‘Die Musik, lieber Freund, die Du mit Deinen Jungen machest, wird mir noch lange im Innern fortleben’: Joseph Joachim’s friendship with Paul David and Uppingham School

 

 

Abstract:

 

 

Music played little part in the education of British children before 1853 when Edward Thring was appointed headmaster of Uppingham Grammar School in the English Midlands. Thring created an innovative holistic curriculum for the twenty-five boys of this rural boarding school and he appointed a musician as the third addition to his staff to form a teaching team of five. By the time of Thring’s death in 1887, and a pupil roll now three hundred, Uppingham School was a renowned public school – the word ‘grammar’ had been dropped – and the full-time musicians numbered six. Almost all came from Prussia: early appointments stayed only a year or two but later ones, including Paul David – “Music and Choir Master” – made Uppingham their permanent home. Over the course of four decades, David – son of Ferdinand David, a member of the Mendelssohn and Schumann circle, and a friend of Brahms and Sterndale Bennett – raised music to a high level of distinction and a broad level of participation beyond all other schools in Britain. His lifelong friendship with Joseph Joachim helped to shape the development of music in the school and attracted many celebrated musicians to perform to and play alongside his boys. None of this, however, would have happened but for a chance meeting in Rome in 1852.

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Biography:

 

From 1966 to 1989 Malcolm Tozer taught physics and physical education at Uppingham School, a co-educational boarding school in the English Midlands for pupils aged 13-18. For the next sixteen years he was headmaster of two smaller schools before retiring in 2005. His recent publications include The Ideal of Manliness (Sunnyrest Books, 2015), ‘From Prussia with Love: Music at Uppingham School, 1853–1908’ (Journal of Historical Research in Music Education, 2018), Education in Manliness (Routledge, 2018) and Edward Thring’s Theory, Practice and Legacy (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2019). Conference theme 5: Joachim in his Relationships, Family, and Circle.