Carl Albert Hermann Teike (5 February 1864 – 28 May 1922) was a German composer who wrote over 100

military A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct ...

marches In medieval Europe, a march or mark was, in broad terms, any kind of borderland, as opposed to a national "heartland". More specifically, a march was a border between realms or a neutral buffer zone under joint control of two states in which diff ...

and twenty concert works.

Biography

Born the son of a

blacksmith A blacksmith is a metalsmith who creates objects primarily from wrought iron or steel, but sometimes from other metals, by forging the metal, using tools to hammer, bend, and cut (cf. tinsmith). Blacksmiths produce objects such as gates, gr ...

in Stettin-Altdamm,

Pomerania Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to ...

, Teike was the fourth of 14 children in his family. He began studying music when he was 14, playing a variety of instruments. When he was 19, he joined the army of

Württemberg Württemberg ( ; ) is a historical German territory roughly corresponding to the cultural and linguistic region of Swabia. The main town of the region is Stuttgart. Together with Baden and Hohenzollern, two other historical territories, Württ ...

as a musician in the 123rd König Karls Regiment. He was stationed in the Swabian city

Ulm Ulm () is a city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Danube on the border with Bavaria. The city, which has an estimated population of more than 126,000 (2018), forms an urban district of its own (german: link=no, ...

, where he played

French horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most ...

and percussion for the orchestras of local theaters. Teike began writing military marches, including one in 1889 that would eventually be named '' Alte Kameraden'' ("Old Comrades"). Upon his bandmaster's disapproval of that composition, Teike resigned from the army. A publisher purchased the song from him for twenty

German Goldmark The German mark (german: Goldmark ; sign: ℳ) was the currency of the German Empire, which spanned from 1871 to 1918. The mark was paired with the minor unit of the pfennig (₰); 100 pfennigs were equivalent to 1 mark. The mark was on the ...

. ''Alte Kameraden'' later became one of the most popular marches in the world. Teike became a

police officer A police officer (also called a policeman and, less commonly, a policewoman) is a warranted law employee of a police force. In most countries, "police officer" is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. In some, the use of the ...

in Ulm and married his landlord's daughter. They moved to

Potsdam Potsdam () is the capital and, with around 183,000 inhabitants, largest city of the German state of Brandenburg. It is part of the Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region. Potsdam sits on the River Havel, a tributary of the Elbe, downstream o ...

Brandenburg Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an area of 29,480 sq ...

in 1895, where he continued work as a police officer until illness led to his resignation in 1908. He eventually began working as a postal employee in

Landsberg an der Warthe Landsberg may refer to: * Landsberg (surname) * Margraviate of Landsberg, a march of the Holy Roman Empire * Palatinate-Landsberg, a state of the Holy Roman Empire Places * Landsberg (district), Bavaria, Germany * Landsberg, Saxony-Anhalt, German ...

East Brandenburg The Neumark (), also known as the New March ( pl, Nowa Marchia) or as East Brandenburg (), was a region of the Margraviate of Brandenburg and its successors located east of the Oder River in territory which became part of Poland in 1945. Call ...

, where he died in 1922. Potsdam, Plaque for Carl Teike (20201230 140750 HDR)

Teike is commemorated in Potsdam with a plaque on the exterior of the Mercure Hotel.

External links

*
List of Marches by Carl Teike
* "The Graf Zeppelin March"
"Alte Kameraden" by Carl Teike
1864 births 1922 deaths German composers German police officers Military music composers 19th-century German musicians {{Germany-composer-stub