The Life and Legacy of Franz Xaver Hauser

Franz Xaver Hauser (17941870), born near Prague in Czechoslovakia, combined his career of singing and teaching with a consuming interest in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Hauser was a colleague of Felix Mendelssohn, Moritz Hauptmann, Robert Schumann, Jenny Lind, and Otto Jahn; author of a text on vocal pedagogy that stayed in print for more than a century; founder of the Munich Tonal Academy, which is still in existence; and the primary private contributor to the complete edition of Bach s works. In this remarkable biography, Dale A. Jorgenson discloses the existence of the great legacy left by Hauser. Although his achievements were many, Hauser s greatest contribution was his determined effort to catalogue all the known works of J. S. Bach, collect and share all the original manuscripts and authentic copies of Bach s work, and make his unpublished catalogue, the manuscripts, and his professional guidance available to the Bach Society, which was founded in Leipzig in 1850. This activity provided a meaningful dimension to Hauser s life apart from his stage career. He made a wide circle of significant friends who loved Bach s music or who were themselves leaders in literature and the artsLudwig Tieck, Schumann, the Grimm Brothers, and many others. This remarkable man had slipped into obscurity. Jorgenson s biography will enhance Hauser s reputation and remind the world of his achievements. Jorgenson s book also is an invaluable asset to scholars of nineteenth-century music, culture, and the arts, particularly to those who share Hauser s enduring interest in Bach."