Johann Heinrich Andreas Vohs (probably 16 March 1763 in
Kleve
Kleve (; traditional en, Cleves ; nl, Kleef; french: Clèves; es, Cléveris; la, Clivia; Low Rhenish: ''Kleff'') is a town in the Lower Rhine region of northwestern Germany near the Dutch border and the River Rhine. From the 11th century ...
– 16 July 1804 in Stuttgart) was a German actor and singer.
Life
From 1787 Vohs belonged to the touring troupe of Christian Wilhelm Klos, who played in the Rhineland, and from 1789 to February 1790 to the
Theater Bonn
Theater Bonn (also known as the Stadttheater Bonn) is the municipal theatre company of Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is an organization that produces operas, musicals, ballets, plays, and concerts. It operates several performance venu ...
, where the young
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...
played in the orchestra. He then joined Peter Matthias Rheinberg's touring troupe.
On 30 May 1792 Vohs made his debut in
Weimar
Weimar is a city in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It is located in Central Germany between Erfurt in the west and Jena in the east, approximately southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouri ...
, where he met great success in the role of Carl Moor in Schiller's drama ''
The Robbers
''The Robbers'' (', ) is the first drama by German playwright Friedrich Schiller. The play was published in 1781 and premiered on 13 January 1782 in Mannheim, Germany, and was inspired by Leisewitz' earlier play ''Julius of Taranto''. It wa ...
'' on 9 June.
Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as treat ...
soon entrusted him with the direction. On 29 June 1793 he married the 14 years younger actress
Friederike Porth with whom he had five children.
Other important roles included Max Piccolomini in ''
Die Piccolomini'' (premiere on 30 January 1799) and ''
Wallenstein's Death'' (premiere on 20 April 1799) as well as the title role in ''
Macbeth
''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
'' in Schiller's arrangement (premiere on 14 May 1800). In the world premiere of Schiller's
''Mary Stuart'' on 14 June 1800 he impersonated Mortimer, and his wife the title role.
In September 1802 he went with his wife to Stuttgart and took over the post of artistic director at the
Hoftheater.
He died there at the age of 41.
Further reading
*
Alexander Wheelock Thayer
Alexander Wheelock Thayer (October 22, 1817 – July 15, 1897) was an American librarian and journalist who became the author of the first scholarly biography of Ludwig van Beethoven, still after many updatings regarded as a standard work of refer ...
, ''Ludwig van Beethovens Leben, Nach dem Original-Manuskript deutsch bearbeitet von
Hermann Deiters
Hermann Deiters (27 June 183311 May 1907) was a German writer about music, and educator. He is known for his writings about Ludwig van Beethoven, publishing the composer's first major biography as a translation of Alexander Wheelock Thayer's work ...
''.
''Ludwig van Beethovens Leben : nach dem original-manuskript deutsch bearbeitet von Hermann Deiters''
on WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the OCL ...
Volume 1, 3rd edition, Leipzig 1917,
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vohs, Heinrich
German male stage actors
18th-century German male singers
1763 births
1804 deaths
People from Kleve