Carl August Peter Cornelius (24 December 1824 – 26 October 1874) was a German composer, writer about music, poet and translator.

Life

He was born in Mainz to Carl Joseph Gerhard (1793–1843) and Friederike (1789–1867) Cornelius, actors in Mainz and Wiesbaden. From an early age he played the violin and composed, eventually studying with

Tekla Griebel-Wandall Tekla Griebel-Wandall (26 February 1866 – 28 June 1940) was a Denmark, Danish composer and music educator. Biography Tekla Griebel was born in Randers, Denmark, the daughter of Theodor Johan Heinrich Griebel (1829–1900) and teacher Camilla J ...

and composition with

Heinrich Esser Heinrich Joseph Esser (15 July 1818 – 3 June 1872) was a German violinist, influential conductor and composer. Biography Heinrich Esser was born in Mannheim. He got musical instruction by Franz Lachner who was court conductor in Mannheim fr ...

in 1841. He lived with his painter uncle Peter von Cornelius in Berlin from 1844 to 1852, and during this time he met prominent figures such as Alexander von Humboldt, the Brothers Grimm, Friedrich Rückert and

Felix Mendelssohn Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include sy ...

. His early compositions included chamber and church music and secular songs, among which stands the Stabat Mater for soloists, choir, and orchestra, composed in 1849. Cornelius's first mature works (including the opera ''

Der Barbier von Bagdad ''Der Barbier von Bagdad'' (''The Barber of Baghdad'') is a comic opera in two acts by Peter Cornelius to a German libretto by the composer, based on ''The Tale of the Tailor'' and ''The Barber’s Stories of his Six Brothers'' in '' One Thousand ...

'') were composed during his brief stay in Weimar (1852–1858). His next place of residence was Vienna, where he lived for five years. It was in Vienna that Cornelius began a friendship with

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...

. At the latter's behest, Cornelius moved to Munich in 1864, where he married and fathered four children. During his last few years in Berlin, Cornelius wrote music criticism for several major Berlin journals and entered into friendships with Joseph von Eichendorff, Paul Heyse and Hans von Bülow. Despite his long-standing association with Wagner and

Franz Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...

(the latter on occasion sought Cornelius's advice when it came to matters of orchestration), Cornelius's relations with the so-called "New German School" of composition were sometimes rocky. For instance, he did not attend the premiere of '' Tristan und Isolde'', using the premiere of his own opera ''Der Cid'' as an excuse. Cornelius's third and final operatic project, ''Gunlöd'', based on the Norse eddas, was left incomplete at his death (from diabetes) in Mainz. He was buried in the city's Hauptfriedhof, and his grave can still be seen there.

Legacy

The Mainz Conservatory was renamed the

Peter Cornelius Conservatory The Peter Cornelius Conservatory (''Peter-Cornelius-Konservatorium der Stadt Mainz'', PCK) is the conservatory in Mainz, the capital of the German state Rhineland-Palatinate. It dates back to a first conservatory founded around 1882. It is named ...

in 1936. The state of Rhineland-Palatinate honors musical achievements with the since 1951. A bust created by

Hugo Lederer Professor Hugo Lederer (16 November 1871, in Znaim – 1 August 1940, in Berlin) was an Austro-Hungarian-born German sculptor. Lederer studied in Dresden under sculptor John Schilling from 1890, then briefly under Christian Behrens. His great ...

in 1930 is displayed in Park Drususwall, Mainz. Several streets and squares are named after him in Mainz () and across other German cities such as Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, Augsburg and Weimar, as well as in Vienna, Salzburg, and

Waalwijk Waalwijk () is a municipality and a city in the southern Netherlands. It had a population of in and is located near the motorways A59 and N261. The villages of Capelle, Vrijhoeve-Capelle, Sprang (the former municipality of Sprang-Capelle) and W ...

, Netherlands. The Peter Cornelius Archive is an extensive collection maintained by the , consisting of the composer’s personal items, documents, and musical works. It includes around 50 original music manuscripts, 58 notebooks with diaries, sketches, and poems, personal memorabilia like death masks, and over 2,600 letters. The archive, enriched by contributions from Cornelius's family, is open to the public for research. In Britain to this day, Cornelius's best-known work is "

The Three Kings "The Three Kings", or "Three Kings From Persian Lands Afar", is a Christmas carol by the German composer Peter Cornelius. He set "Die Könige" for a vocal soloist, accompanied by Philip Nicolai's hymn "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern" ("Ho ...

" (""), a song for solo voice and piano originally from his 1856 song cycle, '' Weihnachtslieder''. The song's melody line is accompanied by the chorale tune of "

Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern "" (; How lovely shines the morning star) is a Lutheran hymn by Philipp Nicolai written in 1597 and first published in 1599. It inspired musical settings through centuries, notably Bach's chorale cantata , but also vocal and instrumental works by ...

" ("How brightly shines the morning star"), written by Philipp Nicolai in 1597. An English translation made in 1928 by H.N. Bate ("Three Kings from Persian lands afar...") was arranged by

Ivor Atkins Sir Ivor Algernon Atkins (29 November 1869 – 26 November 1953) was the choirmaster and organist at Worcester Cathedral from 1897 to 1950, as well as a composer of songs, church music, service settings and anthems. He is best known for editi ...

in 1957 for solo voice and choir, and this version was included in the first volume of the popular David Willcocks and Reginald Jacques compilation ''

Carols for Choirs ''Carols for Choirs'' is a collection of choral scores, predominantly of Christmas carols and hymns, first published in 1961 by Oxford University Press. It was edited by Sir David Willcocks and Reginald Jacques, and is a widely used source of ...

'' in 1961.

Selected works

* Stabat mater for soloists, chorus and orchestra (1849) * ''Brautlieder'' (1856) * ''Weihnachtslieder'', Op. 8 (1856) * ''

'', opera buffa (1858) * ''Der Cid'', opera (1865) * ''Requiem'' ("Seele, vergiß sie nicht"), after a poem of Hebbel (1872) * String quartets * ''Gunlöd'', unfinished opera in three acts (1869–1874) after the Edda (1906) * Mass in D minor, CWV 91 for two soloists, chorus and organ, strings

References

Cited sources

External links

* * * *
Free scores
at the

Mutopia Project The Mutopia Project is a volunteer-run effort to create a library of free content sheet music, in a way similar to Project Gutenberg's library of public domain books. It started in 2000.Portal page at thInternet ArchiveRetrieved January 24, 20 ...

Peter Cornelius
Mahler Foundation
Cornelius, Peter
(in German) Oesterreichisches Musiklexikon {{DEFAULTSORT:Cornelius, Peter 1824 births 1874 deaths 19th-century classical composers 19th-century German composers 19th-century German male writers 19th-century German journalists 19th-century German male musicians 19th-century German poets German Romantic composers German opera composers German male journalists German music critics German male poets German male opera composers Musicians from Mainz People from Rhenish Hesse Pupils of Siegfried Dehn Writers from Mainz