Pianists Alexander Dreyschock and Anton Door
Two Celebrated Nineteenth Century Concert Pianists
May 12, 2009
Alexander Dreyschock, born in Zack, Bohemia, on October 15,1818, showed signs of musical talent at a very early age, and he was sent to Prague to study medicine at thirteen. Unknown, apparently, to his mother, he was studying music instead. After seven years of study with the celebrated Bohemian composer Johann Tomaschek (1774-1850), he embarked on his first tour as a professional pianist, traveling throughout northern and central Germany.
Dreyschock Concert Tours
In the years from 1840 to 1842 he also visited Russia, Belgium. France, Holland and London, England, always receiving a warm reception. Johann Baptist Cramer ( 1771-1858), the celebrated German pianist, heard Alexander in Paris and exclaimed, “The man has no left hand, they are both right hands.” He was said to have been a remarkable technician, playing octaves, sixths and thirds with no effort. Dreyschock toured Europe many times and was noted for his mechanical expertise, but many critics made mention that his music was cold.
Dreyschock was appointed Imperial Pianist in Vienna in 1846 and visited the celebrated pianist Franz Liszt (1811-1886) and the violinist and composer Ludwig Spohr (1784-1859) at Weimar in 1858. At that time his powers were waning and he was “downhearted.” In 1862, at the request of Russian pianist Anton Rubinstein (1829-1894), he became professor of piano at the St.Petersburg Conservatoire. He died of consumption at Venice in 1869.
Austrian Pianist Anton Door
Door was born on June 20, 1833, at Vienna, Austria, and showed musical talent very early. His father, a doctor, held no hopes of his son being successful in a musical career, even though he had performed publicly at the age of nine. Later, he received musical instruction from Karl Czerny ( 1791-1857), and Simon Sechter (1788-1867). He later met Peter Pixis(1788-1874), a celebrated pianist who took a great interest in the young man.
Member of the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm, Sweden.
He was appointed to that post and stayed there for a year, going on to St.Petersburg, where he met the pianists Anton Rubinstein (1829-1894), Adolf Henselt (1814-1889) and Theodore Dreyschock (1818-1869). Count Wielhorsky, a music lover, became his patron and it was through his intervention that Door was offered the position of Professor of Piano at the Royal Institute of Music at Moscow. In 1869 he was appointed Professor of Pianoforte at the Vienna Conservatory of Music. Anton Door died in 1919 in Vienna.
Source
Celebrated Pianists of the Past and Present by A. Ehrlich Theodore Presser, Philadelphia 1894
For further reading about pianists see Brull and Brassin Anton Rubinstein
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