Ernesto Köhler (4 December 1849 – 17 March 1907) was an Italian

flautist The flute is a member of a family of musical instruments in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, producing sound with a vibrating column of air. Flutes produce sound when the player's air flows across an opening. In th ...

and

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

. He was considered one of the best flautists of his era. Born in

Modena Modena (, ; ; ; ; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) on the south side of the Po Valley, in the Province of Modena, in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy. It has 184,739 inhabitants as of 2025. A town, and seat of an archbis ...

, Köhler was taught the

flute The flute is a member of a family of musical instruments in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, producing sound with a vibrating column of air. Flutes produce sound when the player's air flows across an opening. In th ...

by his father, Venceslau Joseph Köhler, who was the first flute of the Duke of Modena's

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * String instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, ...

.Flutepage.de
/ref> He moved to Vienna in 1869 as a flautist, and then became a member of the orchestra of the Imperial Opera in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

beginning in 1871. Noted as a composer for flute, Köhler wrote over 100 works for the instrument: études,

duet A duet (italian language, Italian: ''duo'') is a musical composition for two Performing arts, performers in which the performers have equal importance to the piece, often a composition involving two singers or two pianists. It differs from a har ...

s, and solos. He also produced an

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

and several ballets. He is well known among flute players for ''"Flöten-Schule"'' (c. 1880), his popular method for learning the flute, and for ''Progress in Flute Playing'' (his Opus 33, published in the 1880s), a series of three progressive instructional books for the flute player. Köhler also had ties to the

mandolin A mandolin (, ; literally "small mandola") is a Chordophone, stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally Plucked string instrument, plucked with a plectrum, pick. It most commonly has four Course (music), courses of doubled St ...

community; he is credited with writing an early mandolin method, ''Mandolinen Schule, self instructor for the mandolin'', first published in 1887. His mandolin method is thought to be the first mandolin method published in Russian. His publisher was Julius Heinrich Zimmermann. Ernesto Köhler died in Saint Petersburg on 17 March 1907.

References

Sources

Köhler's Page
* Inside cover biography of Ernesto Köhler, "Progress in Flute playing (Op.33) Book 3: 8 Advanced studies", Chester Music, edited by Edward Blakeman http://www.chesternovello.com/default.aspx

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kohler, Ernesto 1849 births 1907 deaths 19th-century Italian classical composers 19th-century Italian male musicians 20th-century Italian classical composers 20th-century male composers 20th-century Italian male musicians Italian classical flautists Italian male classical composers Italian people of German descent Italian Romantic composers 20th-century Italian flautists Burials at Nikolskoe Cemetery