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Bernhard Joachim Hagen

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bernhard Joachim Hagen (April 1720 in or near Hamburg (?) December 9, 1787 in Ansbach)
was a German composer, lutenist and violinist. He was the last important composer of lute music in
18th-century Germany.

Contents
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Life
Works
Influence
Literature & Sources

Life
Little is known about his youth, but he obviously grew up in a musical family: his brother Peter
Albrecht Hagen (also called Peter Albert van Hagen, 1714 - September 12, 1777) studied the
violin with Francesco Geminiani, learned to play the lute and organ, and was an organist in
Rotterdam. There are several transcriptions of Geminiani's violin works for lute by J.B. Hagen
extant.
The younger Bernhard Joachim Hagen must have learned to play lute and violin early too, for in
1737 he was already employed as an assistant to Bayreuth violin virtuoso and Kapellmeister Johann
Pfeiffer; later he was listed officially as a court violinist. He kept this position at the Bayreuth and
since 1769 the Ansbach court until his death. Adam Falckenhagen and Charles Durant (Carol
Duranowski), also called to the Bayreuth court by Wilhelmine of Bayreuth, may have further
trained him in playing the lute.
In 1745, Hagen married Anna Fikentscher (born in Bayreuth; died May 22, 1789 in Ansbach).
During 1760/1761 he visited his brother in Rotterdam and there gave five concerts from November
till March.

Works
Hagen was employed at the Bayreuth court as a violinist and as a lutenist, and his virtuoso lute
performances and his compositions for lute were known and appreciated. He is one of the most
important composers for lute in the era following Sylvius Leopold Weiss, and far more important
than his teachers Falckenhagen and Durant. His style is shaped by the Empfindsamkeit and the

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Bernhard Joachim Hagen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernhard_Joachim_Hagen

beginning of the Sturm und Drang period. There is a clearly discernible influence of Carl Philipp
Emmanuel Bach in Hagen's music.
Through margravine Wilhelmine's efforts, lute music flourished in the 18th century one last time
before being rediscovered in the 20th century.
There are 33 known compositions by Bernhard Joachim Hagen found in the Staats- und
Stadtbibliothek Augsburg:
12 Sonatas for Lute solo
6 Trios for Lute, Violin and Violoncello
2 Lute concerti
1 Duo for two Lutes
1 Duo for Lute und Violin
Many Lute arrangements of compositions by Geminiani, Locatelli, Arne, and others.
The facsimile editions of Hagen's solo lute sonatas (1983) and chamber works (1984) have been
published by Joachim Domning for the Roman Trekel Musikverlag.
There are two excellent CD recording of Hagen's sonatas by the lutenist Robert Barto:
Joachim Bernhard Hagen, Solo Works for Lute: Five Sonatas, Locatelli Variations (Naxos
8.554200)
Bernhard Joachim Hagen, Sonate Liuto solo (Symphonia Sy98164)
Some of Hagen's works listed in the 1769 Breitkopf catalog (these have no concordances in
Augsburg manuscripts) are presumed missing.

Influence
The lute sonatas of Roman Turovsky-Savchuk (a contemporary lutenist-composer) were written in
homage to Hagen.

Literature & Sources

Ernst Ludwig Gerber: Historisch-biographisches Lexicon der Tonknstler, Teil 1. (1790)
Rainer Trbsbach: Geschichte der Stadt Bayreuth. Druckhaus Bayreuth (1993)
Robert Barto: Bernhard Joachim Hagen, Sonate Liuto solo CD Booklet (1999)
Per Kjetil Farstad: Bernhard Joachim Hagen (1720-87): Some New Biographical Information,
in: The Lute. Journal of the Lute Society, Vol. 40 (2000), p. 1-11.
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Categories: 1720 births 1787 deaths German composers Composers for lute
German lutenists 18th-century composers
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