Jacob Schmitt (composer)

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Jacob Schmitt , also Jaques or Jacques (born November 2, 1803 in Obernburg near Aschaffenburg , † June 1853 in Hamburg ) was a German composer and piano teacher who worked in Hamburg.

Life

Jacob Schmitt is the youngest of seven children of Franz Bartholomäus Schmitt and Anna Maria Scheller; his oldest brother is the composer Aloys Schmitt . His father is already an ambitious musician who is improving his teaching salary as organist in the parish church of St. Peter and Paul. He promotes his sons musically, gives them their first lessons and ensures that they are accepted in the house of the music publisher Johann Anton André in Offenbach . There Schmitt was tutored by André and his brother Aloys and in 1814 he made his first appearances as a piano accompanist. In the public eye at this time he is usually the little brother of the already known Aloys, with whom he has a close relationship.

Schmitt's journey into the world of the independent music business begins around 1823. This becomes clear through an exchange of letters that he has with his former sponsor André. In it, Schmitt first asks for the financing of a new grand piano in return for the rights to further compositions; after this request was refused, Schmitt asks at least for the inclusion of new works in Andrés Verlag and for support with a planned concert tour. He realizes that as a freelance artist he is no longer dealing with a patron, but with an entrepreneur and cooperation partner. At this time, Schmitt stayed in Mannheim for a long time , where he taught the pianist Jakob Rosenhain .

Schmitt went on a concert tour to Hamburg for the first time in 1825. There he was welcomed by the critics and settled in the city; public records name the years 1828/29, although contemporary sources speak of 1825. In 1827 Schmitt married the daughter of a businessman, Henrica Worms, in Obernburg. The Schmitt family's first place of residence in Hamburg is near the Altonaer Tor , subsequently Schmitt tries to make himself popular with the Hamburg public, for example with his first composition Les charmes de Hambourg, which was published there . For a short time he also heads an orchestral society, the Apollo Society ; However, he gives up this office after a few years. His teaching activities, which he accompanies with various teaching books for piano, are more successful. His students include Diederich Krug , Henry Christian Timm and Otto Goldschmidt . Frequent moves to socially disadvantaged areas of Hamburg as well as his correspondence from this time show that Schmitt did not want to achieve any great economic success. In 1853 he died lonely and impoverished.

plant

Schmitt created over 330 works mainly for piano, including numerous sonatinas divertissements , nocturnes and other small pieces. They found some favor in contemporary criticism. His only opera Alfred the Great , however, was not a success.

Schmitt's most important contemporary critic was Robert Schumann . He saw in Schmitt a great talent that could never or never wanted to develop fully. Schumann especially valued Schmitt's great works such as his Concerto op.300 and the Grande Fantaisie brilliant op.225 as well as his teaching material. Like many critics of the time, he compared Jakob with his brother Aloys Schmitt and came to the conclusion that Jacob had the greater talent, but Aloys was the more sovereign artist and made better use of his gifts. Aloys was also regarded as the more important artist in the contemporary “Encyclopedia of the Entire Musical Sciences or Universal Lexicon of Music”. He was only given as much space as his brother in the “Small Musical Conversations Lexicon”, which was published by his Hamburg music publisher and in which he himself was involved as an author.

literature

  • Eric Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt . In: Erich Schneider (Ed.): Fränkische Lebensbilder . tape 21 . Society for Franconian History, Würzburg 2006, ISBN 3-86652-721-7 , p. 231-242 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Julius Schuberth: Small musical conversation lexicon. Published by J. Schuberth & Co, Leipzig 1865, p. 271.
  2. ↑ a b Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 331.
  3. ↑ Carl Friedrich Weitzmann : History of the piano playing and the piano literature. Verlag der JB Cotta'schen Buchhandlung, Stuttgart 1863, p. 119.
  4. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 332.
  5. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 333.
  6. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. , P. 334 f.
  7. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 335.
  8. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 336.
  9. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 339.
  10. ↑ a b Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 340.
  11. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 337.
  12. ↑ Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present. Person part . 2nd Edition. tape 14 . Bärenreiter, Kassel et al. 2005, ISBN 3-7618-1100-4 , Sp. 1465 .
  13. ↑ Erfurth: Jacob Schmitt. 2006, p. 337 f.
  14. ↑ Gustav Schilling (Ed.): Encyclopedia of the Entire Musical Sciences or Universal Lexicon of Tonkunst . tape 6 . Publisher by Franz Heinrich Köhler, Stuttgart 1838, p. 226 .
personal data
SURNAME Schmitt, Jacob
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schmitt, Jaques; Schmitt, Jacques
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer and piano teacher
DATE OF BIRTH November 2, 1803
PLACE OF BIRTH Obernburg am Main
DATE OF DEATH June 1853
Place of death Hamburg