Christoph Graupner
Encyclopedia
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
harpsichordist
Harpsichordist
A harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord.Many baroque composers played the harpsichord, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, George Frideric Handel, François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau...
and composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
of high Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
music who lived and worked at the same time as Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
, Georg Philipp Telemann
Georg Philipp Telemann
Georg Philipp Telemann was a German Baroque composer and multi-instrumentalist. Almost completely self-taught in music, he became a composer against his family's wishes. After studying in Magdeburg, Zellerfeld, and Hildesheim, Telemann entered the University of Leipzig to study law, but eventually...
and George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
.
Graupner's life
Born in HartmannsdorfHartmannsdorf bei Kirchberg
Hartmannsdorf bei Kirchberg is a municipality in the district Zwickau, in Saxony, Germany....
near Kirchberg
Kirchberg, Saxony
Kirchberg is a town in the Zwickau district, in the Free State of Saxony, Germany. It is situated on the western end of the Ore Mountains, 11 km south of Zwickau....
in Saxony
Saxony
The Free State of Saxony is a landlocked state of Germany, contingent with Brandenburg, Saxony Anhalt, Thuringia, Bavaria, the Czech Republic and Poland. It is the tenth-largest German state in area, with of Germany's sixteen states....
, Graupner received his first musical instruction from his uncle, an organist
Organist
An organist is a musician who plays any type of organ. An organist may play solo organ works, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers or instrumental soloists...
named Nicolaus Kuester. Graupner went to the University of Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
where he studied law
Law
Law is a system of rules and guidelines which are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior, wherever possible. It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a social mediator of relations between people. Contract law regulates everything from buying a bus...
(as did many composers of the time) and then completed his musical studies with Johann Kuhnau
Johann Kuhnau
Johann Kuhnau was a German composer, organist and harpsichordist.-Biography :Kuhnau was born in Geising, Saxony. He grew up in a religious Lutheran family. At age nine, he auditioned successfully for the Kreuzschule in Dresden...
, the cantor
Cantor (church)
A cantor is the chief singer employed in a church with responsibilities for the ecclesiastical choir; also called the precentor....
of the Thomaskirche (St Thomas' Church).
In 1705 Graupner left Leipzig to play the harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
in the orchestra of the Hamburg Opera
Hamburg State Opera
The Hamburg State Opera is one of the leading opera companies in Germany.Opera in Hamburg dates back to 2 January 1678 when the "Opern-Theatrum" was inaugurated with a performance of a biblical Singspiel by Johann Theile...
under the direction of Reinhard Keiser
Reinhard Keiser
Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
, alongside a young violinist named Handel. In addition to playing the harpsichord, Graupner composed six operas in Hamburg, some of them in collaboration with Keiser, a popular composer of operas in Germany.
In 1709 Graupner accepted a post at the court of Hesse-Darmstadt
Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt
The Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt was a member state of the Holy Roman Empire. It was formed in 1567 following the division of the Landgraviate of Hesse between the four sons of Philip I, the last Landgrave of Hesse....
and in 1711 became the court orchestra’s Hofkapellmeister (court chapel master). Graupner spent the rest of his career at the court in Hesse-Darmstadt, where his primary responsibilities were to provide music for the court chapel. He wrote music for nearly half a century, from 1709 to 1754, when he became blind
Blindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
. He died six years later.
Graupner and Bach
Graupner inadvertently played a key role in the history of music. Precarious finances in Darmstadt during the 1710s forced a reduction of musical life. The opera house was closed, and many court musicians' salaries were in arrearsArrears
Arrears is a legal term for the part of a debt that is overdue after missing one or more required payments. The amount of the arrears is the amount accrued from the date on which the first missed payment was due...
(including Graupner's). After many attempts to have his salary paid, and having several children and a wife to support, in 1723 Graupner applied for the Kantorship in Leipzig. Telemann had been the first choice for this position, but withdrew after securing a salary increase in Hamburg. Graupner's "audition" Magnificat
Magnificat
The Magnificat — also known as the Song of Mary or the Canticle of Mary — is a canticle frequently sung liturgically in Christian church services. It is one of the eight most ancient Christian hymns and perhaps the earliest Marian hymn...
, set in the style of his teacher and mentor Kuhnau, secured him the position. However, Graupner's patron (the Landgrave
Landgrave
Landgrave was a title used in the Holy Roman Empire and later on by its former territories. The title refers to a count who had feudal duty directly to the Holy Roman Emperor...
Ernst Ludwig of Hesse-Darmstadt
Ernest Louis, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt
Ernest Louis of Hesse-Darmstadt was Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt from 1678 to 1739. His parents were Landgrave Louis VI of Hesse-Darmstadt and Elisabeth Dorothea of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg ....
) would not release him from his contract. Graupner's past due salary was paid in full, his salary was increased; and he would be kept on staff even if his Kapelle was dismissed. With such favorable terms, Graupner remained in Darmstadt, thus clearing the way for Bach to become the cantor in Leipzig.
After hearing that Bach was the choice for Leipzig, on May 4, 1723 Graupner graciously wrote to the city council in Leipzig assuring them that Bach "is a musician just as strong on the organ as he is expert in church works and capelle pieces" and a man who "will honestly and properly perform the functions entrusted to him."
Graupner's opus & modern editions
Graupner was hardworking and prolific. There are about 2,000 surviving works in his catalog, including 113 sinfoniaSinfonia
Sinfonia is the Italian word for symphony. In English it most commonly refers to a 17th- or 18th-century orchestral piece used as an introduction, interlude, or postlude to an opera, oratorio, cantata, or suite...
s, 85 ouvertures (suites), 44 concerto
Concerto
A concerto is a musical work usually composed in three parts or movements, in which one solo instrument is accompanied by an orchestra.The etymology is uncertain, but the word seems to have originated from the conjunction of the two Latin words...
s, 8 opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s, 1,418 religious and 24 secular cantata
Cantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
s, 66 sonatas and 40 harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
partita
Partita
Partita was originally the name for a single instrumental piece of music , but Johann Kuhnau and later German composers used it for collections of musical pieces, as a synonym for suite.Johann Sebastian Bach wrote two sets of Partitas for different instruments...
s. Nearly all of Graupner's manuscripts are housed in the ULB (Technical University Library) in Darmstadt, Germany.
Graupner wrote for exotic combinations of instruments, including the oboe d'amore
Oboe d'amore
The oboe d'amore , less commonly oboe d'amour, is a double reed woodwind musical instrument in the oboe family. Slightly larger than the oboe, it has a less assertive and more tranquil and serene tone, and is considered the mezzo-soprano of the oboe family, between the oboe itself and the cor...
, flute d'amore, and viola d'amore
Viola d'amore
The viola d'amore is a 7- or 6-stringed musical instrument with sympathetic strings used chiefly in the baroque period. It is played under the chin in the same manner as the violin.- Structure and sound :...
. Over half of his sinfonias require brass
Brass
Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc; the proportions of zinc and copper can be varied to create a range of brasses with varying properties.In comparison, bronze is principally an alloy of copper and tin...
and timpani
Timpani
Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...
, with about 25 sinfonias requiring 3 to 4 timpani, one (sinfonia in G Major GWV 611) 5 timpani, and another, sinfonia in F Major (GWV 566), was composed for 6 timpani.
Obscurity
After he died, Graupner became an obscure composer for several reasons. His manuscripts became the source of a long legal battle between his heirs and the rulers of Hesse-Darmstadt. A final court decision denied the Graupner estate ownership of the music manuscripts. The heirs were unable to obtain permission to sell or publish his works, which remained inaccessible. Music styles had changed dramatically, reducing any interest in Graupner's music. On the positive side however, the Landgrave's seizure of Graupner's musical estate ensured its survival in toto. Fate was not so kind to J. S. Bach's musical legacy, for example. Another factor that contributed to Graupner's posthumous obscurity was that, unlike Bach, Graupner had very few pupils other than Johann Friedrich FaschJohann Friedrich Fasch
Johann Friedrich Fasch was a German violinist and composer.Fasch was born in Buttelstedt, was a choirboy in Weissenfels and studied under Johann Kuhnau at the famous St. Thomas School in Leipzig and later founded a Collegium Musicum in that city...
to carry on his musical legacy.
As critic David Vernier has summed up, Graupner is "one of those unfortunate victims of fate and circumstance - a contemporary of Bach, Handel, Telemann, etc., who has remained largely -- and unfairly - neglected."
Rediscovery
Graupner's music is enjoying a revival, due in large part to the research efforts of many musicologists, performers, and conductors.Beginning in the early 20th century, research began with Willibald Nagel's study of Graupner's sinfonias. In the 1920s, Friedrich Noack published his research on Graupner's cantatas. Baerenreiter published several sinfonias and an ouverture in the 1950s. In the early 1980s, Myron Rosenblum edited four sinfonias for the massive Barry Brook
Barry S. Brook
Barry S. Brook was an American musicologist.Brook received his masters’ degree from Columbia University, where he studied with P.H. Lang, Erich Hertzmann, Hugh Ross, and Roger Sessions, in 1942; he received the doctorate from the Sorbonne in 1959...
project The Symphony, 1720-1840: A Comprehensive Collection of Full Scores (New York: Garland, 1979-85), 60 vols. The year 1988 saw the publication of Oswald Bill's study of Graupner, with several articles by such Graupner experts as Peter Cahn (on the sinfonias), Joanna Cobb Biermann (musicians and salaries in Darmstadt), as well as source documents on court life in Darmstadt. Three dissertations were very important for Graupner research: H. Cutler Fall's study of the Passiontide
Passiontide
Passiontide is a name for the last two weeks of Lent, beginning on Passion Sunday and ending on Holy Saturday....
cantatas, Rene Schmidt's study of the Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
cantatas, and Vernon Wicker's study of solo bass cantatas. Christoph Grosspietsch published an extensive study of Graupner's ouvertures in 1994.
Despite all this research, there were relatively few recordings available to the general public. This changed in 1998, when Hermann Max conducted a CD of Graupner works on the CPO
Classic Produktion Osnabrück
Classic Produktion Osnabrück is a record label founded in 1986 by Georg Ortmann and several others. Its declared mission is to fill niches in the recorded classical repertory, with an emphasis on romantic, late romantic and 20th-century music...
label. Montreal harpsichordist Geneviève Soly came across a Graupner manuscript in the Beinecke Library at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
in the year 2000 and started performing and recording his works. Graupner was "always on the cutting edge for his time and very innovative in his ideas for harmony, notation, and the use of instruments," as Soly has noted. "You have to take into consideration his various styles in relation to the actual period and the ideas he was interested in developing at that moment. The size of the catalogue imposes added difficulties in this respect, because another composer might have written for just as long, but in one style only. Mozart comes to mind: although he composed over a shorter period, his style was always well defined."
In April 2005, a thematic catalog of Graupner's instrumental music (Oswald Bill and Christoph Grosspietsch, editors) was published by Carus Music. There are plans to catalog Graupner's vocal music.
In 2010, Belgian conductor and musicologist Florian Heyerick published an online and searchable digital GWV of the instrumental and vocan works.
Works
- List of cantatas by Christoph Graupner
- List of chamber pieces by Christoph Graupner
- List of concertos by Christoph Graupner
- List of harpsichord pieces by Christoph Graupner
- List of orchestral suites by Christoph Graupner
- List of symphonies by Christoph Graupner
Selected discography
- Graupner: Ouvertures GWV 420 & 421. Antichi Strumenti (StradivariusStradivariusThe name Stradivarius is associated with violins built by members of the Stradivari family, particularly Antonio Stradivari. According to their reputation, the quality of their sound has defied attempts to explain or reproduce, though this belief is controversial...
3661472) - Graupner: Orchestral Works. Nova Stravaganza. Siegbert Rampe conductor (MD+G Gold 34111212)
- Graupner: Ouvertures and Cantata. Das kleine Konzert. Hermann Max conductor. (CPO 999592)
- Graupner: Ouverture, Trio, Sinfonia. Nova Stravaganza. Siegbert Rampe conductor. (MD+G Gold 3411252)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 1. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 23109)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 2. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 23164)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 3. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 23181)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 4. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 29116)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 5. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 29118)
- Graupner: Partitas For Harpsichord, Vol 6. Performed by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 29119)
- Graupner: Instrumental And Vocal Music. Performed by Ingrid Schmithüsen, Mathieu Lussier, Hélène Plouffe, Geneviève Soly and L'Ensemble des Idées Heureuses conducted by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 23162)
- Graupner: Cantate, Sonate, Ouverture. Performed by Hélène Plouffe, Geneviève Soly, Chantal Rémillard, Isabelle Bozzini, Ingrid Schmithüsen and L'Ensemble des Idées Heureuses conducted by Geneviève Soly (Analekta 23180)
- Virtuoso Timpani Concertos. Dresden Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra. Alexander Peter conductor. (Naxos 8557610)
- Graupner: Ein Weihnachtsoratorium, 9 Christmas Cantatas (2 CD, Ricercar 307 , 2010), Florian Heyerick, Ex Tempore, Mannheimer Hofkapelle
External links
- Graupner 2010 a digital Graupner Werkverzeichnis with integrated search function
- The Christoph Graupner Society Homepage
- Extensive online bibliography for research on Christoph Graupner
- Christoph Graupner: The Life and Work of Christoph Graupner on GoldbergWeb, the early-music portal
- ULB Library Graupner's music manuscripts and archives in Darmstadt, Germany
- Christoph Graupner's works at La Sinfonie d'Orphée
- Kim Patrick Clow's webpage dedicated to promoting Graupner's work.