Composers and Performers

Of the hundreds of song-composers working in German-speaking countries in the second half of the eighteenth century, only a handful are still household names: C.P.E. Bach, Gluck, Haydn, Mozart, Quantz, Telemann. Among these it is only Bach whose keyboard songs form a really important part of his total output, both as regards intrinsic worth and historical impact. By contrast, Gluck’s Klöpstock-settings, although far from negligible, fade into insignificance beside his operas. ¹ It is impossible to bring to mind a great composer who achieved a major and revolutionary development in the eighteenth-century Lied as did, say, Mozart with the piano concerto or Haydn with the string quartet. It is probably not unjust to say that the German songs of Haydn, Mozart, Quantz or Telemann are no more than an interesting and attractive sideline when related to the composer’s oeuvre as a whole. Towards the turn of the century and slightly beyond, we find a number of gifted minor composers who, to a greater or lesser extent, concentrated on solo keyboard songs (Reichardt, Zelter, Zumsteeg), but in general the development of eighteenth-century German song is the joint achievement of a large number of composers, most of whom made their modest contributions unobtrusively. Few were full-time composers; they usually combined their activity with some salaried post, as orchestral player, court or municipal music-director, teacher, organist or choirmaster.