AHJ, Vol. 4 No. 3, Spring 1974

However, if at Paris the Concerto in C of Mozart was
the first example of a work for harp and orchestra, it
was not the same in Vienna, where the man who remains
the greatest harpist of the 18th century, Jean-Baptiste
Krumpholtz was then living.
In 1773 he was the harpist of Prince Esterhazy under
the direction of Haydn and at the time when Mozart
left the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg for the trip
which was to take him to Paris, Krumpholtz had already
composed (and played) four concertos which unfortunately
have never been found.
The first of these concertos had been composed at
Prague before 1773 (Wagenseil made the orchestration),
the three others at Vienna between 1773 and 1777,
under the direction of Joseph Haydn. Undoubtedly
Mozart heard the concertos of J. B. Krumpholtz and
profited thereby.
At Christmas 1778, having left Vienna for Paris,
Jean-Baptiste Krumpholtz made his debut at the Concert
Spirituel, playing his own 5th concerto for harp
(op. VII) with accompaniment of two violins, viola and
bass, two oboes, two horns, one flute and one bassoon
ad lib. which is the perfect model of a work written for
the harp by a musician of talent.
This 5th concerto, in B flat, has three movements:
I. allegro-moderato, very brilliant: frequently the harp
plucks an octave in arpeggiated eighth-note triplets in
the left hand which continue in a scale, shooting three
octaves high and falling back upon itself. The second
movement consists of variations on the celebrated romance
of Monsigny: 0 ma tendre musette, "bravura"
variations as they were later called. It is the diversion of
a virtuoso, demonstrating what the harp is capable of
achieving when the player has an irreproachable technique.
By contrast, the rondo seems trivial, and relies
too often on the Alberti bass. The conductor of this 5th
concerto was Henri-Joseph Riegel.
The works of Krumpholtz are difficult to classify. A
catalogue by opus number is printed on the back cover
of Opus XII (4 sonatas for harp with accompaniment
of violin and violincello), but it does not seem that the
author observed a careful chronology in numbering his
compositions.
What seems more important in the work of Krumpholtz
is to note the rapid evolution of the technique of
the harp. In Op. VIII: 6 Sonatas for Harp, the First Five
with Accompaniment of Violin and Flute, Dedicated
to Mme. la Princesse de Lamballe, a work which logically
must have been composed immediately after the
5th concerto, certain sonatas, whose numbering changes
with the editions, are written without refinement: one
might say bad harpsichord! By contrast others show a
different workmanship and notably, in the Adagio of
Sonata No. 4 there are harmonics (even in thirds) in the
left hand.
The work which best sums up the discoveries of
Krumpholtz in matters of technique is certainly the
volume: 12 Preludes and Little Melodies, Dedicated
to Mlle. de Guines, and published under the opus number
II, although these preludes could not have been
SPRING/1974
composed until after the arrival of Krumpholtz in Paris,
that is, after 1777.
The title page tells us: "One learns in these preludes
to make use of the pedals for varied and graceful modulations."
Actually, Krumpholtz, who regretted all his
life the necessity of playing on an imperfect instrument,
had the inspiration of genius to make use of enharmonic
substitutes, augmenting considerably in this way the
possibilities of modulation. Without going into technical
details which have no place here, let us remember that
the harp, (whether in double or single action) is an
instrument of fixed pitch, and that the use of enharmonics,
if it is advantageous to harpists faced with rapid
modulations, is still more so to composers, who sometimes
misuse this sound-color which only the harp can
produce.
Here is a curious passage from Prelude No. 1 O by
J. B. Krumpholtz emplying the homophones d sharp
and e flat (example 6):
It is regrettable that the Preludes of J.B. Krumpholtz
are not in the program of Conservatory studies; young
students would acquire from them a security in the use
of pedals which would not be without value, as is proved
in another fragment from the same Prelude No. 10
(see example 7, p. 16).
The life of Jean-Baptiste Krumpholtz was a veritable
romance. Jean-Marie Plane, his disciple, has collected
under the title Principles of the Harp information about
his teacher as well as a biography recounted by Krumpholtz
in the course of conversations between master
and pupil.
Born at Zlowitz, near Prague, in 1745, Krumpholtz
learned to play the harp when quite young from a
teacher who (he says) "needed to learn that which he
taught."
His father, having enlisted as an oboe player in a
French regiment, took his family with him, and taught
his young offspring to blow into an oboe and scrape
at a violin and a viola.
But chance put young Krumpholtz in the company
of Hochbriicker, who had just arrived in Paris and who
gave him some lessons. Very few, for Papa Krumpholtz'
regiment was sent to Lille: Young Jean-Baptiste
followed and increased his musical knowledge by studying
the horn. In France the Krumpholtz family did not
find either glory or fortune. At the end of ten years our
Jean-Baptiste returned to Prague with his parents, to
go into business. "There was 1, a shop assistant!" relates
Krumpholtz. Not for long. One evening, when
walking through the streets, he heard the sound of a
harp: and this awakened memories ... He arranged
for a harp with pedals to be sent from Paris and set to
work furiously with such successful results that in 1773,
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