A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Manns, August

by George Grove

MANNS, August, an eminent conductor, born of poor parents at Stolzenburg, near Stettin, in North Germany, March 12, 1825. His first teacher was the Village-musician at the neighbouring village of Torgelow, from whom he learnt the violin, clarinet, and flute. His next instruction was received from Urban, the Town-musician of Elbing, near which his parents had removed, and to whom he was apprenticed. Here he had regular practice in an orchestra, especially that of the Dantzig opera company during its annual visits to Elbing; and this led to his entering one of the regimental bands of Dautzig as 1st clarinet, while he played among the 1st violins at the theatre. He now began to arrange and compose for the band, and generally to take a prominent part in the music of the place. In 1848 the Regiment was transferred to Posen, and here Mr. Manns was noticed by Wieprecht, and through his assistance transferred himself from the military band to Gungl's orchestra in Berlin, and was at length advanced to the post of conductor and solo-violin player at Kroll's Garden—the Crystal Palace of Berlin. Here, under Gyer, he worked hard at harmony and composition, and produced much dance music and other pieces which were very popular. After the destruction of Kroll's establishment by fire in 1851, Mr. Manns was chosen by Herr von Roon (the well-known war-minister), then in command of a crack infantry regiment at Königsberg, to be his bandmaster. Colonel von Roon, though not himself a musician, was very anxious that the band of his regiment should shine in the service. He accordingly gave his bandmaster every opportunity of display. At his instance Beethoven's Symphonies (not at that time so universally known as they are now) were arranged for the band, and in other ways the music of the regiment was made very prominent. It was soon afterwards moved from Königsberg to Cologne, and there enjoyed a still greater reputation. Mr. Manns, however, longed for a wider field, and wisely leaving to others the department of composition, in which his abilities were quite sufficient to have insured him considerable success, he fortunately accepted, in the spring of 1854, an engagement as sub-conductor in the band of the Crystal Palace, then a wind band only, under Herr Schallehn. This position he gave up in October, and after following his profession at Leamington and Edinburgh (in Mr. Wood's opera band) he became conductor of the summer concerts at Amsterdam in 1855, and finally, in the autumn of that year, was engaged as conductor of the Crystal Palace band, a post which he entered upon on October 14, 1855. The music at the Crystal Palace was at that time in a very inchoate condition, the band was still a wind band, and the open Centre Transept was the only place for its performances. Under the efforts of the new conductor things soon began to mend. He conducted a 'Saturday Concert' in the 'Bohemian Glass Court' the week after his arrival—through the enlightened liberality of the Directors the band was changed to a full orchestra, a better spot was found for the music, adjoining the Queen's rooms (since burnt) at the northeast end, and at length, through the exertions of the late Mr. Robert Bowley, then General Manager, the Concert Room was enclosed and roofed in, and the present famed Saturday Concerts began, and have progressed, both in the value and variety of the selections and the delicacy and spirit of the performances, ever since. Mr. Manns's duties as conductor, both of the daily music and of the Saturday Concerts, as well as of the numerous fêtes and extra performances, where music has to be arranged for large combined masses of wind and string, are naturally very arduous. Mendelssohn (in a letter from Leipzig dated Feb. 27, 1841) says, 'I have conducted fifteen public performances since Jan. 1; enough to knock up any man.' What would he have said if he had had to do this with all the added difficulties caused by the calls of the London season on his musicians, and with two band-performances to arrange and conduct every day as well? Mr. Manns has therefore hitherto only rarely taken engagements outside the Crystal Palace. In 1859 ne conducted the Promenade Concerts at Drury Lane, and he is announced to conduct the approaching Winter Series at Glasgow (Dec. 1879 and Jan. 1880).

Mr. Manns often appears in the Crystal Palace programmes as a composer, but it is as the director of his orchestra that he has won his laurels. In a remarkable article in The Times of April 28, 1847, it is said that 'the German conductor makes the orchestra express all the modifications of feeling that an imaginative soloist would give voice to on a single instrument.' It is to this power of wielding his band that Mr. Manns has accustomed his audience during the 24 years of his conductorship. In addition to the many qualities necessary to produce this result he is gifted with an industry which finds no pains too great, and with a devotion, which not only makes him strictly loyal to the indications of the composer, but has enabled him to transcend the limits of a mere conductor, and to urge on his audience music which, though at first received with enthusiasm only by a few, has in time amply justified his foresight by becoming a public necessity. It is not too much to say that his persistent performance of the works of Schumann—to name but one composer out of several—in the early part of his career at Sydenham, has made the London public acquainted with them years before they would otherwise have become so. [App. p.710 "Add that at the Handel Festival of 1883 he undertook the duties of conductor at very short notice, in place of Sir Michael Costa, who had just been taken ill. The Festivals of 1885 and 1888 were also conducted by Mr. Manns."]

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