Christian Gottlob Neefe

Christian Gottlob Neefe ( born February 5, 1748 in Chemnitz, † January 26, 1798 in Dessau ) was a German composer, organist, conductor and musicologist. Particularly well known he was a teacher of Ludwig van Beethoven.

Life

Neefe comes from a long-established family of craftsmen in Chemnitz; He was the son of the tailor Johann Gottlieb Neefe and his wife Rosina Weyrauch. With 12 years Neefe came as a chorister at the city church of his hometown, where he received his first musical instruction by the organist Johann Friedrich Wilhelmi, the very promoted him. He was on the suggestion of his teacher a grant from the city of Chemnitz, and was thus able to study the age of 19 at the University of Leipzig Jura. The First State Exam, he took off in 1771; his thesis was entitled Whether a father sey entitled to disinherit his son if he verschreybe himself to the theater.

Already during his studies Neefe made ​​the acquaintance of the composer Johann Adam Hiller and was able to publish concerning a student even minor works in the magazine Weekly News, the music. As Hiller in 1771 founded his private singing school in Leipzig, Neefe was one of his first students.

One of his first major works for Hiller were ten arias composed Neefe for his opera The village barber. As a result of this co- Hiller and as a master student Neefe 1776 was also his successor as music director of Abel Seyler's theater company. Along with this ensemble he has performed among others in Dresden, Frankfurt, Mainz and Cologne.

Neefe married in Leipzig, the actress Susanna Zinck. With her he had three daughters, including Margaret, the future wife of the actor Ludwig Devrient, and three sons, including the later painter Hermann Josef Neefe.

1779 had the Seyler'sche theater company - despite remarkable artistic achievements and successes - declare bankruptcy. In the same year he got a job as a composer and music director of the Ensemble of Gustav Friedrich Grossmann and Karl Hellmuth at the electoral National Theatre in Bonn. There was summoned Neefe 1781 also as successor to the court organist Gilles van Eeden of.

The duties of the organist also included the training of young musicians. Neefe taught in piano, organ and composition. His most famous student was from 1782 Ludwig van Beethoven. Neefe was also the first published works of the young Beethoven - Variations pour le clavecin as the sur une Marche de Mr. Dressler.

Neefe was Beethoven send with the assistance of the court on a study trip to Vienna; at that time a center of European music. Equipped with a recommendation letter from the Archbishop of Cologne, Maximilian Franz of Austria should Beethoven, though, a pupil of Mozart only for a short time. Beethoven, however, came back after a short time, as his mother was seriously ill and was dying.

Politically interested, Neefe was in the Electoral Cologne residence of the most famous philosophers of the Enlightenment. In Bonn, he was like his colleague Franz Anton Ries and Nikolaus Simrock member of Stagira Minervalkirche the Illuminati order. After its dissolution he became a founding member of the Bonn Reading Society.

In Neuwied Neefe was a member of the Masonic Lodge Karoline to the three peacocks.

When the troops of the French Revolution led by General Jean- Étienne Championnet 1794 occupied the Rhineland and occupied on October 6 of that year, Cologne, the Elector's time was over. Neefe lost his job at age 46 in Bonn, trying to come to terms with the occupiers. After several unsuccessful petitions could get him to Dessau in 1796 one of his daughters, where he Bosann'schen music director of the theater company was in the same year. He held until his death this office.

On January 26, 1798 Christian Gottlieb Neefe died in Dessau at the age of 50 years.

Reception

His musical work is marked by numerous compositions of chamber music, piano works, choral music and operas. He is considered one of the best German Singspiel composers of his time.

Works (selection)

  • The pharmacy. Musical comedy in two Acts of. Leipzig 1771
  • Adelheit Veltheim. Musical comedy in four acts. Leipzig 1772
  • Cupid's proscenium. Singspiel. 1772
  • The objections. Singspiel. 1772
  • Heinrich and Lyda. Singspiel. 1776
  • Zémire et Azor. Singspiel. 1776
  • Posthumously: Twelve Piano Sonatas. in: Monuments Rhenish Music Vol 10/11

Discography

  • XII sonatas (on a modern concert grand ). Oliver Drechsel. DCD027
  • XII sonatas ( on a clavichord ). Oliver Drechsel. DCD026
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