Simon Breu

Honorary grave in the main cemetery in Würzburg

Simon Breu (born January 15, 1858 in Simbach am Inn ; † August 9, 1933 in Bad Brückenau ) was a German composer and music teacher .

life and work

Simon Breu was born on January 15, 1858 in Simbach am Inn , Lower Bavaria, the second of five children. After attending primary school, on October 1, 1870, he sent a request to the “royal government of Lower Bavaria” for gracious admission to the royal preparatory school in parish churches . These years served as preparation for the teachers' seminar in Straubing . This is also where his musical talents were discovered. At the age of 16 he was allowed to play the big organ in the St. Jakobs Church in Straubing. At the age of 17 he left the seminar in Straubing as a young teacher and got his first job as an assistant teacher in Hengersberg in Lower Bavaria . This is also where his first Marian songs were written. The young school assistant, to whom he was appointed soon after passing the exam, also wrote real Bavarian dances. Soon the whole area knew the music school teacher from Hengersberg.

After his transfer to Neustadt an der Donau , he met the local pastor and member of the state parliament, Josef Zach, who soon brought the young Simon Breu into contact with the Cäcilian movement (church music) that originated in Regensburg . Now his musical path was mapped out. His first choir songs were written here, which were adopted and premiered by the “Liedertafel Kelheim ”. In 1881 Simon Breu was called back to Straubing . As a teacher at the district dumbbell, a position as head teacher and householder was advertised, but he was still too young for that. Instead, he was offered the post of ordinary teacher, which he accepted.

In 1885, Simon Breu moved to Würzburg , where he succeeded the late Kapellmeister and conductor of the “Würzburger Singerverein”, for which the director of the music school recommended him. The native Simbacher quickly recognized the ability of the native Simbacher after Simon Breu had started a thorough study at the Royal Music School in Würzburg. In 1889 the now well-known musician took over the musical direction of the "Academic Choral Society" (today Academic-Musical Association to Würzburg ). A number of his best compositions were written during this time. “It's Sunday's”, written down during a break from class, became a song of the most sung male choirs in Germany. About a dozen student songs also fell into this period, as he was a teacher, conductor and music student at the same time.

In 1890, Simon Breu met Johannes Brahms and Richard Strauss in Bad Ischl, Austria . The Wagner singer Marianne Wilt sang some songs by Simon Breu, accompanied by Brahms on the piano. The decisive hour for the now well-known composer struck in 1894. The Würzburg music school, where he had studied for a long time, appointed him as a teacher of theory and choral singing. The time as a deaf and dumb teacher was over, Simon Breu could now turn his love for music into a profession. He used his skills so intensively that, after he had drafted a new curriculum for training as a school musician and his completely new teaching methods were soon introduced in all higher education institutions in Bavaria, in 1912 he became the clerk of the Bavarian Ministry of Culture for musical education.

He devoted his creative work primarily to male choirs. He became honorary choirmaster of the most famous choirs. The "German Book of Young People's Songs for Higher Educational Institutions" edited by him served as a teaching book in schools for decades and when Kaiser Wilhelm II initiated the publication of a " Folksong Book for Male Choirs ", the former Lower Bavarian played a key role. In total, his musical legacy includes around 300 works. Many of his songs are now part of the inalienable inventory of the choral society repertoire and some of them have become so popular that the composer has been completely forgotten.

The honors and awards of the great Lower Bavaria were numerous. In 1906 he became a professor and in 1924 a senior teacher. He has received several awards from Prince Regent Luitpold . The city of Würzburg presented him with the bronze city plaque on his 75th birthday in 1933. On the same occasion, the Simbach municipal council took the opportunity to make him an honorary citizen of his home parish. Since then, the house where he was born in Innstrasse has had a memorial plaque.

In contrast to his professional successes, Simon Breu had to suffer misfortune in his private life. His beloved wife Helene died in 1883 after only one year of marriage, immediately after giving birth to a son who also died. The composer suffered heavily from this stroke of fate. He did not remarry. From then on, his sister Regina ran the household for him for 33 years.

At the age of 75, Simon Breu sustained a foot injury on a cure in Bad Brückenau , which resulted in phlebitis with the following embolism. Simon Breu died quietly and peacefully on August 9, 1933. Today streets named after Simon Breu in his hometown Simbach am Inn and at his workplaces in Hengersberg , Würzburg and Münnerstadt in Lower Franconia remind of this extraordinary Lower Bavaria .

literature

• Benno Ziegler : Simon Breu: a picture of the life of the choir song composer and music teacher: with picture and sheet music supplements and a catalog raisonné , Würzburg: Stürtz 1928.
• Bruno Rottenbach: Würzburg street names. Volume 2, Fränkische Gesellschaftdruckerei, Würzburg 1969, p. 74 ( Schadewitzstrasse - Simon-Breu-Strasse - [...] ).

Web links

• Works by and about Simon Breu in the catalog of the German National Library
• Sheet music and audio files by Simon Breu in the International Music Score Library Project

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Peter Weidisch: Würzburg in the "Third Reich". In: Ulrich Wagner (Hrsg.): History of the city of Würzburg. 4 volumes, Volume I-III / 2, Theiss, Stuttgart 2001-2007; III / 1–2: From the transition to Bavaria to the 21st century. Volume 2, 2007, ISBN 978-3-8062-1478-9 , p. 1273, note 60.