Max von Schillings
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Max von Schillings (April 19, 1868 – July 24, 1933) was a German conductor, composer and theatre director. He was chief conductor at the Berlin State Opera from 1919 to 1925.
Schillings' opera Mona Lisa (1915) was internationally successful and was performed at the Metropolitan Opera. The composer married Barbara Kemp, the soprano who sang the title role. Before Mona Lisa, Schillings had already written three operas: Ingwelde (1894), Der Pfeifertag (1899) and Der Moloch (1906).
Biography
Born in
Max Schillings was given a professorship by the Royal
As early as the 1890s, he was given a position as an assistant at the Bayreuth Festival; later he was engaged as a conductor and music teacher in Munich. Between 1908 and 1918 he was the Intendant at the Königlichen Hoftheater (Royal Court Theatre) in Stuttgart, for which he received the honor mentioned above. From 1918 to 1925, he succeeded Richard Strauss as intendant of the State Opera in Berlin, whilst concurrently being the musical director of the summer-time Zoppot Forest Opera. In the second half of this decade, he undertook concert tours which took him through Europe and to the USA.
Having returned to Germany, he took over the job of President of the Prussian Academy of the Arts in 1932, succeeding Max Liebermann. From March 1933 until his death, Schillings was also the artistic director of the Städtische Oper Berlin. He died in 1933 from a pulmonary embolism in Berlin. His ashes were entombed at Frankfurt-am-Main.
His composition work includes several operas, melodramas, choral works, chamber music pieces, violin and piano concertos, symphonic poems and works for stage (see list below). His most important work is undoubtedly his opera Mona Lisa (first performed on September 26, 1915, in Stuttgart), which became one of the most-performed operas in Germany until his death. He stands beside Engelbert Humperdinck and Richard Strauss as one of the composers who re-established the music form of melodrama at the start of the 20th century. Schillings was renowned as a music educator – one of his more famous students was Wilhelm Furtwängler. He was the dedicatee of "Sea Drift" by Frederick Delius.
Schillings was an opponent of the
Selected works
Operas
- Ingwelde
- Der Pfeifertag
- Moloch op. 20
- Mona Lisa (1913/15, libretto by Beatrice von Dovsky)
Melodramas
- Das Hexenlied, op. 15
- Kassandra
- Das Eleusische Fest
Concertos
- Violin Concerto in A minor, op. 25
Chamber music
- String quartet in E minor
- String quintet, op. 32
Miscellaneous
- Glockenlieder ("Bell Songs"), op. 22
- Meergruß und Seemorgen (Sea Greeting and Lake Morning), op. 6
- Vier liederen aus der Wanderzeit ("Four Songs from the Wandering Time"), op.2
Literature
- Gedenkschrift Prof. Dr. phil. h.c. Max von Schillings, Komponist und Dirigent, Zum 100. Geburtstag 19. April 1968, J. Geuenich + K. Strahn, Düren 1968
- Max von Schillings, Der Kampf eines deutschen Künstlers (Max von Schillings, The struggles of a German artist), Wilhelm Raup, Hanseatische Verlaganstalt Hamburg, 1935.
- Max von Schillings. August Richard, Drei-Masken-Verlag München, 1922
- Max von Schillings, Gesamtverzeichnis seiner Werke (Max von Schillings, A Summary of his Works), Joachim Beck
Documents
Letters by Max von Schillings held by the State Archives in Leipzig, company archives of the Music Publishing House C.F.Peters (Leipzig).
Sources
- Much of the content of this article comes from the equivalent German-language Wikipedia article (retrieved June 21, 2007).
- Levi, Erik: 'Schillings, Max von', Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed [June 21, 2006]), Grove Music.
External links
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