Kindred spirits: Schumann and Verhulst

SPIEGEL HALL 1:40-14:05 PM - Ton Braas on Johannes Verhulst

Johannes Verhulst? This Dutch friend of Robert Schumann wrote one of the most impressive compositions of nineteenth-century Holland with his Mass. Did you know that Verhulst was one of the first to conduct Bach's Matthäus in our country?

Verhulst at the top
Schumann and the six years younger Verhulst (1816-1891) also manifested themselves as conductors. Verhulst was the most important composer the Netherlands produced in the first half of the nineteenth century. Moreover, in the second half of the century he ruled the musical life of both Amsterdam and The Hague as a conductor.

Schumann and his idol Bach
Verhulst was a great admirer of Handel and arranged his oratorios for his choral performances. Schumann was music director in Düsseldorf, where he had great difficulty with recalcitrant orchestra members. But with his choir members, assisted by his wife Clara at the piano, he got along well. For them he wrote ballads and arranged cantatas by his idol Bach. Schumann wrote praising words about Verhulst in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik. Here the two find each other in the Mass that Verhulst wrote as a young fellow, and the Dutch premiere of Schumann's orchestration - including clarinet - of Bach's Cantata 105.