MOSCHELES, Ignaz (1794-1870), one of the most refined and accomplished pianists of the present century, was born at Prague, 30th May 1794, and first studied music at the Conservatorium in that city under the direction of Dionys Weber. At the age of fourteen he made his first appearance before the public in a pianoforte concerto of his own composition with marked success. Soon after this he removed to Vienna, where he studied counterpoint under Albrechtsberger and composition under Salieri. In 1814 he prepared, with Beethoven’s consent, the pianoforte arrangement of Fidelio, afterwards published by Messrs Artaria. In the following year he published his celebrated Variationen uber den Alexandermarsch, a concert piece of great difficulty, which he played with so great effect that he was at once recognized as the most brilliant performer of the day. He then started on a tour, during the course of which he visited most of the great capitals of Europe, making his first appearance in London in 1822, and there securing the friendship of Muzio Clementi and John Cramer, the fathers of the English school of pianoforte playing. For a concert given by the latter he wrote his famous Hommage à Händel, a duet for two pianofortes, which afterwards became a lasting favourite with the public. His reception in England was sufficiently encouraging to justify his return in 1823, when he again met with a hearty welcome. During a visit to Berlin in 1824 he first became acquainted with Mendelssohn, then a boy of fifteen; and a friendship sprang up between them which was severed only by Mendelssohn’s early death....
In 1826 Moscheles relinquished his wandering habits, and settled permanently in London, surrounding himself with a clientèle fully capable of appreciating his talents as an artist and his social worth as a firm and loyal friend. His position was henceforth a more than ordinarily enviable one. He was recognized from end to end of Europe as a virtuoso of the highest rank; and his popularity both as a performer and as a teacher was based on grounds which effectually secured it from the caprice of changing fashion or ephemeral patronage. He was undoubtedly for some considerable time the greatest executant of his age; but, using his brilliant touch as a means and not as an end, he consistently devoted himself to the further development of the true classical school, interpreting the works of the great masters with conscientious fidelity, and in his extempore performances, which were of quite exceptional excellence, exhibiting a fertility of invention which never failed to please the most fastidious taste.
In 1837 Moscheles conducted Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony at the Philharmonic Society’s concerts with extraordinary success; and on this and other occasions contributed not a little, by his skilful use of the baton, to the prosperity of the time-honoured association. During the course of his long residence in London he laboured incessantly in the cause of art, playing at innumerable concerts, both public and private, and instructing a long line of pupils, who flocked to him, in unbroken succession, until the year 1848, when, at Mendelssohn’s earnest solicitation, he removed to Leipsic, to carry on a similar work at the Conservatorium then recently founded in that city. In this new sphere he worked with unabated zeal for more than twenty years, dying 10th March 1870.
Moscheles’s most important compositions are his Pianoforte Concertos, Sonatas, and Studies; his Hommage à Händel ; and his three celebrated Allegri di Bravura.
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