Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg was a German

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...

 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...

 and conductor

Conducting

Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...

.

Zumsteeg championed the operas of Mozart in Stuttgart, staging the first performances there of Die Zauberflöte, Don Giovanni

Don Giovanni

Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...

, and Cosi fan tutte

Così fan tutte

Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....

. He also was a prolific composer of lieder and ballads. His ballads had a great influence on the young Franz Schubert

Franz Schubert

Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...

, who imitated a number of Zumsteeg's as studies (some even in exactly the same keys) while he was a teenager.

Zumsteeg's received his early education at the Carlschule 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 ....

. There Zumsteeg became intimate friends with Friedrich Schiller

Friedrich Schiller

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life , Schiller struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe...

. A setting for Schiller's drama, Die Räuber

Die Räuber

The Robbers was the first drama by German playwright Friedrich Schiller. The play was published in 1781 and premiered on January 13, 1782 in Mannheim, Germany. It was written towards the end of the German Sturm und Drang movement and has been considered by many critics, such as Peter Brooks, to...

, 1782, is an example of the type of close collaboration that Zumsteeg undertook with prominent poets.

Perhaps the most well-known of Zumsteeg's compositions are the seven volumes of Kleine Lieder und Balladen published by 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...

 between 1800 and 1805. These were highly popular in Germany, remaining well-known until the 1830s.

In 1783, Zumsteeg married Luise Andreae with whom he had seven children. During most of his career, Zumsteeg was closely connected to the Swabia

Swabia

Swabia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany.-Geography:Like many cultural regions of Europe, Swabia's borders are not clearly defined...

n court, and in 1791 he was appointed court director of music to fill the vacancy left by C. F. D. Schubart

Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart

Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart , was a German poet, born at Obersontheim in Swabia.He entered the university of Erlangen in 1758 as a student of theology. He led a dissolute life, and after two years' stay was summoned home by his parents...

's death. In this capacity, Zumsteeg championed the works of German composers, countering the dominant Italian influence at the court. The last important post he held before his death in 1802 was that of court Konzertmeister.

Works

• Operas
  • Das tatarische Gesetz (1780)
  • Die Geisterinsel (1798)
  • Das Pfauenfest
    Das Pfauenfest
    Das Pfauenfest is a singspiel in two acts by composer Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg. The opera has a German libretto by F. A. C. Werthes and premiered at the Hoftheater in Stuttgart on 24 February 1801.-Synopsis:...
    
    (1801)
  • Elbondocani (1803)
• Duodrama
  • Tamira (1788)
• Ballads
  • Leonore
  • Des Pfarrers Tochter von Taubenhain
  • Die Büßende
  • Die Entführung
  • Das Lied von der Treue
  • Ritter Toggenburg

Sources

• Warrack, John and West, Ewan (1992), The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5

External links