Nikolaos Mantzaros

Nikolaos Mantzaros

Nikolaos Chalikiopoulos Mantzaros ( Greek Νικόλαος Χαλικιόπουλος Μάντζαρος , usually only Nikolaos Mantzaros , Italian Niccolò Mantzaro, born October 26, ^jul. / 6. November  1795 ^greg. On Corfu , † March 31 ^{. Jul} / 12. April  1872 ^{. Greg} ibid) was a Greek composer and music teacher . As a leading composer and teacher of the early Ionian School , he had a lasting influence on 19th-century Greek music.

Family and education

Mantzaros came from a long-established and very wealthy family. He received his first musical training in his homeland from the brothers Stefano (piano) and Gerolamo Pojago (violin). His first compositions were performed in the Nobile Teatro di San Giacomo in Corfu as early as 1815 . From 1819 he made a series of trips to Italy , where he trained as a student of Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli .

Profession and works

Mantzaros worked as a composer and music teacher in Corfu from 1826, where he founded the first Greek conservatory, the Società Filarmonica di Corfù . He composed 24 overtures , three masses and numerous other church music works, as well as piano pieces , dances and marches .

In 1829 and 1830 he set 24 of the 158 stanzas of the hymn to freedom , which his friend Dionysios Solomos had composed in 1823 on the Ionian island of Zakynthos . This version, of which only the first two - popular - stanzas are sung, was declared the Greek national anthem by King George I on August 4, 1865 .

As early as 1844, the first Greek king, Otto I. von Wittelsbach , had awarded Mantzaros a medal for a "more serious" second composition and used this version for official occasions in the royal palace. At that time, however, the national anthem of the Kingdom of Bavaria was still used .

The original work was printed only once, namely in London in 1873, a year after Mantzaros' death , because the composer had not made his manuscript available for a long time.

literature

• Nikolaos Mantzaros . Biography. In: Music in the past and present . tape 11 , 2004, Sp. 1014 (personal part).

Web links

• Kostas Kardamis: Greek Music of the Early Nineteenth Century: Nikolaos Halikiopoulos Mantzaros and his Early Works . Online at: Royal Holloway Graduate Music Research (English)
• Konstantinos Kardamis: The pre-Solomic Nikolaos Chalikiopoulos Mantzaros and his work . Dissertation. Online at: Εθνικό Αρχείο Διδακτορικών Διατριβών: Ο προσολωμικός Νικόλαος Χαλικιόπουλος Μάντζαρος και το έργο του , Ionian University , Corfu 2006, 45 (Greek)
• Greek Embassy Berlin: The National Anthem
• Greek Presidential Office: The National Anthem (Greek)