Karl Holz (violinist)
Karl Holz (1798 – 9 November 1858
Early career
In Vienna in 1819, the violinist
In 1824, Beethoven, who had not written a string quartet since his
Beethoven's secretary
While Holz was working as one of Beethoven's copyists, the composer fired his current secretary Anton Schindler and Holz became Beethoven's secretary in 1825. Letters to Holz and entries in Beethoven's conversation books (used when conversing with the deaf composer in his later years) show that Holz was a devoted admirer, and of great help to the composer. Beethoven reconciled with Schindler in 1826; Schindler returned to assist Holz with managing Beethoven's affairs.[3][4]
Some years later, Holz talked to the music scholar Ludwig Nohl about the composer during the time of writing the late quartets: "While composing the three quartets requested by Prince Galitzin, such a wealth of new quartet ideas flowed from Beethoven's inexhaustible imagination that he virtually had to write the Quartets in C-Sharp Minor and F Major involuntarily. 'My dear fellow, I've just had another idea,' he would say jocularly and with glistening eyes when we were out walking, and would write down a few notes in his sketchbook."[5]
Also as told to Ludwig Nohl, Holz said, "For him the crowning achievement of his quartet writing, and his favourite piece, was the E-Flat Cavatina in 3/4 time from the Quartet in B-Flat Major Op. 130. He actually composed it in tears of melancholy (during the summer of 1825) and confessed to me that his own music had never had such an effect on him before, and that even thinking back to that piece cost him fresh tears."[6]
After Beethoven
In 1829, Holz became a director of the Concerts Spirituels, a series of concerts in Vienna, which had been established in 1819. (They were based on the Concert Spirituel series of concerts in Paris during religious holidays.) As director, Holz frequently programmed works of Beethoven in the concerts.[1][4]
After Ignaz Schuppanzigh's death in 1830,
References
- ^ a b c Wikisource. (in German). Vol. 9. 1863. p. 243 – via
- ^ a b c The early performers of the quartets of Beethoven Elias String Quartet: the Beethoven Project, accessed 10 April 2014.
- ^ a b c William Drabkin Beethoven Forum, edited by Mark Evan Bonds, Elaine Sisman, accessed 4 May 2014.
- ^ a b Paul Nettl. "Holz, Karl". Beethoven Encyclopedia. Philosophical Library, New York, 1956.
- ^ Beethoven: A Documentary Study, by H. C. Robbins Landon, p180. Thames & Hudson, 1974.
- ^ Beethoven: A Documentary Study, by H. C. Robbins Landon, p190. Thames & Hudson, 1974.