The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Becker, Gottfried Wilhelm

BECKER. I. Gottfried Wilhelm, a German physician and writer, born in Leipsic, Feb. 22, 1778, died there, Jan. 17, 1854. He translated some of Cooper's novels, and Le mie prigioni of Silvio Pellico. By his literary labors he accumulated $40,000, to which his son Karl Ferdinand added a house of the value of $7,000, appropriating the whole amount to the establishment of an educational and charitable institution for the blind at Leipsic. II. Karl Ferdinand, a German musician, son of the preceding, born in Leipsic, July 17, 1804. He studied the piano, harmony, and composition under Friedrich Schneider, and at the age of 14 made his first public appearance as a pianist. Soon after this he turned his attention specially to the organ, and became professor of the organ and of harmony at the Leipsic conservatory. He has published several pieces for the piano, not of great value, and made important collections of chorals; but he is better known as a writer on musical art than as either a composer or compiler. He contributed largely to musical journals, among others to the Cæcilia, edited by Gottfried Weber, the Eufonia, the Tageblatt, and the Zeitgenossen. Finally, when Robert Schumann established his Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, Becker became one of its most constant contributors. He has published Rathgeber für Organisten (Leipsic, 1828); Systematisch-chronologische Darstellung der musikalischen Literatur (1836); Die Hausmusik in Deutschland in dem 16., 17. und 18. Jahrhundert (1840); an index of musical works published during the 16th and 17th centuries (Die Tonwerke des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, 1847); Die Tonkünstler des 19. Jahrhunderts (1849), &c.