A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Lincke, Joseph

by Carl Ferdinand Pohl

LINCKE,^[1] Joseph, eminent cellist and composer, born June 8, 1783, at Trachenberg in Prussian Silesia; learnt the violin from his father, a violinist in the chapel of Prince Hatzfeld, and the cello from Oswald. A mismanaged sprain of the right ancle left him lame for life.^[2] At 10 he lost his parents, and was obliged to support himself by copying music, until in 1800 he procured a place as violinist in the Dominican convent at Breslau. There he studied the organ and harmony under Hanisch, and also pursued the cello under Lose, after whose departure he became first cellist at the theatre, of which C. M. von Weber was then Capellmeister. In 1808 he went to Vienna, and was engaged by Prince Rasoumowsky^[3] for his private quartet-party, at the suggestion of Schuppanzigh. In that house, where Beethoven was supreme, he had the opportunity of playing the great composer's works under his own supervision.^[4] Beethoven was much attached to Lincke, and continually calls him 'Zunftmeister violoncello,' or some other droll name, in his letters. The Imperial library at Berlin^[5] contains a comic canon in Beethoven's writing on the names Brauchle and Lincke.

[App. p.701 "In the musical example, the sign should be over the third bar of the canon."]

The two Sonatas for P.F. and Cello (op. 102) were composed by Beethoven while he and Lincke were together at the Erdödys in 1815.^[6]

Lincke played in Schuppanzigh's public quartets, and Schuppanzigh in turn assisted Lincke at his farewell concert, when the programme consisted entirely of Beethoven's music, and the great composer himself was present. His playing appears to have been remarkable for its humour, and he is said to have been peculiarly happy in expressing Beethoven's characteristic style, whence no doubt the master's fondness for him.^[7] He then went to Grätz, and from thence to Pancovecz near Agram, the residence of Countess Erdödy, as her chamber-virtuoso, where he remained a year and a half. In 1818 he was engaged by Freiherr von Braun as first cellist in the theatre 'an der Wien,' and in 1831 played with Merk, the distinguished cellist, in the orchestra of the court-opera. He died on March 26, 1837. His compositions consist of concertos, variations, capriccios, etc., his first 3 works only (variations) having been published.

[ C. F. P. ]

1. He always wrote his name thus, though it is usually spelled Linke.
2. It is perhaps in allusion to this that Bernard writes. 'Lincke has only one fault—that he is crooked' (Krumm).
3. Weiss played the viola, and the Prince the second violin.
4. Compare Thayer's Beethoven, iii. 49.
5. See Nohl's Beethoven's Briefe, 1867, p. 92. note.
6. See Thayer, iii. 343.
7. See the 'Neue Zeitschrift für Musik,' 1837, No. 32.