Johann Stamitz

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Johann Stamitz Life

He was born in Deutschbrod on 19 June, 1717, the son of a schoolmaster.
In 1742, he performed as solo violinist at the festivities held in Frankfurt in honour of the coronation of Emperor Karl VII, and created so much enthusiasm for his performance that he attracted the notice of the Elector Palatine Karl Theodore who took him, one year later, to Mannheim as chamber musician.

In 1745, Stamitz rose to the rank of concertmaster and conductor of the Mannheim orchestra.

It was in this position that he made conductorial history, not only by establishing the Mannheim school of conducting but also by developing his orchestra as one of the most technically perfect of the time.

But Stamitz's importance in musical history rests even more with his compositions, in which he proved to be one of the fathers of the symphony, one of the distinguished forerunners of Haydn.

Stamitz's symphonies enjoyed a great popularity in their day, and as early as 1751 they received performances in Paris.
In these symphonies, Stamitz brings new development to the then embryonic sonata form.

Stamitz is historically the most significant composer of the Rococo style, because of the change from the romantic point of view in his instrumental music.

General avoidance of the conventional, pedantic, contrapunal and fugal style; the discarding of the figured bass; frequent use of dynamic expression: it is these qualities which have made more than one recent critic refer to Stamitz as one of the first of the great instrumental composers in music history.

In 1755, Johann Wenzel Stamitz went to Paris to visit his sons, and he sojourned in the Français capital for a brief period.

He died in Mannheim on 30 March, 1757.

The roots of Beethoven exist already in the Mannheim symphonies, in the work of Johann Stamitz.

Through him, instrumental music becomes the supple garment of the living soul, always in movement, perpetually changing, and with its unexpected fluctuations and changes.

The symphonies of Stamitz, though less rich, less beautiful, less exuberant, are more spontaneous than those of a Haydn or Mozart.

Two sons of Johann Wenzel Stamitz ( Karl Stamitz and Johann Anton Stamitz) distinguished themselves as composers, helping their father to bring the symphony form to integration and technical develpment.