Franz Xaver Schnyder von Wartensee

1786 (LUCERNE) – 1868 (LUCERNE)‍

Franz Xaver Schnyder von Wartensee was born into a patrician family inLucerne in 1786. He initially began his career in the civil service of his home city, but soon abandoned this in order to devote himself entirely to music. He played a crucial role in setting up the first Swiss Music Society in 1808. Schnyder studied first in Zurich before moving to Vienna in 1811 to pursue his musical training.

Schnyder tried to get lessons with Beethoven – though to no avail, as the latter wasn’t accepting any more pupils (the only exception being Archduke Rudolph of Austria). In 1812, a fire in Baden bei Wien destroyed all of Schnyder’s possessions, including his musical instruments and the manuscripts of his works. He returned to Lucerne, but in 1815 participated in the military campaign against the French during the Coalition Wars that led to Napoleon’s ultimate defeat and the Second Treaty of Paris. In 1817, Schnyder moved to Frankfurt am Main where he remained for the rest of his life.

This son of Lucerne aristocracy went on to become one of the major Swiss composers of the 19th century. He was in contact with innumerable leading figures on the European music scene of his time – not least with Robert Schumann, of which we have a curious letter as proof. When Schnyder’s oratorio Zeit und Ewigkeit (“Time and Eternity”) was given its world premiere in July 1838 at the first German Singers’ Festival in Frankfurt am Main, it prompted a review by one Mr Halbanonymus (literally:“Semi-anonymous”) in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik that aggrieved Schnyder, prompting him to write accordingly to the journal’s editor, who was Schumann himself. This oratorio is in fact one of Schnyder’s most significant compositions, along with his Overture in c minor and his Symphony No. 1 in A major.