Born in
Düren, Max von Schillings was brother to the photographer
Carl Georg Schillings. He received his first musical training in
violin,
piano and
theory at the same time as his formal education in
Bonn. His teachers were
Caspar Joseph Brambach and
Otto von Königslow. Schillings later studied
jurisprudence,
philosophy,
literature and
art history at the
University of Munich. On October 1, 1892, he married his cousin Caroline Josefa Peill in
Römlinghoven. They were divorced in 1923, and on June 11, 1923, he married the opera singer Barbara Kemp in
Berlin-Charlottenburg. Max Schillings was given a professorship by the Royal
Bavarian Ministry of the Interior (
Königliches Bayerisches Staatsministerium des Innern) on February 16, 1903. In October 1911, he was named an Honorary Doctor of Philosophy by the Philosophy
Faculty at the
University of Heidelberg. He was awarded the
Ehrenkreuz (Ger. honorary cross), the fifth highest rank awarded, by the
Order of the Württemberg Crown, the highest order of chivalry in
Württemberg. With this honor, he was allowed to use the name Max
von Schillings. In
Düren, the street between Goethestraße and Aachener Straße was renamed "Schillingsstraße". As early as the 1890s, he was given a position as an assistant at the
Bayreuth Festival; later he was engaged as a conductor and music teacher in Munich. Between 1908 and 1918 he was the Intendant at the
Königlichen Hoftheater (Royal Court Theatre) in
Stuttgart, for which he received the honor mentioned above. From 1918 to 1925, he succeeded
Richard Strauss as intendant of the State Opera in
Berlin, whilst concurrently being the musical director of the summer-time
Zoppot Forest Opera. In the second half of this decade, he undertook concert tours which took him through Europe and to the USA. Having returned to Germany, he took over the job of President of the
Prussian Academy of the Arts in 1932, succeeding
Max Liebermann. From March 1933 until his death, Schillings was also the artistic director of the
Städtische Oper Berlin. He died in 1933 from a
pulmonary embolism in Berlin. His ashes were entombed at Frankfurt-am-Main. His composition work includes several operas, melodramas, choral works, chamber music pieces, violin and piano concertos, symphonic poems and works for stage (see list below). His most important work is undoubtedly his opera
Mona Lisa (first performed on September 26, 1915, in Stuttgart), which became one of the most-performed operas in Germany until his death. He stands beside
Engelbert Humperdinck and Richard Strauss as one of the composers who re-established the music form of melodrama at the start of the 20th century. Schillings was renowned as a music educator – one of his more famous students was
Wilhelm Furtwängler. He was the dedicatee of "
Sea Drift" by
Frederick Delius. Schillings was an opponent of the
Weimar Republic and a declared
anti-Semite. The expulsion and exclusion of important
Jewish and free-thinking artists from the Prussian Academy of the Arts began during his time as the Academy's President – among the many artists affected were
Käthe Kollwitz,
Heinrich Mann,
Ricarda Huch,
Alfred Döblin,
Thomas Mann,
Max Liebermann,
Alfons Paquet,
Franz Werfel and
Jakob Wassermann. He laid off
Arnold Schoenberg from the teaching staff of the Academy, in contravention of Schoenberg's contract and in 1933, he ordered
Franz Schreker, the leader of masterclasses in composition at the Academy, into early retirement. ==Selected works==