Heinrich Marschner

• Period: Romantic (1820-1869)
• Country: Germany
• Born: August 16, 1795 in Zittau, Saxony
• Died: December 14, 1861 in Hannover
• Genres: Opera

Biography

Heinrich August Marschner is generally considered both a key figure in German opera in the second quarter of the nineteenth century and an important link between Weber and Wagner. His 1827 opera Der Vampyr was an overwhelming success that is still staged today. Marschner followed it shortly with two more operatic triumphs, Der Templer und die Jüdin (1829) and Hans Heiling (1833). After these sensations, Marschner failed to achieve a significant success on stage, though the 1838 opera Der Babu, showed he still possessed remarkable, if inconsistent, talent. Marschner was born in Zittau, Germany, on August 16, 1795. Despite his father's wishes that music be only an amateur pursuit, Marschner converted the instruction provided by his father (studies with Karl Gottlieb Hering and others) into a career as a burgeoning composer, with the appearance of his successful 1810 ballet Die Stolze Bäuerin.

Yet, apparently undecided on his career goals, Marschner traveled to Leipzig in 1813 to study law. But he could not resist music for long, and in 1816 he composed the singspiel Der Kiffhaeuser Berg. It was not a success, as were ensuing stage works, like the opera Saidar und Zulima (1818) and various incidental scores to plays, like Ali Baba, oder Die 40 Räuber (1823). Marschner had little luck in his personal life at this time as well, marrying twice, the first time in 1817, the second in 1820. Both wives died quickly (the first after only six months) and in 1826 Marschner married for the third time, a year after his second wife had died. His new bride was soprano Marianne Wohlbrück.

But his bad luck would soon end with the appearance of his 1827 opera Der Vampyr, composed to a libretto by his new brother-in-law, actor Wilhelm August Wohlbrück. The pair's next collaboration, the aforementioned Der Templer (1829), was also a great success. Marschner was now arguably the undisputed leading figure in German opera. In 1830 he accepted the post of Hofkapellmeister in Hanover, where he would complete Hans Heiling in 1833, regarded by many as his magnum opus. After this triumph Marschner did not produce another successful stage work. Even his personal life returned to its luckless beginnings: his wife died in 1854. But the tenacious Marschner married for the fourth time a year later. He died in Hanover in 1861. ~ Robert Cummings, All Music Guide

(b Zittau, 16 Aug 1795; d Hanover, 14 Dec 1861). German composer. Originally intended for a legal career, he devoted himself to music from 1815-16, when he met Beethoven and became a private music teacher in Bratislava. From 1821 he worked as a stage composer and conductor in Dresden, then at the Leipzig Stadttheater (swiftly winning fame with Der Vampyr, 1827, and Der Templer und die Jüdin, 1829) and, from 1830, at the Hanover Hoftheater, where his Hans Heiling (1831-2) made his name as a leading German opera composer. Outspoken in his advocacy of a true German opera, he was held in high esteem by Mendelssohn and Schumann, and later by Bülow, Hanslick, Spitta and Pfitzner, for his 13 operas, which in content and form represent a link between Weber and Wagner, making him one of the central figures of the Romantic era. They are characterized by a consistent integration of all theatrical means. From creating a protagonist psychologically divided within himself (Der Vampyr), he evolved a drama less dependent on local setting or comic and folk elements than Weber's operas but more melodramatic, stressing explicit musical characterization, motivic development, leitmotif technique and ultimately, in Hiarne (1857-8), through-composition. Since he often sacrificed music for dramatic ends, most of his work is forgotten, but his masterpiece, Hans Heiling, is the definitive expression of the spirit of his age. He also wrote Singspiels, pageants, incidental music, a ballet, over 400 songs and 120 male-voice choruses, and chamber music.

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Marschner, Heinrich August (hīn'rĭkh ou'gʊst märsh'nər) , 1795–1861, German opera composer. Marschner's first opera, Heinrich IV und d'Aubigné, was produced by Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden in 1820. He worked with Weber at the Dresden Opera from 1823 to 1826. His most famous works are Der Vampyr (1828); Der Templer und die Jüdin (1829), based on Scott's Ivanhoe; and Hans Heiling (1833). Marschner's operas continued Weber's romantic style; his use of full orchestration influenced Wagner.

Heinrich August Marschner, the author of the first vampire opera, was born on August 16, 1795, in Zittau, Germany . He manifested an early talent for music but left home at age 18 to pursue law at the University at Leipzig. Fortunately, one of his professors recognized his true talents and convinced him to drop out of law. Marschner moved to Vienna, where he met Beethoven and wrote his first operas. In 1823 he became music director at the opera house at Dresden. Four years later he moved back to Leipzig. By the time of his return to Leipzig, the vampire had become an item of fascination for French artists and that interest was being felt in Germany. Thus, in 1828, while in Leipzig, Marschner wrote his opera Der Vampyr.

The finished piece was a collaborative product. The libretto was written by Wilhelm August Wohlbrück, Marschner's brother-in-law. It was based on Charles Nodier 's very successful stage play that had first brought the vampire to Parisian theater audiences. Nodier's work was in turn based on John Polidori's "The Vampyre". The opera opened with a gathering of witches. Lord Ruthven appeared and was told that he had 24 hours to locate three victims. Janthe, the first of his three victims-to-be, soon arrived, and she and the vampire departed into the vampire's cave where he killed her. Janthe's father then killed Ruthven, but he was revived when his friend Aubry placed him in the moonlight. (Moonlight, a theme introduced by Polidori, was retained in the nineteenth-century works based on "The Vampyre," but disappeared from the twentieth-century lore.)

The next scene was the home of Malwina, the young woman with whom Aubry was in love. They were prevented from consummating their love, however, as Malwina's father had promised his daughter to the Earl of Marsden-that is, Ruthven. Aubry could not expose Ruthven because he had taken an oath never to reveal Ruthven's vampiric condition. On his way to the wedding, Ruthven located his third victim, Emmy, the daughter of a peasant. After killing Emmy he headed for another needed feeding. Unable to prevent the wedding by his best arguments, Aubry finally broke his oath and revealed Ruthven's true nature. Cosmic forces took over, and Ruthven was struck by lightning and fell into the pits of hell. The opera ended with the wedding guests singing a closing song thanking God.

Der Vampyr opened in Leipzig in March 1829. The opera was a great success and was taken on the road. It opened in London in August and ran for some 60 performances at the Lyceum Theater, the same theater that later played such a central role in Bram Stoker's career and the site of the original dramatization of Dracula. In 1831 Marschner continued his career at Hanover, where he wrote his most critically acclaimed work, Hans Heiling. In 1859 he was pensioned as Hanover's general music director. He died two years later on December 14, 1861. The town erected a monument to him in 1877.

Der Vampyr has been revived only rarely since the 1820s; however, in 1992 the BBC sponsored a modern production of it. The new production, entitled Der Vampyr-A Soap Opera, utilized Marschner's music but had a completely new libretto written by Charles Hart that transferred the setting to modern London. Lord Ruthven became Ripley the Vampyr. (His part was sung by Omar Ebrahim.) The outline of the old plot survived, however, and Ripley, after several bloody scenes that would satisfy any vampire enthusiast, received his just reward in the presence of the wedding guests. The new version of Der Vampyr has been released on a Virgin Classics compact disc.

Brautigam, Rob. "Der Vampyr." International Vampire 1, 4 (Summer 1991): 8-10.
---. "The Vampyr-A Soap Opera." International Vampire 10 (1993): 5.

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