What a pity that sound-recording was not invented in the eighteenth century! Then we could hear not only Mozart at the piano and the Mannheim Orchestra, but also that remarkable musical aggregation at the court of the Elector Max Franz at Bonn. Max Franz was the son of the Empress Maria Theresa, and the brother of the Emperor Joseph II and of Marie Antoinette. In order to become Elector of Cologne--a post gained for him by the usual political skullduggery--Max Franz also had to become Archbishop. Obviously he must have been blessed with great theological talent, for he made it from layman to priest in less than a month; later the promotions came easy. He grew very fat thereafter, talked in an asthmatic squeak, and was regarded by many as a penny-pincher. But he obviously had musical taste, and, had not Napoleon got on his high horse and messed Europe up, Max Franz might have made Bonn the musical capital of the Germanies.
What a little orchestra that must have been! Old Joe Reicha was first fiddle and Kapellmeister. His fatherless nephew and adopted son Anton played second flute. Ludwig van Beethoven, born in the same year as his lifelong friend Anton, played viola; he was also court organist. Bernhard Romberg was a 'cellist, his brother Anton a violinist. Another violinist was Franz Ries, father of the composer Ferdinand, and benefactor of young Beethoven. Nikolaus Simrock played horn. Several of these were, or became, composers of stature; most of them were internationally-known virtuosi. Simrock was to become founder of one of the great music-publishing houses. The only sour note was Johann van Beethoven, a tenor and father to Ludwig, who was on the sauce and kept knocking over music stands and stepping into 'cellos; unfortunately nothing much could be done about him because he had tenure.
Joseph Reicha thought, in the time-honored way of parents, that Anton's desire to be a composer was not such a hot idea, and refused to teach him, so that Anton had, so to speak, pick up the facts on the street (or at least in the library). He succeeded so well that before you could say "Hans Rotkehlchenssohn" Joseph had the orchestra playing symphonies by his nephew-son. Later Anton went to Paris and became both a success and a Frenchman. He crowned his career by succeeding Mehul at the Conservatoire and Boieldieu at the Institute. (I find this singularly appropriate since I am quite unable to differentiate in the abstract between these two composers.)
Reicha produced symphonies and operas and other aspiring big works, but he is best known (and increasingly admired) for his twenty-four splendid wind quintets, which he published in four sets of six. It has been conjectured that he learned what wind instruments can do from Max Franz's wind band, some of whose members may have been brought in from Vienna. The two earlier opus numbers are well represented on records; it is good to see the Richards Quintet exploring the higher latitudes.
It used to be that musicians looked like musicians. They had long hair and dreamy eyes and other features too romantic to mention. The Richards Quintet, to judge from their publicity photos look disappointingly like members of the Lehigh faculty. One even looks like the Dean of the Arts College, who is on leave this year. Good heavens! Do you suppose ... ? At any rate their press notices, from such faraway places with strange sounding names as Tulsa, Little Rock, Kansas City, and Monterey, are notably enthusiastic.
