Julius Benedict

Sir Julius Benedict

Julius Benedict, lithograph by Josef Kriehuber , 1861

Sir Julius Benedict (born November 27, 1804 in Stuttgart , † June 5, 1885 in London ) was a British composer and conductor of German origin.

Life

Born as the son of the Jewish banker Moritz Benedict (1772–1852), he studied music and composition; initially in Stuttgart with Ludwig Abeille , later in Weimar with Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Carl Maria von Weber , whose most talented pupil he was. In 1821 he met Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy in Berlin , with whom he was to become a lifelong friend.

On the recommendation of Carl Maria von Weber, Benedict took up the position of music director at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna in 1823 . There he met Ludwig van Beethoven several times and accompanied his teacher Weber when he visited Beethoven in Baden.

Two years later he moved to the same function of Naples to the San Carlo Theater . He then gave concerts as a pianist for several years, changing residence in Germany and Paris. From 1835 he lived with a few interruptions in London and worked as Kapellmeister at various theaters. In 1837 and 1850 he wrote a piano concerto each; both are clearly in the tradition of Hummel and combine virtuosity with fine lyricism.

In 1850 he went on a concert tour to America as the accompanist of Jenny Lind . After he returned to London in 1851, he took up the position of Kapellmeister at Covent Garden . In 1871 he was ennobled as a Knight Bachelor and was henceforth allowed to call himself "Sir". In the late 1870s he directed the Liverpool Philharmonic . Benedict was the founder of the so-called Monday concerts (chamber music) that are popular in London and the conductor of many major English music festivals.

In addition to numerous brilliant piano compositions and some ecclesiastical musical works, he composed a number of operas, the first of which, Italian, are written in Rossinian style; In 1838 he started composing English texts with “The gypsy's warning”, followed by more Weber's style, and with it he had great successes, such as “The Brides of Venice”, 1844, “The Crusaders” 1846, “The Bride of the Song” and “The Rose of Erin” (“The Lily of Killarney”, 1865, his most successful work by far). He also wrote several choral works for the music festivals.
Until his death in 1885 he was held in high regard as an orchestra conductor and piano player.

Works (selection)

Operas

• The Lily of Killarney
• The Crusaders
• The Brides of Venice
• The Portuguese in Goa

Operettas

• The Bride of Song
• Un anno e un giorno

Piano concerts

• No. 1 in C minor, Op. 45 (1837) and No. 2 in E flat major, Op. 89 (1850) (first recording in 2008)

Documents

Letters from Julius Benedict are in the holdings of the Leipzig music publisher CF Peters in the Leipzig State Archives .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Weber saw a certain lack of discipline in him
2. ↑ See Klaus Martin Kopitz , Rainer Cadenbach (Ed.) And a .: Beethoven from the point of view of his contemporaries in diaries, letters, poems and memories. Volume 1: Adamberger - Kuffner. Edited by the Beethoven Research Center at the Berlin University of the Arts. Henle, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-87328-120-2 , pp. 53-58.
3. ↑ The Romantic Piano Concerto Vol.48 ( Hyperion Records ). Howard Shelley (piano & conductor), Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra

literature

• Robert Eitner:  Benedict, Sir Julius . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 46, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1902, p. 354 f.
• Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon, Volume 2. Leipzig 1905, p. 626.
• Eveline Bartlitz and Frank Ziegler: Julius Benedict. A composer between Weber, Rossini and Mendelssohn. In: Weberiana. 19/2009, ISSN  1434-6206 , pp. 125-190

Web links

Commons : Sir Julius Benedict  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Sheet music and audio files by Julius Benedict in the International Music Score Library Project
• List of stage works by Julius Benedict based on the MGG at Operone