Johann Matthäus Schmahl
Johann Matthäus Schmahl (also: Schmal) (born May 1, 1734 in Ulm ; † November 24, 1793 ibid) was a south German piano and organ builder .
Life
Johann Matthäus Schmahl came from a widespread, originally Central German family of organ builders. He was born in Ulm in 1734 as the eldest son of the organ builder Georg Friedrich Schmahl . He learned the trade of organ and instrument maker in his father's workshop. In addition to smaller instruments such as violins and pianos with and without pedals , like his father he also built new, smaller organs for various village churches in the area around Ulm and on the Swabian Alb . He carried out fundamental repair work on the organ of the Dreifaltigkeitskirche in Ulm and provided it with new registers .
In 1779 he was commissioned by a donor to build a new organ for the Barfüßerkirche belonging to the Franciscan monastery on Ulm Münsterplatz , which he completed in 1781. This Schmahl organ was moved to the town church of Geislingen a few decades later and - after some modifications and repairs - was still in use there until 1934. His rococo organ in the Protestant parish church Zum Hl. Laurentius in Berghülen is one of the few original instruments from the 18th century in the organ landscape of Upper Swabia .
After the death of his father, Johann Matthäus Schmahl took over his workshop and shifted the focus of his work to the construction of pianos and harpsichords . Some of his table pianos and fortepianos , made between 1770 and 1785, can be seen in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg , others in the Museum of Musical Instruments at the University of Leipzig , the Musical Instrument Museum in Berlin and the Musical Instrument Museum (mim) in Brussels . Even Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart said to have had one of his instruments.
Johann Matthäus Schmahl died in Ulm in November 1793 at the age of 59. After his death, his younger brother Georg Friedrich Schmahl d. J. (1748–1827) continued the workshop, later his son Christoph Friedrich Schmahl (1787–1839).
On August 27, 1936, played a musicologist and organist Joachim Alte Mark (1906-1963) in the Department of German Music Research in Berlin for the Germany transmitter of the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft on historical pianos of the Berlin collection of instruments a little on shellac records preserved program, including two Mozart pieces on a square piano by Johann Matthäus Schmahl (listening quotes: see web links).
Works
Organs (selection)
- Moravia (1775)
- Reutti, organ with 8 registers
- Ulm, Barfüßerkirche (1781), organ with two manuals and 19 stops
- Jungingen , organ with 8 registers
- Holzkirch , organ with 8 registers
- Lonsee , organ with 12 registers
- Berghülen, Protestant church "Zum Hl. Laurentius" (1784)
Instruments in museums (selection)
- Square piano (around 1770) Square piano in the Musical Instrument Museum of the University of Leipzig
- Square piano with harp-shaped outline (around 1770) Square piano in the Germanic National Museum in Nuremberg
- Square piano (around 1785) Square piano in the Musical Instrument Museum in Brussels
literature
- Gotthilf Kleemann: The Schmahl family of organs. In: Acta Organologica 7, 1973, pp. 71-104.
- Wolfgang Manecke and Johannes Mayr: Historic organs in Ulm and Upper Swabia. Pipe organs in the Alb-Donau district, in Ulm, Hayingen and Zwiefalten . (= Alb and Danube, art and culture; Volume 21). Süddeutsche Verlags-Gesellschaft, Ulm 1999, ISBN 3-88294-268-1 .
- Wolfgang Manecke: A dreamy dreamer: Johann Matthäus Schmahl and his organ in the Evangelical Parish Church of Berghülen. In: Organ international , 2000, pp. 333–335 [1]
- Michael Günther: The Ulm piano maker Johann Matthäus Schmahl (1734–1793). In: Ulm and Oberschwaben , vol. 59, vol. 2015, pp. 254–277.
Web links
- Johann Matthäus Schmahl , Bavarian Musicians' Lexicon Online, ed. by Josef Focht, (Version of March 9, 2010)
- Johann Matthäus Schmahl in the personal name file of the Musical Instrument Museum Online
- Historical radio recordings: 2 Mozart pieces, played on a Schmahl's square piano , listening quotes available online as .ram files
Individual evidence
- ^ Johann Matthäus Schmahl in the state bibliography Baden-Württemberg , statistik-bw.de, accessed on December 17, 2015.
- ↑ a b Albrecht Weyermann (ed.): News from scholars, artists and other strange people from Ulm. Christian Ulrich Wagner, Ulm 1798, p. 470.
- ^ Karlheinz Bauer: The organ in the town church Geislingen. kirchen Bezirk-geislingen.de, accessed on December 17, 2015.
- ^ Sabine Graser-Kühnle: Organ concert for the renovation. In: Südwest Presse , April 11, 2012, swp.de, accessed on December 17, 2015.
- ^ Database Musical Instrument Museums Online (English, partly with photos) , mimo-db.eu, accessed on December 17, 2015.
- ↑ Wolfgang Manecke: Johann Matthäus Schmahl (1734–1793): the ingenious, ungracious son. ( Memento from December 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) In: Original-Nachrichten aus Schwaben - Part II. Orgel-information.de, accessed on December 17, 2015.
- ^ Document of the Month January 2006 - The Young Mozart. German Broadcasting Archive , accessed on January 8, 2016.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Schmahl, Johann Matthäus |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Schmahl, Johann Matthaeus; Schmal, Johann Matthäus |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German piano and organ builder in Ulm |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 1, 1734 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ulm |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 24, 1793 |
| Place of death | Ulm |