German composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music (1711-1783)
Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer (18 September 1711 – 7 April 1783) was an Austrian composer of
symphonies,
concertos,
operas, and
chamber music, and a member of the
Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.
Biography
Holzbauer was born in
Vienna. Despite the opposition of his parents, who intended him for the law, he studied music, and in 1745 became
kapellmeister to Count Rottal and at the Court Theatre of Vienna. Later he was kapellmeister at
Stuttgart, Germany.[1] His operas include Il figlio delle selve, which was the opening performance of the
Schlosstheater Schwetzingen in 1753. Its success led to a job offer from the court at Mannheim, Germany, where he stayed for the rest of his life, continuing to compose and to teach, his students including
Johann Anton Friedrich Fleischmann (1766–1798), the
pianist, and
Carl Stamitz. Holzbauer died in
Mannheim, having been entirely deaf for some years.
His opera Günther von Schwarzburg, based on the life of the eponymous
king (and described
here), was an early German national opera, a performance of which
Mozart and his sister attended, through which they met
Anton Raaff, who was later to premiere a role in Idomeneo. This opera has recently been recorded on the label
cpo. Holzbauer wrote 196 symphonies.[1]
Mozart also composed nine
numbers for insertion in a Miserere by Holzbauer on commission by the Parisian
Concert Spirituel in 1778, but they have been lost. They have been given the catalog number
KV 297a in the list of Mozart's works.