Ferdinand David (musician)
Ferdinand Ernst Victor Carl David (German: [ˈdaːvɪt]; 19 June 1810 – 18 July 1873)[1] was a German virtuoso violinist and composer.
Biography
Born in the same house in
After Mendelssohn's sudden death, David was assigned Kapellmeister of the Gewandhaus Orchestra, a duty he fulfilled 1841–1842 and 1852–1854. He died suddenly in 1873, aged 63, while on a mountain excursion with his children, near
Compositions
David's own compositions number about 50 opuses. They include 12 "theme and variations" pieces for violin and orchestra, five violin concertos, a string sextet, concertinos for violin, bassoon, clarinet, trombone and orchestra, and a number of lieder. Supposedly he also wrote two symphonies and an opera (Hans Wacht, 1852), but these seem not to have been preserved.
David's most played piece today is his Concertino for Trombone and Orchestra, Op. 4. This piece is very often used as the obligatory piece for trombonists auditioning for symphony orchestras around the world.[citation needed]
Editions and arrangements
David had close connections with
He made an arrangement for violin and piano of Niccolò Paganini's 24 Caprices for Solo Violin, which was the version used for the world premiere integral recording of the Caprices, by Ossy Renardy and Walter Robert in 1940, the centenary of Paganini's death; this was seven years before Ruggiero Ricci made the first recording of the original solo violin version.[4] When Renardy re-recorded the Caprices in 1953, he again used David's arrangement.
The
Other
On the recommendation of William Sterndale Bennett, with whom he had worked in Leipzig, David's son Paul David became the first Director of Music at Uppingham School from 1864–1908.[5]
In 1835, the year that Mendelssohn was assigned Kapellmeister of the Gewandhaus Orchestra, there was an audition for the Konzertmeister position. One of the other applicants was Karol Lipiński, the Polish virtuoso. Most probably, the childhood connection between David and Mendelssohn played a part in Mendelssohn choosing David as the Konzertmeister.[citation needed]
References
- ^ "David, Ferdinand (1810-1873) - Composer". Hyperion Records. Retrieved 2013-09-03.
- ^ ISBN 1581126670.
- ^ Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th ed, 1954, Vol. II, p. 606
- ^ Woolf, Jonathan (2003). "Ossy Renardy. The Great Violinists Volume XVIII". Musicweb-international.com. Retrieved 2013-09-03.
- ^ Matthews, Bryan (1984). By God's Grace. A history of Uppingham School.
External links
- Free scores by Ferdinand David at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
- "Ferdinand David". Messianic Judaism Wiki. 2011-11-14. Archived from the original on 2012-04-25. Retrieved 2014-01-01.
- Jong, Cameo (2012). Rediscovering Ferdinand David's violin pedagogy through his Violinschule and zur Violinschule (DMA thesis). University of Iowa. . Retrieved 2014-01-01.