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Emil Hartmann (1 February 1836, Denmark – 18 July 1898, Copenhagen, Denmark) was a Danish composer of the romantic period, fourth generation of composers in the Danish Hartmann musical family.

Emil Hartmann.
Emil Hartmann.

Early life and education


Hartmann was born on 1 February 1836 in Copenhagen, the eldest son of composer Johan Peter Emilius Hartmann and of his composer wife Emma Hartmann. He grew up in the Zinn House in Copenhagen.

Emil Hartmann got his first education from his father Johan Peter Emilius and brother-in-law Niels Gade. His piano teachers were Niels Ravnkilde (1823-1890) and Anton Rée (1820-1886). Letters from Hans Christian Andersen show that he was composing even before he could talk properly.


Career


Emil Hartmann was a prolific composer who wrote seven symphonies, concertos for respectively violin, cello and piano, several ouvertures, a symphonic poem (Hakon Jarl), orchestral suites, serenades, ballets, operas and singspiels, incidental music and cantatas. He was also the author of multiple works of chamber music (nonet, piano quintet, string quartets, clarinet quartets, piano trios, serenade for clarinet, cello and piano, sonatas for violin and piano, etc), songs and piano music. His opera Ragnhild («Runenzauber» in German) was created by Gustav Mahler in Hamburg. His music is resolutely Nordic, colourful and melodic and won great popularity in his days when performed. At the time, his arrangements of Scandinavian folk music became famous, in line with Brahms’ Hungarian Dances or Dvorak's Slavonic Dances. Stylistically, his works form a Scandinavian pendant to the music of some of his more famous contemporaries such as Dvorak or Tchaikovsky. Most of his works were published by German editors.

In 1858, Hartmann' s first major work to be played in public was a Passion Hymn on a text by Bernhard Severin Ingemann for Soprano, Chorus and Orchestra, played on Easter Day in Copenhagen Cathedral. That same year, he and his later brother-in-law August Winding were given the task to compose music for August Bournonville's ballet Fjeldstuen. The ballet was first performed at the Royal Theater in Copenhagen in May 1859 and became an immediate success which ran for a long time.

Still in 1859, he received a scholarship and went on study tour to Germany, where he spent most time in Leipzig, but visited also Berlin, Paris and Vienna. After returning to Denmark, he took a position as organist at the St. Johannes Church in Copenhagen in 1861 and from 1871 at the Christiansborg Palace Chapel.

Emil Hartmann was a gifted conductor and went yearly on tour to Germany and elsewhere to conduct his works in the major cities, always to great acclaim. Following the decease of Niels W. Gade, he became his successor at the head of the Copenhagen Musikforeningen for a brief period but had to resign for health reasons.


Family


Emil Hartmann belonged to an old family of artists which dominated Danish musical life for close to a century and a half. He was fourth generation of composers in the Hartmann family, as well as brother-in-law to composers Niels Gade and August Winding, and brother to the sculptor Carl Hartmann.

He married Bolette Puggaard, a daughter of the wealthy merchant and philanthropist Rudolph Puggaard and granddaughter of merchant Hans Puggaard and his painter wife Bolette Puggaard. For his wedding in the Cathedral Vor Frue Kirke in Copenhagen, Niels W. Gade and Hans Christian Andersen wrote in common a wedding cantata. He acquired the house Carlsminde on the countryside North of Copenhagen where he could compose quietly.

Emil Hartmann had three sons, Johannes Palmer Hartmann (1870-1948) who established a large horticulture in Ghent, Rudolph Puggaard Hartmann (1871-1958), an electro-engineer, and Oluf Hartmann (1879-1910), a painter, who died early and in whose memory Carl Nielsen wrote his Andante Lamentoso, "At the bier of a young artist". His two daughters were Bodil Neergaard (1867-1959), a soprano, philanthropist and patron of the arts who lived at Fuglsang Manor in Lolland, and Agnete Lehmann (1868-1902), actress at the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen, and wife of Julius Lehmann (1861-1931), theatre and opera instructor. The Danish film director Lars von Trier descends from Emil Hartmann.


Personality


Emil Hartmann’s highly eccentric personality was multifaceted and reflected both his great charm, his fiery temper and a darker and melancholic side. He had a baroque sense of humour. One day for instance, when he was staying at Fuglsang manor, a German lady, Mrs Ströhmer, had been expected but her arrival had been delayed. So he decided instead to dress himself up with grey curls and a black dress, pretending to be her, and played his role so well that none of the other guests doubted a minute that he was really «Mrs Ströhmer». One of them whispered to her neighbour that this was really a «rather vulgar person». The children were struggling to remain serious. However, at one point, «Mrs Ströhmer» made a dramatic gesture pointing at a painting on the wall of the naked Kraka, trying in vain to hide her charms by means of a fishing net, and said loudly in German: «Ah, maybe the late baroness?», whereupon everybody burst into laughter and the disguise could no longer be hidden.

Emil Hartmann was a cosmopolitan and used to say: «Yes of course, God, King and Country, and the World Axe goes through the horse in Kongens Nytorv«(statue in Copenhagen’s central square). His son Rudolph describes also his hostility to the rampant anti-semitism of the day, one of his favourite sayings being that «we are all Jews for our Lord».

All his life, Emil Hartmann suffered from poor health, psychological troubles and regular depressions, and decided on several occasions to reside in psychiatric institutions for treatment. His later years were marked by a growing weakness that often put him in dark moods; he tried then to abreact by taking a walk with a whip and crack it at imaginary critics of his art.

After his death, his music fell in oblivion, but is having a certain renaissance lately.


List of works


Here is an incomplete list of his works:


Sources





На других языках

[de] Emil Hartmann (Komponist)

Emil Wilhelm Emilius Zinn Hartmann (* 21. Februar 1836 in Kopenhagen; † 18. Juli 1898 ebenda) war ein dänischer Komponist und Sohn von Johann Peter Emilius Hartmann.
- [en] Emil Hartmann

[ru] Хартман, Эмиль

Эмиль Хартман (дат. Emil Hartmann; 1 февраля 1836 (1836-02-01), Копенгаген — 18 июля 1898, Копенгаген) — датский композитор и органист, сын Й. П. Э. Хартмана.


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