HANS CONRAD SWERTZ (1858-1927)

Hans Conrad Swertz. Swertz was born in Geldern in Rhine-Prussia in 1858 as the son of a primary schoolteacher. He studied church music in the Scuola Cantorum of Ratisbon (Regensburg) in Bavaria, graduating in 1878.

His first post was that of organist in Dachau, a small town near Munich, famous for its painters. There he fell in love with the only daughter of a master-tanner who, however, was not enthusiastic about an alliance with an impecunious musician and a ‘Prussian’ to boot. So in 1879 Swertz accepted a post in St Vincent’s Church in Cork; the following year he married the tanner’s daughter and brought her to live in Cork, where they had nine children.

Swertz Family Pictured in 1901

He became organist at Cork’s St Mary’s Catholic Cathedral in 1890. He was made diocesan inspector of church music by the bishop and in that capacity drew up a catalogue of music for the diocese which was published and circulated to all the churches. He also taught in the newly established Cork School of Music; gave recitals, composed and had a number of choral works published in Britain.

In 1903, Pius X instituted a reform of church music with his Instruction The Juridical Code of Sacred Music, known as Motu Proprio. Plain chant and classical polyphonic music of the 16th and 17th centuries were to be sung at church services, and women to be excluded from church choirs. Section 13 stipulated:

… singers in church have a real liturgical office, and … therefore women, being incapable of exercising such office, cannot be admitted to form part of the choir.

Over the previous 16 years, Swertz’s mixed choir had built up a considerable reputation; he was unwilling to abandon his repertoire of 18th and 19th century masses and to replace the women with boys. This was one of the reasons why in 1906 he decided to leave Cork and take up a post as organist at the Visitation B.V.M. Church in Philadelphia, as the Papal Instruction was differently interpreted in the USA and mixed choirs were not disbanded. Swertz worked there until his death in 1927.

Swertz’s daughter, Tilly, was sent in 1901 to the Royal Academy of Music in Munich to study the piano with two pupils of Liszt. There she met Aloys Fleischmann, who had studied with the composer Rheinberger and had just been appointed organist in his home town, Dachau.

He was making a name for himself with nativity plays for which he composed the music, the scenery and costumes being designed by two of Dachau's best known painters. Aloys and Tilly married there in 1905.

When her father left Cork for America the following year, she was the only one of the nine children to have finished her education. So she persuaded her husband to come to Cork with her to apply for her father’s post in the Cathedral and support the family. Though the stay in Cork was originally intended to be temporary, Fleischmann was to serve there as Cathedral organist for over fifty years.