Son of a German im­mi­grant, Fischer showed mu­sic­al abil­i­ty at an early age. When he was eight years old, he be­gan sing­ing in a Ger­man church in Bal­t­imore. He learned to read mu­sic in a church sing­ing class, and af­ter­wards stu­died pi­ano and or­gan. He learned book­bind­ing at J. B. Lip­pin­cott’s in Phil­a­delphia, Penn­syl­van­ia, but spent his even­ings stu­dy­ing and prac­tic­ing music. He was an ex­per­i­enced train­er and lead­er of large bo­dies of sing­ers of all ages, and was much sought af­ter to lead choirs and chor­us­es in sac­red music in Phil­a­del­phia. He al­so taught sing­ing, pi­ano and mu­sic the­ory. He was close­ly con­nect­ed with Welsh mu­sic fes­tiv­als, and di­rect­ed the com­bined Welsh So­ci­e­ties at the bi­cen­ten­ni­al of the land­ing of Wil­liam Penn (founder of Penn­syl­van­ia).

From 1858-1868, Fischer was Pro­fes­sor of Mu­sic at Gir­ard Coll­ege. Before leav­ing Gir­ard Coll­ege, he start­ed in the pi­ano bus­i­ness, where he built up one of the most pros­per­ous piano houses in the count­ry. He was part­ner with John E. Gould until Gould’s death in 1875. From that time, Fischer was sole pro­pri­e­tor of the bus­i­ness for a num­ber of years, when he took his old­est son, Charles, into part­ner­ship. He fin­al­ly re­tired in 1898, and was suc­ceeded by his son.

Sources

Music

1. God Loved the World
2. I Love to Tell the Story
3. I Am Coming to the Cross
4. I Am Trusting, Lord, in Thee
5. Little Talk with Jesus, A
6. O, ’Twas Love, Wondrous Love
7. Rock That Is Higher Than I, The
8. Valley of Blessing, The
9. Waiting at the Pool
10. Whiter Than Snow