Hans-Georg-Nägeli (1773-1836)

[adriano]

I am in the way of digitally transferring an LP from the 1970s, with harp pieces (solo, duets and groups) by this Swiss composer, who was an important personality, since he also worked as a tecacher and music publisher. Incidentally, he is the author of he song "Freut Euch des Lebens", which is still very popular in all Europe.
http://www.volksliederarchiv.de/freut-euch-des-lebens/
in 1895, composer Emile Jaques-Dalcroze wrote a set of entertaining orchestral variations on this tune, entitled "13 petites variations sur 'la Suisse est belle'", which I recorded in 2003 on Sterling CDS-1057-2. This piece is one of my most frequently played items on Swiss Radio, and not only on our National Day :-)
To those who are interested, I can send an MP3 or .wav file of the Nägeli LP transfer

[UnsungMasterpieces]

I have not been able to find that much recordings of Nägeli's music, but there are a few on Spotify.
Those are mostly short songs, such as "Haingesang" and "Auf dem Zuricher See".

I'm intrigued by Tränentrost, a choral song apparently based on Beethoven's Op. 30 No. 2 (which is the 7th Violin Sonata). I'm going to give it a listen and try to compare the pieces to find the similarities, because I'm curious now. There's also a piano piece "Toccata no. 1", recorded by Jean Dube. But my favourite piece by Nägeli at the moment is "Der Mensch lebt und bestehet", a motet for male choir.

Furthermore, in my country (the Netherlands) the melody of "Freut Euch des Lebens" is used for the Sinterklaas song "O, kom er eens kijken, wat ik in mijn schoentje vind." It's a festive song about Sinterklaas leaving presents in childrens' shoes during the night.
So I've known the melody all my life, but only a few years back I found out it was actually of Swiss origin.

I don't know if you still have the Nägeli LP files, but I would be very interested in those.

[Double-A]

I think I remember this LP.  My then girl friend played the harp and took lessons from Emmi Hürlimann who is playing on it--if it is the one I remember.

Nägeli was at the time the musical establishment in Switzerland (at least in the German speaking part) all by himself.  He was composer, teacher, publisher and musicologist (music philosopher?).  There is an amusing passage in Schnyder von Wartensee's autobiography about his first meeting with Nägeli (who was well aware of his importance).  Schnyder studied with him for a while.

[UnsungMasterpieces]

I wonder what the amusing anecdote about Nägeli relates to, because unfortunately I don't have Schnyder's autobiography.

[eschiss1]

Archive.org has digitized several books of his but not an autobiography exactly, so no easy solution there, I guess...