JAVS Spring 2020

With Viola in Hand

J.G. Knechtel’s Concerto in E-flat for Viola and Strings By Baird Knechtel

This short but very attractive work by Johann Georg Knechtel (1710–1783) apparently was originally written for French horn, and transcribed for viola by a certain P. S.(?) Wascher. According to Moritz Fürstenau’s Zur Geschichte Der Musik Und Des Theaters Am Hofe Zu Dresden (On the History of Music at the Court of Dresden) , Knechtel played first horn in the Staatskapelle Dresden (Dresden Court Orchestra) from 1734, taking over from Johann Adam Schindler. In 1756 he switched to the cello (as told in Andreas Schreiber’s Von der Churfürstlichen Cantorey zur sächsischen Staatskapelle Dresden ), continuing on until 1773.

Figure 1. The Semperoper Dresden, home to the Staatskapelle Dresden. Photo provided by the author.

originally built in 1841, and reconstructed in 1878 and again in 1985. Performances are still held there today. The current conductor is Christian Thielmann, whose contract runs until 2024. As many readers will know, the horn became very popular in the 18 th century. French horn expert Douglas Myers gives the following account on his website:

Two of Knechtel’s horn concertos have been preserved in a collection of 18 horn concertos by Dresden composers, at the University Library in Lund, Sweden. The Concerto in E Flat for Viola is labelled in the Lund collection as being in Dis-Dur (D Major). A third horn concerto, in F major, has recently surfaced in the Alströmer collection, at the Music and Theatre Library of Sweden in Stockholm. There may well have been many more; but during the Seven Years War, Prussian artillery fire destroyed the Dresden Court music archive—and what few works survived were in desperate condition. The Staatskapelle is one of the world’s oldest court orchestras, founded in 1548. Their concert hall, the Semperoper, is located in the heart of Dresden. It was

In Europe around 1700, the horn suddenly burst onto the musical scene. Almost overnight, this fashionable instrument was being heard in instrumental music and in opera. Previously, the horn was only known as an outdoor signal instrument for the favorite sport of the nobility, the Hunt.[. . .] Primitive fanfares using just three or four low notes of the horn were played at the beginning and at the end of the Hunt.

Journal of the American Viola Society / Vol. 36, No. 1, Spring 2020

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