Niels Gade - 'Michel Angelo' Concert Overture in F Minor, Op.39

Описание: - - -
Orchestra: Lyngby-Taarbæk Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Claes Eriksson
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Niels Wilhelm Gade was a Danish composer, conductor, violinist, organist and teacher. Together with Johan Peter Emilius Hartmann, he was the leading Danish musician of his day, in the period known as the Danish Golden Age.
Gade was born in Copenhagen, the son of a joiner and instrument maker. He was intended for his father's trade, but his passion for a musician's career, made evident by the ease and skill with which he learned to play upon a number of instruments, was not to be denied. Though he became proficient on the violin under Frederik Wexschall, and in the elements of theory under Christoph Weyse and Weyse's pupil Andreas Berggreen, he was to a great extent self-taught.
He began his professional career as a violinist with the Royal Danish Orchestra, which premiered his concert overture Efterklange af Ossian ("Echoes of Ossian") in 1841. When the performance of his first symphony had to be delayed in Copenhagen, it was sent to Felix Mendelssohn. Mendelssohn received the work positively, and conducted it in Leipzig in March 1843, to enthusiastic public reaction. His work attracted the notice of the king, who gave the composer a Danish government fellowship which enabled him to go to Leipzig and Italy. Moving to Leipzig, Gade taught at the Conservatory there, working as an assistant conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra, and befriending Mendelssohn, who had an important influence on his music.
In 1845 Gade conducted the premiere of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor with Ferdinand David at the violin. He also became friends with Robert Schumann and Robert Franz. Robert Schumann wrote a long enthusiastic article describing Gade as an exceptional young musician having the looks of Mozart and the four letters of whose name were those of the four strings of the violin. In his correspondence he talks of Gade as a rare talent with whom he sympathises as only with few. One of Schumann's piano pieces is entitled "Gade" and based on the notes G-A-D-E, and Schumann's third piano trio is dedicated to Gade. Gade conducted the first performance of Schumann's piano Concerto with Clara Schumann at the piano.