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orpheus chor münchen
Gerd Guglhör, Leitung

Georg Joseph Vogler, called Abbé Vogler, was born in Würzburg in 1749. He became famous as an expert in music theory, conductor and composer. In 1772, he accepted a position at the court of Prince Elector Karl Theodor in Mannheim and later followed his employer to Munich. From 1786 onwards, he worked at the court of the kings of Sweden as a conductor.
The orpheus chor münchen closely collaborates with the Bavarian Radio Broadcasting Company. The ensemble focuses on choir music from the modern era and on works from the 17th and 18th centuries.

Abbé Vogler Requiem

The composer Georg Joseph Vogler was born in Würzburg in 1749 and died in Darmstadt in 1814. His surviving oeuvre is largely unknown today, although it comprises hundreds of works in many genres – symphonies, concertos, chamber music, operas and singspiels, masses and oratorios. Vogler was actually far more than just a composer. He was noted for his numerous writings on music theory, directed various court chapels, taught (his most important pupils were Carl Maria von Weber and Giacomo Meyerbeer), worked in the fields of organ building and acoustics and even performed as an organ and piano virtuoso.

The son of a violin maker, he initially studied law at the universities of Würzburg and Bamberg before joining the court of Mannheim in 1771, in order to “deepen his knowledge of music”. Elector Karl Theodor supported the young musician and granted him a scholarship to study in Italy. Vogler visited Padua, Bologna and Rome, where he received instruction from Hasse and other teachers, and also took holy orders. Abbé Vogler was appointed deputy kapellmeister to the electoral court soon after his return to Mannheim.

Initially remaining in Mannheim after the court had moved to Munich, Vogler established the Mannheim Tonschule, “the first systematic institute for music”, in which he accepted pupils without regard to status, sex or religion and held public lectures that were published under the title Kenntnisse in der Tonwissenschaft in 1776.

rom 1780 he spent several years in Paris and London. He would travel extensively for the rest of his life, giving concerts and lectures in music theory wherever he went. Vogler was appointed first kapellmeister to the Munich court in 1784, but again embarked on a tour in March 1785, this time to Germany and the Netherlands. King Gustav III of Sweden appointed Vogler director of music to his court in Stockholm in 1786, but in late 1787 the musician‘s restless nature caused him to tour for several years through Russia, the Baltic States, Poland, Germany, Holland and England, before returning to Sweden and finally, in June 1800, to Germany.

Vogler was in Munich in 1805/06. Having developed a system for simplifying organ building that aimed at deriving the maximum sound from the most economically designed structure, he now modified the organ in the Peterskirche accordingly. He went on to begin a similar modification of the organ in the Michaelskirche, where his friend Caspar Ett worked, but financial straits forced him to discontinue the work. In 1807 Grand Duke Ludewig of Hesse appointed Vogler privy councillor for ecclesiastical affairs at his court in Darmstadt, from where the musician several times travelled to Munich to complete the organs he had begun to build there.

Abbé Vogler won great acclaim in Munich. As kapellmeister to the Munich court opera, he composed an opera seria for the Munich carnival of 1784; Castor et Pollux was revived in 1806 and found great favour with Crown Prince Ludwig, at whose instigation Vogler became a corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. Extremely large audiences attended the concerts Vogler gave on October 16 and 19, 1809 on the new organ built in accordance with his system in the Munich Peterskirche; even the court attended the first concert. The highlights of his appearances were always programmatic semi-improvised works. Vogler was famous for his musical representations of thunderstorms, earthquakes and the fall of Jericho. According to the Munich music commentator Lipowski, he painted with notes as if with colours, calculated “the musical effect, concentrated on excellent euphony, the correct representation of overflowing feelings and true emotion, combining melody with rich harmony, and was exceptionally liked”. Profanely theatrical tone-painting is also found in his sacred works.

It is possible that Vogler composed his large Requiem in E flat major during his time in Munich in 1805/06. When Joseph Haydn died in Vienna in 1809, Vogler vainly strove to have the work performed at the funeral. The Requiem was in fact never performed in his lifetime, being published four years after his death. Referred to by Carl Maria von Weber as “divine”, the work was well liked by contemporaries but soon forgotten.