Classical
Johann Nicolaus Forkel
1749–1818 · Meeder · German historian, theorist and bibliographer of music
Johann Nikolaus Forkel (Meeder, near Coburg, 1749 – 1818) is regarded as one of the founders of modern musicology. Born into a modest family, his work spanned music history, music theory and music bibliography, and his work at the University of Göttingen helped shape the discipline as it is understood today.
The son of a shoemaker, Forkel received his first keyboard lessons from the local cantor and trained in theory largely on his own, from printed treatises by Mattheson, Scheibe and Nichelmann. After spending time in Lüneburg and Schwerin, where he was valued by Duke Frederick, he obtained a scholarship to study at Göttingen, where he enrolled in 1769. In 1770 he was appointed university organist and from then on held various musical posts at the university until his death. In 1779 he became musical director, a position from which he organised an annual series of concerts accompanied by lectures. His marriage, in 1781, ended in divorce in 1793. In 1787 he received his doctorate from the university without examination, and in 1788 he published the first volume of his Allgemeine Geschichte der Musik, a general history of music that was left unfinished.
In 1792 his Allgemeine Litteratur der Musik appeared, a bibliography notable for its rigour in arrangement and commentary. Around 1801 he began to collaborate on the edition of Bach's keyboard works and, in 1802, published his biography Ueber Johann Sebastian Bachs Leben, Kunst und Kunstwerke, based on information received from the composer's eldest sons. Although it is an indispensable primary source, it contains errors, such as the claim that Bach simplified his works. Forkel also conceived of music as an expression of human feeling, closer to language than to mathematics, and valued the fugue as the most elevated instrumental form.
His legacy is twofold: his histories and bibliographies established models of method, and his biography of Bach marked the beginning of the Bach revival. His own works, it seems, were considered dry in his time and are today largely forgotten.
Notable works and achievements
- Allgemeine Geschichte der Musik (1788–1801, unfinished)
- Allgemeine Litteratur der Musik (1792)
- Ueber Johann Sebastian Bachs Leben, Kunst und Kunstwerke (1802)
- Ueber die Theorie der Musik (1777)
- Geschichte der italiänischen Oper (1789)
Teachers and pupils
Studied with
- Johann Heinrich Schulthesius (keyboard)
Pupils
- Gottlieb Streitwolf (theory)
Stories about Johann Nicolaus Forkel
Anecdotes and curiosities
A cobbler's son with a gift for music
Born to a shoemaker, Forkel took his first keyboard lessons from the local Kantor, yet much of his theoretical knowledge came from his own self-directed study. As a teenager he sang in Lüneburg, and he later spent more than fifty years tied to a university where he eventually directed all its music.
A biography built on family testimony
His 1802 book on Bach gained rare weight because he could still correspond with two of Bach's sons, Carl Philipp Emanuel and Wilhelm Friedemann. Those direct exchanges preserved details that would otherwise have been lost to history.
Collecting rare books when they were cheap
He assembled his library carefully at a time when rare volumes could be bought cheaply. Today a considerable part of it sits within the Berlin Royal Library, a lasting trace of his passion for collecting.
Source: Wikipedia (EN) · CC BY-SA 4.0