Born in
Tübingen, Schmid was the son of
Wilhelm Schmid from Graz and grandson of Karl Emil Kauffmann. Initially, Schmid studied violin, viola and viola d'amore at the Akademie der Tonkunst in Munich from 1924 to 1927 and was also active as a violist in
Düsseldorf in 1927. He then studied
musicology in Freiburg, Tübingen and Vienna. He received his
doctorate in 1929 and his
habilitation in 1934. From 1935 to 1937 he was
Extraordinarius for Musicology at the
University of Tübingen and its university
music director. Around 1937 he was robbed of his position by the National Socialists and initially worked as choir director in the southern German communities of
Amorbach and
Miltenberg as well as in Augsburg until he was enlisted as a soldier in 1940. During the war he married Lotte Köbele from Munich in 1942, with whom he had three sons. Schmid is the father of the Tübingen professor emeritus and Mozart researcher
Manfred Hermann Schmid. Since 1945, at Schmid's suggestion, classical concerts have been held in the
Ottobeuren Abbey and in the
Kaisersaal there in the series
Ottobeurer Konzerte, partly with world-famous conductors such as
Herbert von Karajan and
Leonard Bernstein. Although Schmid was one of the most important co-founders of the in 1951 and was one of the supporting institutions of the
Neue Mozart-Ausgabe, there was no employment for him until the 1950s. It was not until 1958 that he was able to buy his own apartment in Augsburg. Schmid was considered to be an internationally recognized Mozart expert and was one of the most important pioneers and collaborators of the Neue Mozart-Ausgabe and its first edition director from 1954 to 1960. In his work, however, he also devoted himself to numerous other areas of musicology, including in particular
Joseph Haydn and his complete edition. On the occasion of his death the brochure
In memoriam Ernst Fritz Schmid (1904-1960): ein Gedenkblatt für seine Angehörigen und Freunde was published. In 1957 Schmid was a founding member of the . Schmid died in
Augsburg at age 55. == Publications ==