Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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SCHELLER SCHBNK 257
sion ; and after that we hear of Samson ' ' and
other oratorios of Handel, Bach's motets,
and choruses of Mendelssohn, whose genius
Sehelble was one of the first to recognise, and
whose ' St. Paul ' was suggested to him by the
Caecilian Association, doubtless on the motion
of its conductor. Whether the Society ever attempted
Beethoven's mass does not appear, but
Sehelble was one of the two private individuals
who answered Beethoven's invitation to subscribe
for its publication. [See vol. i. p. 255, note 6 ;
vol. iii. p. 131o.]
His health gradually declined, and at length,
in the winter of 1835, it was found necessary to
make some new arrangement for the direction
of the Society. Mendelssoh n was asked (^Letters,
Feb. 18, 1836), and undertook it for six weeks
during the summer of 1836. Mendelssohn's
fondness and esteem for the man whose place
he was thus temporarily filling is evident in
every sentence referring to him in his letters of
this date. Sehelble died August 7, 1837. His
great qualities as a practical musician, a, conductor,
and a man, are well summed up by
Hiller ' in his book on Mendelssohn, to which
we refer the reader. His compositions have
not survived him. His biography was published
shortly after his death J. iV. Schelhle,
von Weissmanu (Frankfort, 1838). G.
SCHELLEK, Jakob, born at Schettal, Kakonitz,
Bohemia, May 16, 1759, a very clever
violinist. He was thrown on his own resources
from a very early age, and we hear of him at
Prague, Vienna, and Mannheim, where he remained
for two years playing in the court band,
and learning composition from Togler. After
more wandering he made a stay of three yeai-s in
Paris, studying the school of Viotti. He then,
in 1785, took a position as Ooncertmeister, or
leading violin, in the Duke of Wiirtemberg's
band at Stuttgart, which he retained until the
establishment was broken up by the arrival of
the French in 1 792. This forced him to resume
his wandering life, and that again drove him to
intemperance, till after seven or eight years
more he ended miserably, being even obliged
to borrow a fiddle at each town he came to. ^ He
was more celebrated for his tricks and tours de
force than for his legitimate playing. Spohr
{SelbstMog.i. 280) speaks of his flageolet-tones, of
variations on one string, of pizzicato with the
nails of the left hand, of imitations of a bassoon,
an old woman, etc. ; and Fftis mentions a trick
in which by loosening the bow he played on all
four strings at once. By these, and probably
also by really fine playing, he excited so much
enthusiasm, that it used to be said of him one
'
God ; one ScheUer.' G.
SCHEMELLI, Georg Christian, born at
Herzberg about 1678, was a pupil of theThomasschule
at Leipzig from 1695, and was cantor of
1 UendeluoTm, translated by Miss M. E. von Olehn, p. 6.
2 Bochlitz, F&r FreuTide der Tvnkunst, il.
the castle at Zeitz. In 1736 he published a
'
Musicalisches Gesang-Buch, Darinnen 954
geistreiohe, sowohl alte als neue Lieder und
Arien, mit wohlgesetzten Melodien, in Discant
und Bass, befindlich sind ..." In the
preface the compiler states that the tunes in his
book were partly newly composed, partly improved,
by J. 8. Bach. Various authorities on
the life of Bach have spent much labour in
investigating which were the tunes newly composed
by him, and which were merely revised
and corrected by him. "While Spitta attributes
twenty-nine out of the sixty-nine tunes to Bach,
Herr F. Wiillner, the editor of the volume of
the Bach-Gesellschaft (xxxix.) in which the
hymns appear, considers that only twenty- four
are Bach's ; while Eitner, in the Qtiellen-Lexikon,
assigns only twenty -two to the master. His
name, curiously enough, is appended to only
one of the sacred songs of which the collection
mainly consists (the beautiful ' Vergiss mein
nieht,' above which is written, 'di J. S. Bach,
D. M. Lips." See S. Spitta, J. S. Bach, Eng.
trans, i. 367-70 ; iii. 109-114.) M.
SCHENK, JoHANN, (I) was a viol-da-gamba
player in the service of the Elector Palatine at
Diisseldorf in the latter part of the 1 7th century.
He was afterwards at Amsterdam, where he
published numerous works for his instrument,
and other compositions. The following are
known to have existed, but only a few of them
are still extant, according to the Quellen-
Lexikon
—
Op.
' 1. Airs from an opera, Ceres en Bachna.'
2. KonstoefTeningen (sonatas or suites).
3. n giardino annonlco, sonate da camera a 4 [two ylns., gamba,
and continQo).
4. Koninklyke Harpllederen, 150 aits for one or two voices, with a
ptelnde and postlude.
6. Scherzi muBicali, for viol da gamba and bass.
7. Eighteen sonatas for violin and baas.
8. La ninfa del Beno, twelve sonatas or suites.
9. L'dcho du Danube, sonatas.
10. Lea F^ntaisies biaarres de la goutte, twelve sonatas for viol da
gamba.
'^Lexikon ; Riemann's Lexikon.) m.
SCHENK, JoHANN, (II) is mainly interesting
from his connection with Beethoven ; he was
born of poor parents, Nov. 30, 1753,^ at Wiener
Neustadt in Lower Austria, and at an early
age was admitted into the Archbishop's choir
at Vienna. [In 1774 he was a pupil of
WagenseU.] In 1778 he produced his first
mass, which he followed by other sacred pieces,
and by many Singspiele and Operas [beginning
with ' Die Weinlese,' 1785, and ' Die Weihnacht
auf dem Lande,' 1786, and ending with 'Der
Fassbinder,' 1802], which gained him a considerable
name, and rank with those of Dittersdorf
and Wenzel Miiller. In addition he wrote
symphonies, concertos, quartets, lieder, etc. The
autographs of many of these are in the Gesellschaft
der Musikfreunde at Vienna, with that
of a theoretical work, Grundsdtze des Generallasses.
[In 1794 he was appointed music-
3 SolnBiemann'sZ«ri^:on; Eitner (Quellen-Zexifein) gives the date
as 1761.