Jacob Schmitt

Jacob Schmitt, also called Jakob, Jaques or Jacques, (2 November 1803 – June 1853) was a German composer and piano teacher who worked in Hamburg. He was born in Obernburg near Aschaffenburg and died in Hamburg. Life Jacob Schmitt was the youngest of the seven children of Franz Bartholomäus Schmitt and Anna Maria Scheller; his oldest brother was the composer Aloys Schmitt. His father was already an aspiring musician, who supported his salary as a teacher by being an organist in the town’s parish church St. Peter and Paul. He supported his sons musically, giving them their first musical lessons and making sure, that they were taken up in the house of the music publisher Johann Anton André in Offenbach. There, Schmitt was taught by André as well as his brother Aloys and had his first performances as a piano accompanist in 1814. At this time in the view of the public, he was the little brother of the already well-known Aloys whom he had a close relationship with. Schmitt’s way into the world of the free music business began around 1823. This becomes clear from an exchange of letters with his former patron André. In these letters, Schmitt initially asked for the financing of a new grand pi