Wilhelm Ehlers (singer)

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Wilhelm Ehlers ( 1774 in Hanover - November 29 or December 1, 1845 in Mainz ) was a German theater actor , opera singer ( tenor ), theater director and theater director .

Life

According to Eisenberg, Ehlers was self-taught and began his career in 1796. From 1798/99 to December 31, 1800 he was then at the Hamburg Theater, together with his wife Christiane Ehlers , nee. Knocke, actress, active. From 1801 to 1805 the couple were employed at the Mannheim Court Theater under Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's direction, whom Ehlers, like Friedrich Schiller , held in high esteem.

In 1804 he published his own compositions German chants with accompaniment of the chitarra or the piano based on texts by Goethe.

In June / July 1805 he made guest appearances in Berlin before making his debut at the Hofoper Vienna on November 8, 1805. He stayed there until 1811. His second wife, Louise Ehlers , b. Jonas, singer, died on October 19, 1812 at the age of 22 (presumably in connection with the birth of her daughter Louise ). The reason for the first separation (divorce / death?) Is unknown.

In 1813/14 he was at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna and then made his debut on September 28, 1814 at the Breslau Theater. There he also worked as an opera director. From autumn 1815 to April 1816 was at the Estates Theater in Prague. There he rivaled Carl Maria von Weber for the favor of the actress Caroline Brandt .

This was followed by a longer tour, including a. Ehlers joined the theater in Darmstadt (September / October 1816), in Frankfurt / Main (October / November 1816), at the company of Joseph Seconda in Leipzig (December 1816 to February 1817), in Bremen (1816), in Hamburg (March 1817), at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna (July 1817) and again in Leipzig (October 1817).

In November / December 1817 he worked with his third wife Minna Ehlers (actually Sophie Wilhelmine Karoline, née Barlow, around 1798–1875). While Minna Ehlers was engaged at the court theater in Weimar in 1817/18, their son Wolfgang Ehlers was born. Godfather on February 22, 1818 was Goethe. From spring 1819 to Easter 1820 he worked again as an opera director at the Wroclaw Theater. After a stopover in May 1820 as a guest at the Vienna Court Theater, he went to Pest . In March 1822 he gave a concert in Vienna with his then 10-year-old daughter Louise. A stage accident forced him to take a break in 1823.

In January / February 1823 he traveled back and forth between Vienna and Pressburg several times and also visited Beethoven in Vienna. He then worked at the Ständisches Theater in Graz until autumn 1823. From August 1824 he was hired as an opera director and singing teacher at the newly founded Königsstädtische Theater in Berlin. From August 1825 to May 1826 he was an opera director at the Theater Magdeburg, his daughter Louise was also active there at the time.

On May 22, 1826, he traveled to Mannheim with his daughter (who also worked there) and was then director and singing teacher at the Mannheim Theater from July 1826 to June 1827. During this time, with Beethoven's consent, he reworked his music for the festival The Consecration of the House into the one-act opera Simson and offered his work to the Schott publishing house in June 1827.

He probably continued to live with his daughter, who then worked at the Danzig Theater (1827/28?), The Stuttgart Court Theater (1828/29) and, after guest appearances in November / December 1829, at the Kassel Court Theater (1830/31).

According to Eisenberg, he had completely withdrawn from the stage for several years from 1824 "until his savings were completely exhausted" and then took over the direction of the Frankfurt Opera in 1831, which he left in 1834 without appearing as a singer in Frankfurt . Eisenberg mentions that Ehlers' last professional position was the management of the Mainz theater, which he shared with Clemens Remie and gave up in 1835.

In 1831 he became a director at the Frankfurt / Main Theater. In the spring of 1833 he was in London. In 1834 he took over the directorships in Mainz and Wiesbaden together with Clemens Remie.

From April to June 1838 he was under director Amadeus Müller at the theaters in Koblenz and Trier, from October 1838 to January 1839 under Franz Andreas Eisenhut at the theater in Trier. From 1839 to 1845 in Mainz he was a professor of singing and declamation. When he fell ill towards the end of his life, his friend Giacomo Meyerbeer supported him financially.

Ehlers also wrote plays and has tried (quite unsuccessfully) as a theater entrepreneur in Hungary and Holland. Allegedly, Franz Wild and Josef Staudigl were among his students .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Joseph Kürschner:  Ehlers, Wilhelm . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1877, p. 700.
  2. ^ A b Ludwig Eisenberg: Large biographical lexicon of the German stage in the XIX. Century . Verlag von Paul List , Leipzig 1903, p. 221, ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive )
  3. ↑ German chants with accompaniment of the chitarra or the piano in the catalog of the Saxon State Library - State and University Library Dresden (SLUB)
  4. ↑ Wilhelm Ehlers in the Carl-Maria-von-Weber-Gesamtausgabe

Remarks

  1. ↑ According to Eisenberg, rather questionable
personal data
SURNAME Ehlers, Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German theater actor and opera singer (tenor), theater director and director
DATE OF BIRTH 1774
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH November 29, 1845 or December 1, 1845
Place of death Mainz