Daniel de Lange

Daniel de Lange was born on 11 July 1840 in Rotterdam (Netherlands). His father was the organist Samuel de Lange Sr. who taught him his first musical instructions. This included organ playing, church music, music theory, and composition. From 1851 to 1854 he attended the Toonkunst Music School in Rotterdam, where he studied cello with Simon Ganz and theoretical subjects with Johannes Verhulst.
In 1855 he moved to Brussels to continue his studies at the Royal Conservatory. There he studied cello with Adrien Francois Servais, with whom he lived for three years, composition with Berthold Damcke, and organ with Jacques-Nicolas Lemmens. During this period he developed into a distinguished cellist.
At the age of seventeen, Daniel de Lange and his brother Samuel de Lange Jr. began undertaking concert tours throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire as a cello and piano duo. Through the recommendation of Karol Mikuli, a pupil of Chopin, the brothers were appointed to the conservatory in Lemberg (now Lviv, Ukraine), where they taught from 1860 to 1863. After returning to Rotterdam in 1863, Daniel de Lange was appointed cello teacher at the local music school. In 1864 he moved to Paris, where he worked as an organist, choir conductor, composer, and composition teacher. During his years in Paris he came into contact with Hector Berlioz, Camille Saint-Saëns, Édouard Lalo, Georges Bizet, Jules Massenet, Henri Vieuxtemps, and other leading musicians. He is also reported to have taught composition to Ernest Chausson. Following the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, he returned to the Netherlands and settled in Amsterdam. There he taught at the Amsterdam Music School and founded a music school in Zaandam in 1873. He served for five years as conductor of the Amstels Mannenkoor and in 1875 founded the Leiden branch of the Maatschappij tot Bevordering der Toonkunst. From 1877 to 1908 he was secretary of that organization. In 1878 he became a co-founder of the Nederlandsche Koorvereeniging and later served as its chairman. From 1881 to 1913 he was a board member of the Vereeniging voor Nederlandsche Muziekgeschiedenis and organized courses in music history. In 1881 he founded an a cappella choir of professional singers, which toured extensively throughout Europe. In 1884 he co-founded the Amsterdam Conservatory together with Frans Coenen, Julius Röntgen, and others. There he taught composition, solfege, and music history, and in 1895 he became director of the institution. He was also the first professional paid music critic in the Netherlands, writing for Het Nieuws van den Dag. In 1914 Daniel de Lange emigrated to Point Loma, California, where he became director of the local conservatory and continued his educational work. He remained active as a teacher at the Isis Conservatory of Music.
For his contributions to musical life and choral music, de Lange was awarded the Austrian Order of the Iron Crown. In 1893 he was appointed a Knight of the Order of the Netherlands Lion by the Dutch government.
As a composer, de Lange wrote dozens of songs, chamber music works, compositions for solo piano and organ, numerous choral works, and several orchestral compositions. Among his best-known works are the Requiem for double choir, composed in Paris in 1867, and his Symphony No. 1, Op. 4. Much of his output dates from his Paris and Amsterdam periods, and he continued composing throughout his career alongside his activities as conductor, teacher, and critic.
Daniël de Lange died on 30 January 1918 in Point Loma (California, United States).

In my possession is the autograph manuscript of an untitled song for voice and piano by Daniel de Lange. The work was composed in 1893 and uses a German text of unknown authorship.