It often happens that people become famous for activities that they themselves perceive as less important than their main ambitions and the German composer and writer Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann (1776-1822) is a good example of this. We know him mainly as the imaginative author of the German Romantic school and as an authoritative music critic. For example, he published a much-cited review of
… Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. However, writing was a side issue for Hoffmann: he wanted to be a composer above all. His love for music went so far as to add Mozart's first name 'Amadeus' to his own first names. As a musician he was partly self-taught, but did take some lessons with Reichardt in Berlin. On this CD, the Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss, conducted by Johannes Goritzki, plays a selection from Hoffmann's incidental music, which he wrote while working at the theater in Bamberg. These include three overtures, of which the "Overture 'Das Kreuz an der Ostsee", dating from 1805, is the longest. In addition, two other parts of Hoffmann's music can be heard with this play, of which the characteristic 'March of the Teutonic Knights' is particularly striking. The "Overture 'Liebe und Eifersucht'" and the "Overture 'Der Trank der Unsterblichkeit'" originate from 1807 and 1808 respectively. The most extensive work is the complete ballet "Arlequin", also from 1808. Hoffmann's music is somewhere in between Mozart and Weber and is pleasant to listen to, although the conclusion that he was a better writer than a composer remains inevitable. (JvG) _more
