Ernst Wendel (26 March 1876 – 21 May 1938) was a German violinist and conductor.
Life
Wendel was born in
Breslau. For one season in 1896/97 Wendel was
concertmaster
The concertmaster (from the German ''Konzertmeister''), first chair (U.S.) or leader (U.K.) is the principal first violin player in an orchestra (or clarinet in a concert band). After the conductor, the concertmaster is the second-most signifi ...
of the
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) was founded by Theodore Thomas in 1891. The ensemble makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival. The music director is Riccardo Muti, who began his tenure ...
under
Theodore Thomas. From 1909 to 1935, he was
General Music Director
A music(al) director or director of music is the person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert band, the di ...
of the
Bremer Philharmoniker
The Bremer Philharmoniker is the official orchestra of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen. In addition to the music theatre in the Theater Bremen they organise 28 Philharmonic concerts per season, various special, benefit and chamber concerts a ...
. As a violinist, he taught
Georg Kulenkampff
Alwin Georg Kulenkampff-Post (23 January 1898 – 4 October 1948) was a German virtuoso violinist. One of the most popular German concert violinists of the 1930s and 1940s, he was considered one of the finest violinists of the 20th century.
Kule ...
. In 1914, in
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...
and in 1925/26, he conducted the
Frankfurter Museumsgesellschaft. In 1913, he conducted Anton Bruckner's ''
Symphony No. 9'' for the first time in Russia. He made his mark on .
Wendel was married to the concert pianist Ilse Wendel ''née'' Wolde. His younger son was the set and costume designer Heinrich Wendel (1915-1980).
[Bernd-Ulrich Hergemöller (ed.): ''Mann für Mann: Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte von Freundesliebe und mannmännlicher Sexualität im deutschen Sprachraum, Teil 1.'' LIT Verlag, Münster 2010, , p. 1246f. ().]
Wendel died in Jena aged 62.
Work
* ''Das Grab im Busento'', for male choir with orchestra
* ''Das deutsche lied'', for men's choir with orchestra
He also composed ''
a cappella
''A cappella'' (, also , ; ) music is a performance by a singer or a singing group without instrumental accompaniment, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. The term ''a cappella'' was originally intended to differentiate between Ren ...
'' men's choirs and
Lieder
In Western classical music tradition, (, plural ; , plural , ) is a term for setting poetry to classical music to create a piece of polyphonic music. The term is used for any kind of song in contemporary German, but among English and French sp ...
.
Further reading
* Klaus Blum: ''Musikfreunde und Musici – Musikleben in Bremen seit der Aufklärung''. Hans Schneider Verlag, Tutzing 1975, , from page 419
References
External links
*
*
German conductors (music)
German classical violinists
Concertmasters
1876 births
1938 deaths
People from Wrocław
{{Germany-conductor-stub