Johann Ernst Eberlin | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1702-03-27)27 March 1702 |
| Died | 19 June 1762(1762-06-19) (aged 60) |
Johann Ernst Eberlin (27 March 1702 – 19 June 1762) was a German composer andorganist whose works bridge thebaroque andclassical eras. He was a composer of church organ andchoral music.Marpurg claims he wrote as much and as rapidly asAlessandro Scarlatti andGeorg Philipp Telemann, a claim also repeated byLeopold Mozart - though Eberlin did not live nearly as long as either of those two composers.
Eberlin's first musical training began in 1712 at the JesuitGymnasium of St. Salvator inAugsburg. His teachers there were Georg Egger andBalthasar Siberer, who taught him how to play the organ. He began his university education in 1721 at the Benedictine University inSalzburg where he studied law, but from 1723 turned to music.[1][2]
His first breakthrough was in 1727 when he became the organist for CountLeopold von Firmian (thenArchbishop of Salzburg).[citation needed] He reached the peak of his career when he was the organist for ArchbishopAndreas Jakob von Dietrichstein. By 1749 he held the posts of Hof- und Domkapellmeister (Court and Cathedral chapel master) simultaneously, an achievement which his successorsMichael Haydn,Leopold Mozart, andMozart himself were not to match.[3] Despite Leopold Mozart's great opinion of Eberlin, and having sent his son some of Eberlin's best-known works, his keyboard pieces, the young Mozart later tired of them, writing in a letter of 20 April 1782 that Eberlin's works were "far too trivial to deserve a place besideHandel andBach."[citation needed]
Eberlin composed industriously and played at church concerts. After his death, though, his strict choral pieces in thestile antico faded from popularity and only his keyboard works were (to a limited extent) remembered.[citation needed]
His contemporaries includedAnton Cajetan Adlgasser.
Eberlin composedtoccatas andfugues,[4]masses including theMissa secundi toni,cantatas, a Requiem,psalm settings and operas. He composedoratorios in German onlibrettos by Metastasio:
Editions
Recordings
Sources cited
{{cite encyclopedia}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)By 1749 Eberlin had risen to the highest musical post at the court, with the rank of Hof- und Domkapellmeister, a distinction that his more famous successors in the archbishop's service — Michael Haydn, Leopold Mozart, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart [did not match].
