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The Sing-Akademie zu Berlin, also known as the Berliner Singakademie, is a musical (originally choral) society founded in Berlin in 1791 by Carl Friedrich Christian Fasch, harpsichordist to the court of Prussia, on the model of the 18th-century London Academy of Ancient Music.
The origins of the Singakademie are difficult to discern because the group was initially intended as a private gathering of music lovers and only later became a public institution. The Singakademie grew out of a small circle of singers who met regularly in the garden house of the privy councillor Milow. Their weekly meetings seemed to have resembled those of the then popular Singethees. Carl Friedrich Zelter describes them as rather informal meetings: "One gathered in the evening, drank tea, spoke, talked, in short entertained oneself; and the matter itself was only secondary." [1] Singer and songwriter Charlotte Caroline Wilhelmine Bachmann was one of the original founding members. [2]
Until the early nineteenth century, most musical concert and opera performances consisted of the music of living composers. The Akademie was intended by Fasch to revive music of the past as well as to perform that of the present. In fact its first performance was a 16-part Mass by Fasch himself, but it also regularly performed music by J. S. Bach and other earlier masters. Fasch had been a pupil of Johann Sebastian Bach's son C. P. E. Bach and instilled the devotion to Bach that has been a continuing feature of the Akademie. By the time of Fasch's death on 3 August 1800 the Akademie had about 100 members, and had received many notable visitors keen to experience its unique sound, including Beethoven who came in June 1796.
After Fasch's death, his pupil Carl Friedrich Zelter became leader of the Akademie, continuing Fasch's ambitions and objectives. In 1807 he began an orchestra to accompany the Akademie, and in 1808 he founded a men's choir ('Liedertafel'), which became a model for similar choirs flourishing in the early nineteenth century and dedicated to German national music.
The members of the Akademie were originally drawn from the wealthy bourgeois of Berlin. From early days they also included members of some of Berlin's wealthiest Jewish families, including the Itzig family and descendants of Moses Mendelssohn. These families were to have a significant influence on the history of the Akademie. Moses Mendelssohn's son, Abraham joined the Akademie in 1793 and Itzig's granddaughter, Lea Salomon, in 1796. They were later to marry and their children Felix and Fanny were leading members of the Akademie in the 1820s.
Itzig's daughter (and hence Felix's great-aunt) Sarah Levy (1761-1854), a fine keyboard player who had been taught by Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, played concerti by Bach and others in many Akademie concerts and at Zelter's "Ripienschule" in the period 1806–1815. Her large collection of manuscripts of music of the Bach family, together with many others acquired by Abraham Mendelssohn from the widow of C. P. E. Bach, were left to the Akademie. Zelter also had a fine collection of Bach and Bach family manuscripts which he gave to the Akademie. By these means it acquired one of the finest collections of Bachiana in the world. The collection was looted by the Red Army in 1945 and hidden in the Kyiv Conservatory, but was returned to Germany after its rediscovery in 2000. [3] [4] (See link for the story). Today, the collection is temporarily housed in the music section of the Berlin State Library.
The success of the Akademie encouraged the founding of a new and permanent home. This was established in 1827 at a plaza near Unter den Linden and became a major Berlin concert hall, at which many famous musicians were to give concerts, including Paganini, Schumann, and Brahms. On 11 March 1829, the 20-year-old Felix Mendelssohn, who was himself a pupil of Zelter, conducted here his famous revival of Bach's St Matthew Passion, a major milestone in re-establishing its composer's reputation as a founding father of European musical traditions.
From November 1827 to April 1828, Alexander von Humboldt, Prussia's most famous naturalist and scholar, gave sixteen public lectures about nature's 'cosmos' at the Singakademie and earned much praise across social classes for his performance. [5]
In 1832 on the death of Zelter, Mendelssohn had some hopes of succeeding him, but in the event the post went to the older, mediocre, but 'safe pair of hands' of Carl Friedrich Rungenhagen (1778–1851). Subsequent directors of the Akademie were:
After the separation between East and West Berlin, the Berliner Singakademie was founded in 1963 in East Berlin. This other Berliner Singakademie is a leading oratory choir in the united Berlin today.
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include symphonies, concertos, piano music, organ music and chamber music. His best-known works include the overture and incidental music for A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Italian Symphony, the Scottish Symphony, the oratorio St. Paul, the oratorio Elijah, the overture The Hebrides, the mature Violin Concerto, the String Octet, and the melody used in the Christmas carol "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing". Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words are his most famous solo piano compositions.
Fanny Mendelssohn was a German composer and pianist of the early Romantic era who was known as Fanny Hensel after her marriage. Her compositions include a string quartet, a piano trio, a piano quartet, an orchestral overture, four cantatas, more than 125 pieces for the piano and over 250 lieder, most of which were unpublished in her lifetime. Although lauded for her piano technique, she rarely gave public performances outside her family circle.
Wilhelm Friedemann Bach was a German composer, organist and harpsichordist. He was the second child and eldest son of Johann Sebastian Bach and Maria Barbara Bach. Despite his acknowledged genius as an improviser and composer, his income and employment were unstable, and he died in poverty.
Carl Friedrich Zelter was a German composer, conductor and teacher of music. Working in his father's bricklaying business, Zelter attained mastership in that profession, and was a musical autodidact.
Many of the thirteen children of Daniel Itzig and Miriam Wulff, and their descendants and spouses, had significant impact on both Jewish and German social and cultural history. Notable ones are set out below.
Carl Friedrich Christian Fasch (1736–1800) was a German composer and harpsichordist. Born in Zerbst, he was the son of the composer Johann Friedrich Fasch. He was initially taught by his father.
Abraham Ernst Mendelssohn Bartholdy was a German Jewish banker and philanthropist. He was the father of Fanny Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn, Rebecka Mendelssohn, and Paul Mendelssohn.
Since the 18th century Berlin has been an influential musical center in Germany and Europe. First as an important trading city in the Hanseatic League, then as the capital of the electorate of Brandenburg and the Prussian Kingdom, later on as one of the biggest cities in Germany it fostered an influential music culture that remains vital until today. Berlin can be regarded as the breeding ground for the powerful choir movement that played such an important role in the broad socialization of music in Germany during the 19th century.
Die erste Walpurgisnacht is a poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe telling of efforts by Druids in the Harz Mountains to practice their pagan rituals in the face of new and dominating Christian forces.
The Maxim Gorki Theatre is a theatre in Berlin-Mitte named after the Soviet writer Maxim Gorky. In 2012, the Mayor of Berlin Klaus Wowereit named Şermin Langhoff as the artist director of the theatre.
Carl Friedrich Rungenhagen was a German composer and academic teacher at the Prussian Academy of Arts.
The Harpsichord Concerto in D minor, BWV 1052, is a concerto for harpsichord and Baroque string orchestra by Johann Sebastian Bach. In three movements, marked Allegro, Adagio and Allegro, it is the first of Bach's harpsichord concertos, BWV 1052–1065.
Mathieu Lange was a German musician, conductor and from 1952 to 1973 director of the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin. He hadn't gone by his first name Carl since 1950.
Sechs Lieder, Op. 59, is a collection of six part songs for four voices a cappella by Felix Mendelssohn. He composed the songs between 1837 and 1843, setting six poems in German. They are subtitled "Im Freien zu singen", and focus on nature. They were published after his death as part of his complete works. One of the songs, "O Täler weit, o Höhen" became so popular that it is also regarded as Volkslied.
Johann Theodor Mosewius also Johann Theodor Mosevius was a German operatic bass, choirmaster and music director of the University of Wroclaw.
Helmut Koch was a German conductor, choir leader, composer, and academic teacher. He was recording manager for the Berliner Rundfunk from 1945, where he founded the Solistenvereinigung Berlin, the Kammerorchester Berlin and the Großer Chor des Berliner Rundfunks. He conducted a recording of Monteverdi's L'Orfeo in 1949, and later also contemporary classical music by composers including Hanns Eisler, Fritz Geißler, Ernst Hermann Meyer and Ruth Zechlin. He was professor at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler" from its beginning. After working as a regular guest conductor at the Staatsoper Berlin, he became Generalmusikdirektor. He was the first conductor of the Berliner Singakademie in East Berlin, and held the position until his death.
Throughout the 18th century, the appreciation of Johann Sebastian Bach's music was mostly limited to distinguished connoisseurs. The 19th century started with publication of the first biography of the composer and ended with the completion of the publication of all of Bach's known works by the Bach Gesellschaft. A Bach Revival had started from Mendelssohn's performance of the St Matthew Passion in 1829. Soon after that performance, Bach started to become regarded as one of the greatest composers of all times, if not the greatest, a reputation he has retained ever since. A new extensive Bach biography was published in the second half of the 19th century.
Dietmar Hiller is a German musicologist, organist, dramaturg at the Konzerthaus Berlin and docent at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler" Berlin.
Sara Levy, born Sara Itzig was a German harpsichordist, patron of the arts and music collector. Her salon was the meeting place of the most important musicians and scholars in Berlin, and she was also known as a philanthropist.
Bella Salomon was a prominent Jewish collector of music. Along with her more famous sister Sara Levy she was influential in maintaining the musical legacy of Johann Sebastian Bach. She was also the grandmother of Felix Mendelssohn.
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