikforschung 72 (2019), pp. 38–52.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Transitions and detours in music history - table of contents , German National Library, accessed on September 10, 2014
  2. ↑ Dietmar Schenk on info-netz-musik on July 5, 2012; accessed on January 11, 2015
  3. ↑ Musikologist - Table of Contents , German National Library, accessed on September 17, 2014
  4. ↑ Ingeborg Allihn on info-netz-musik on May 2, 2013; accessed on January 11, 2015
  5. ↑ Jascha Nemtsov on info-netz-musik , January 11, 2015; accessed on January 11, 2015
personal data
SURNAME Jacobsthal, Gustav
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German musicologist , composer and university lecturer
DATE OF BIRTH March 14, 1845
PLACE OF BIRTH Pyritz
DATE OF DEATH November 9, 1912
Place of death Berlin