Blazon Johann Friedrich Reichardt (1752_1814) Prussian Composer

The son of the musician Johann Reichardt, Johann Friedrich Reichardt was introduced to music from an early age, particularly the violin. At the age of ten, he and his father embarked on a concert tour throughout East Prussia as a "child prodigy." He studied philosophy in Leipzig from 1769 to 1771. After presenting his opera La feste galanti to Frederick II of Prussia, he was appointed Kapellmeister of the Prussian court in 1775, a position previously held by Carl Heinrich Graun. In 1777, he married the singer, pianist, and lieder composer Juliane Benda (born May 14, 1752 in Potsdam and died May 9, 1783 in Berlin), daughter of Franz Benda. A supporter of the political ideals of the French Revolution, in 1792 he wrote his Vertrauten Briefe (literally: Intimate Letters), which earned him a dismissal from the Court without pay. He lived for a time in Hamburg, where he contributed to the newspaper Frankreich. In 1796, he was pardoned for his escapades and obtained a position as director of a salt mine, but he continued to compose operas and traveled to Berlin to attend premieres. It was there that his wife died prematurely in 1783. After his wife's death, Reichardt spent time in Italy. On his way back, he stopped in Vienna, where he met Emperor Joseph II and the composer Christoph Willibald Gluck. From 1786 onward, he developed close relationships with Goethe, Herder, Schiller, and Hamann. A trip to Paris in 1802 greatly diminished his fascination with French politics: he even became an opponent of Napoleon I. Four years later, his manor was looted by French troops, and he was forced to flee to Danzig, where he took part in the patriotic fight for freedom. Despite the composer's hostility toward the French, Napoleon's brother Jérôme Bonaparte, then living in Kassel, enabled Reichardt to obtain a nine-month position as director of the city's theater in 1807. In November 1809, Reichardt traveled to Vienna in search of success. After hearing the music of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, he developed a penchant for Viennese classicism. However, he soon returned to Giebichenstein, where he died alone from a gastric illness. His stage works were quickly forgotten after his death, but his strophic (folk-style) Lieder and Ballads im Volkston enjoyed considerable popularity throughout the 19th century, aided by the Wandervogel movement. He was the editor of the journal Deutschland, in which Friedrich Schlegel published reviews.
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