Joachim Raff
Encyclopedia
Germans
The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
-Swiss
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
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...
, teacher
Teacher
A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...
and pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
.
Biography
Raff was born in LachenLachen, Switzerland
Lachen is a municipality in March District in the canton of Schwyz in Switzerland.-Geography:Lachen has an area, , of . Of this area, 26.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while 5.8% is forested...
in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
. His father, a teacher, had fled there from Württemberg
Württemberg
Württemberg , formerly known as Wirtemberg or Wurtemberg, is an area and a former state in southwestern Germany, including parts of the regions Swabia and Franconia....
in 1810 to escape forced recruitment into the military of that southwestern German state that had to fight for Napoleon in Russia. Joachim was largely self-taught in music, studying the subject while working as a schoolmaster in Schmerikon
Schmerikon
Schmerikon is a municipality in the Wahlkreis of See-Gaster in the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland.-Geography:Schmerikon has an area, , of . Of this area, 38.9% is used for agricultural purposes, while 23% is forested...
, Schwyz
Schwyz
The town of is the capital of the canton of Schwyz in Switzerland.The Federal Charter of 1291 or Bundesbrief, the charter that eventually led to the foundation of Switzerland, can be seen at the Bundesbriefmuseum.-History of the toponym:...
and Rapperswil
Rapperswil
Rapperswil-Jona is a municipality in the Wahlkreis of See-Gaster in the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland.Besides Rapperswil and Jona, which were separate municipalities until 2006, the municipality includes Bollingen, Busskirch, Curtiberg, Kempraten-Lenggis, Wagen, and Wurmsbach.-Today:On...
. He sent some of his piano compositions to Felix Mendelssohn
Felix Mendelssohn
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...
who recommended them to Breitkopf & Härtel
Breitkopf & Härtel
Breitkopf & Härtel is the world's oldest music publishing house. The firm was founded in 1719 in Leipzig by Bernhard Christoph Breitkopf . The catalogue currently contains over 1000 composers, 8000 works and 15,000 music editions or books on music. The name "Härtel" was added when Gottfried...
for publication. They were published in 1844 and received a favourable review in Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....
's journal, the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik
Neue Zeitschrift für Musik
Die Neue Zeitschrift für Musik was a music magazine published in Leipzig, co-founded by Robert Schumann, his teacher and future father-in law Friedrich Wieck, and his close friend Ludwig Schuncke...
, which prompted Raff to go to Zürich
Zürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
and take up composition full time.
In 1845, Raff walked to Basel
Basel
Basel or Basle In the national languages of Switzerland the city is also known as Bâle , Basilea and Basilea is Switzerland's third most populous city with about 166,000 inhabitants. Located where the Swiss, French and German borders meet, Basel also has suburbs in France and Germany...
to hear Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
play the piano. After a period in Stuttgart
Stuttgart
Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....
where he became friends with the conductor Hans von Bülow
Hans von Bülow
Hans Guido Freiherr von Bülow was a German conductor, virtuoso pianist, and composer of the Romantic era. He was one of the most famous conductors of the 19th century, and his activity was critical for establishing the successes of several major composers of the time, including Richard...
, he worked as Liszt's assistant at Weimar
Weimar
Weimar is a city in Germany famous for its cultural heritage. It is located in the federal state of Thuringia , north of the Thüringer Wald, east of Erfurt, and southwest of Halle and Leipzig. Its current population is approximately 65,000. The oldest record of the city dates from the year 899...
from 1850 to 1853. During this time he helped Liszt in the orchestration
Orchestration
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra or of adapting for orchestra music composed for another medium...
of several of his works, claiming to have had a major part in orchestrating the symphonic poem
Symphonic poem
A symphonic poem or tone poem is a piece of orchestral music in a single continuous section in which the content of a poem, a story or novel, a painting, a landscape or another source is illustrated or evoked. The term was first applied by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt to his 13 works in this vein...
Tasso
Tasso, Lamento e Trionfo (Liszt)
Franz Liszt composed his Tasso, Lamento e trionfo in 1849, revising it in 1850-51 and again in 1854. It is numbered No. 2 in his cycle of 13 symphonic poems written during his Weimar period.-Composition:...
. In 1851, Raff's 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...
König Alfred was staged in Weimar, and five years later he moved to Wiesbaden
Wiesbaden
Wiesbaden is a city in southwest Germany and the capital of the federal state of Hesse. It has about 275,400 inhabitants, plus approximately 10,000 United States citizens...
where he largely devoted himself to composition. From 1878 he was the first Director of, and a teacher at, the Hoch Conservatory
Hoch Conservatory
Dr. Hoch’s Konservatorium - Musikakademie was founded in Frankfurt am Main on September 22, 1878. Through the generosity of Frankfurter Joseph Hoch, who bequeathed the Conservatory one million German gold marks in his testament, a school for music and the arts was established for all age groups. ...
in Frankfurt
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
. There he employed Clara Schumann
Clara Schumann
Clara Schumann was a German musician and composer, considered one of the most distinguished pianists of the Romantic era...
and a number of other eminent musicians as teachers, and established a class specifically for female composers (this was at a time when women composers were not taken very seriously). His pupils there included Edward MacDowell
Edward MacDowell
Edward Alexander MacDowell was an American composer and pianist of the Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites "Woodland Sketches", "Sea Pieces", and "New England Idylls". "Woodland Sketches" includes his most popular short piece, "To a Wild Rose"...
and Alexander Ritter
Alexander Ritter
Alexander Sascha Ritter was a German composer and violinist.He was born in Narva, Estonia. He studied in Frankfurt am Main under Joachim Raff. In 1854 he married Wagner's niece Franziska...
.
He died in Frankfurt on the night of June 24/25, 1882.
Compositions
Raff was very prolific, and by the end of his life was one of the best known German composers, though his work is largely forgotten today (only one of his pieces, a cavatinaCavatina
Cavatina is a musical term, originally a short song of simple character, without a second strain or any repetition of the air...
for violin and piano, is performed with any regularity today, sometimes as an encore). He drew influence from a variety of sources - his eleven symphonies
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...
, for example, combine the Classical symphonic form, with the Romantic
Romantic music
Romantic music or music in the Romantic Period is a musicological and artistic term referring to a particular period, theory, compositional practice, and canon in Western music history, from 1810 to 1900....
penchant for program music
Program music
Program music or programme music is a type of art music that attempts to musically render an extra-musical narrative. The narrative itself might be offered to the audience in the form of program notes, inviting imaginative correlations with the music...
and contrapuntal
Counterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...
orchestral writing which harks back to the Baroque
Baroque music
Baroque music describes a style of Western Classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1760. This era follows the Renaissance and was followed in turn by the Classical era...
. Most of these symphonies carry descriptive titles including In the Forest (No. 3), Lenore (No. 5) and To the Fatherland (No. 1), a very large-scale work lasting around seventy minutes. His last four symphonies make up a quartet of works based on the four seasons. Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini was an Italian conductor. One of the most acclaimed musicians of the late 19th and 20th century, he was renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orchestral detail and sonority, and his photographic memory...
conducted some performances of the Symphony No. 3 In the Forest in 1931.
The Lenore symphony (No. 5), famous in its time, was inspired by a ballad of the same name
Lenore (ballad)
Lenore, sometimes translated as Leonora, Leonore or Ellenore, is a poem written by German author Gottfried August Bürger in 1773, and published in 1774 in the Göttinger Musenalmanach...
by Gottfried August Bürger
Gottfried August Bürger
Gottfried August Bürger was a German poet. His ballads were very popular in Germany. His most noted ballad, Lenore, found an audience beyond readers of the German language in an English adaptation and a French translation.-Biography:He was born in Molmerswende , Principality of Halberstadt, where...
that also inspired works by several other composers, including Maria Theresia von Paradis (1789), Henri Duparc, Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
(late 1850s, mentioned by Alan Walker in his Liszt biography vol. 2), for example. The world premiere recording of Lenore was made in 1965, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra
London Philharmonic Orchestra
The London Philharmonic Orchestra , based in London, is one of the major orchestras of the United Kingdom, and is based in the Royal Festival Hall. In addition, the LPO is the main resident orchestra of the Glyndebourne Festival Opera...
conducted by Bernard Herrmann
Bernard Herrmann
Bernard Herrmann was an American composer noted for his work in motion pictures.An Academy Award-winner , Herrmann is particularly known for his collaborations with director Alfred Hitchcock, most famously Psycho, North by Northwest, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo...
, who championed Raff's orchestral music. He described it as "one of the finest examples of the Romantic Programme School - it deserves a place alongside the Symphonie fantastique
Symphonie Fantastique
Symphonie Fantastique: Épisode de la vie d'un Artiste...en cinq parties , Op. 14, is a program symphony written by the French composer Hector Berlioz in 1830. It is one of the most important and representative pieces of the early Romantic period, and is still very popular with concert audiences...
of Berlioz
Hector Berlioz
Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
, Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
's Faust Symphony
Faust Symphony
A Faust Symphony in three character pictures , S.108, or simply the "Faust Symphony", was written by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt and was inspired by Johann von Goethe's drama, Faust...
and the Manfred Symphony
Manfred Symphony
The Manfred Symphony in B minor, Op. 58, is a programmatic symphony composed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky between May and September 1885. It is based on the poem "Manfred" written by Lord Byron in 1817...
of Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
".
Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
was a pupil of Hans von Bülow
Hans von Bülow
Hans Guido Freiherr von Bülow was a German conductor, virtuoso pianist, and composer of the Romantic era. He was one of the most famous conductors of the 19th century, and his activity was critical for establishing the successes of several major composers of the time, including Richard...
, a friend of Raff's, and it has been said that Strauss was influenced in his early works by Raff. For example, Raff's Symphony No. 7 In the Alps (1877) could be compared with Strauss's An Alpine Symphony (1915). Much of Raff's music has been said to forecast the early works of Jean Sibelius
Jean Sibelius
Jean Sibelius was a Finnish composer of the later Romantic period whose music played an important role in the formation of the Finnish national identity. His mastery of the orchestra has been described as "prodigious."...
.
Raff also composed in most other genres, including 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, 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...
, chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
and works for solo piano. His chamber works include two piano sonata
Piano sonata
A piano sonata is a sonata written for a solo piano. Piano sonatas are usually written in three or four movements, although some piano sonatas have been written with a single movement , two movements , five or even more movements...
s, five violin sonata
Violin sonata
A violin sonata is a musical composition for violin, which is nearly always accompanied by a piano or other keyboard instrument, or by figured bass in the Baroque period.-A:*Ella Adayevskaya**Sonata Greca for Violin or Clarinet and Piano...
s, a cello sonata
Cello sonata
A cello sonata is usually a sonata written for cello and piano, though other instrumentations are used, such as solo cello. The most famous Romantic-era cellos sonatas are those written by Johannes Brahms and Ludwig van Beethoven...
, a piano quintet
Piano quintet
In European classical music, a piano quintet is a work of chamber music written for piano and four other instruments, most commonly piano, two violins, viola, and cello . Among the most frequently performed piano quintets are those by Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, César Franck, Antonín Dvořák...
, two piano quartet
Piano quartet
In European classical music, piano quartet denotes a chamber music composition for piano and three other instruments, or a musical ensemble comprising such instruments...
s, a string sextet
String sextet
In classical music, a string sextet is a composition written for six string instruments, or a group of six musicians who perform such a composition. Most string sextets have been written for an ensemble consisting of two violins, two violas, and two cellos....
and four piano trio
Piano trio
A piano trio is a group of piano and two other instruments, usually a violin and a cello, or a piece of music written for such a group. It is one of the most common forms found in classical chamber music...
s. Many of these works are now commercially recorded. He also wrote numerous suites, some for smaller groups (there are suites for piano solo and suites for string quartet), some for orchestra and one each for piano and orchestra and violin and orchestra.
Symphonies
- Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 96 "An das Vaterland"
- Symphony No. 2 in C major, Op. 140
- Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 153 "Im Walde"
- Symphony No. 4 in G minor, Op. 167
- Symphony No. 5 in E major, Op. 177 "Lenore"
- Symphony No. 6 in D minor, Op. 189 "Gelebt, Gestrebt, Gelitten, Gestritten, Gestorben, Umworben"
- Symphony No. 7 in B flat major, Op. 201 "In den Alpen"
- Symphony No. 8 in A major, Op. 205 "Frühlingsklänge"
- Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 208 "Im Sommer"
- Symphony No. 10 in F minor, Op. 213 "Zur Herbstzeit"
- Symphony No. 11 in A minor, Op. 214 "Der Winter"
Concertos
- Konzertstück "La Fée d'amour", for violin and orchestra Op. 67
- Konzertstück "Ode au printemps" in G major, for piano and orchestra, Op. 76
- Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 161
- Suite for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 180
- Piano Concerto in C minor, Op. 185 (Allegro; Andante; Finale: Allegro)
- Cello Concerto No. 1, Op. 193
- Suite for Piano and Orchestra in E-flat, Op. 200
- Cello Concerto No. 2, WoO. 45
- Violin Concerto No. 2, Op. 206
Suites
- Suite for Orchestra No. 1, Op. 101
- Italian Suite for Orchestra, WoO. 36
- Suite for Orchestra No. 2 "In ungarischer Weise", Op. 194
- Suite for Orchestra "Aus Thüringen", WoO. 46
Opera
- Benedetto Marcello, based loosely on the life of the composer Benedetto MarcelloBenedetto MarcelloBenedetto Marcello was a Venetian composer, writer, advocate, magistrate, and teacher.-Life:...
.
Other orchestral works
- Orchestral pieces, Op. 85
- Jubilee overture, Op. 103
- Festival overture, Op. 117
- Concert overture, Op. 123
- "A mighty fortress is our God:" Overture to a drama about the Thirty Years War, Op. 127
- Rhapsody for Orchestra "Abends", Op. 136b
- Festival March, Op. 139
- Sinfonietta, Op. 188
- Elegy for Orchestra, WoO. 48
- Orchestral Prelude to Shakespeare's "The Tempest", WoO. 50
- Orchestral Prelude to Shakespeare's "Macbeth", WoO. 51
- Orchestral Prelude to Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet", WoO. 52
- Orchestral Prelude to Shakespeare's "Othello", WoO. 53
- Grand Fugue for Orchestra, WoO. 57
- Overture to "Benedetto Marcello"
- Overture to "La Parole"
- Overture to "Dame Kobold", Op. 154
- Orchestration of BachJohann Sebastian BachJohann 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...
's Chaconne from Violin Partita No. 2Solo Violin Partita No. 2 (Bach)The Partita in D minor for solo violin by Johann Sebastian Bach was written during the period 1717–1723 and one scholar, Professor Helga Thoene, suggests this partita, and especially its last movement, was a tombeau, written in memory of Bach's first wife, Maria Barbara Bach , though this...
Chamber Music
- String Quartet No. 1, Op. 77
- String Quartet No. 2, Op. 90
- Piano Trio No. 1, Op. 102
- Piano Quintet, Op. 107
- Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 112
- String Quartet No. 3, Op. 135
- String Quartet No. 4, Op. 136
- String Quartet No. 5, Op. 137
- Piano Trio No. 3, Op. 155
- Piano Trio No. 4, Op. 158
- String Octet, Op. 176
- String Sextet, Op. 178
- Sinfonietta for 10 Wind Instruments, Op. 188 (2fl, 2ob, 2cl, 2bn, 2hn)
- String Quartet No. 6, Op. 192 No. 1 "Suite in Ancient Style"
- String Quartet No. 7, Op. 192 No. 2 "The Maid of the Mill" [Die Schöne Müllerin]
- String Quartet No. 8, Op. 192 No. 3 "Suite in Canon Form"
- Piano Quartet No. 1, Op. 202 No. 1
- Piano Quartet No. 2, Op. 202 No. 2
External links
- An encyclopedic site devoted to Raff's works, with reviews, sound clips, and discussion forums Raff.org
- Sound-bites from String Quartet Nos.1 & 7, String Octet, and Piano Trio Nos.3 & 4