Kurt Adler
Encyclopedia
Kurt Adler was an Austrian classical music conductor, chorus master and pianist with a European musical education. He was best known as the chorus master and conductor of the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

 in New York City from 1943 to 1973. He conducted in Austria, Germany, Russia, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, United States, Canada, Mexico, Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary.

Early life

Kurt Adler was born in Jindřichův Hradec
Jindrichuv Hradec
Jindřichův Hradec is a town in the South Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has approximately 22,700 inhabitants.- History :The first written mention of the town is in 1220. Before that, it was probably a Slavic settlement. At the end of the 12th century more people arrived...

/Neuhaus
Neuhaus
- Places :*in Germany:**in Bavaria:***Neuhaus an der Pegnitz, in the district Nürnberger Land***Neuhaus am Inn, in the district of Passau**in Lower Saxony:***Amt Neuhaus, in the district of Lüneburg***Neuhaus , in the district of Cuxhaven**in Thuringia:...

, Bohemia
Bohemia
Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

 (now Czech Republic), Bohemia during the Austro-Hungarian Empire to a bourgeois Jewish family. He was the only child of Siegfried Adler (born June 26, 1876 in Luka u Jihlavy, Bohemia), a textile factory owner, and Olga (Fürth) Adler (born April 3, 1883 in Sušice
Sušice
Sušice is a town in the Pilsen Region of the Czech Republic. It lies on the Otava River, some to the south of the regional capital of Pilsen.Sušice is also the seat of the Municipality with Extended Competence and with Commissioned Local Authority....

/Schüttenhofen, Bohemia, (now Czech Republic). Bohemia during the Austria-Hungary Empire). Both parents were murdered by the Gestapo
Gestapo
The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...

 during World War II, after they were deported to Izbica concentration camp
Izbica concentration camp
The Izbica ghetto was a Jewish ghetto created in Izbica in occupied Poland during World War II, serving as a transfer point for deportation of Jews from Poland, Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia to Belzec and Sobibor extermination camps. SS-Hauptsturmführer Kurt Engels was the commandant of the...

, which served as a transfer camp, to the Bełżec extermination camp in Poland on May 15, 1942. His grandparents, Jakob and Eveline Adler are buried in Neuhaus (now Jindřichův Hradec)
Jindrichuv Hradec
Jindřichův Hradec is a town in the South Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has approximately 22,700 inhabitants.- History :The first written mention of the town is in 1220. Before that, it was probably a Slavic settlement. At the end of the 12th century more people arrived...

, Hebrew Cemetery.

During the 1930s many now-famous musicians, including Adler, emigrated to the United States to escape from Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...

. Adler emigrated to the United States on October 9, 1938. He sailed from Rotterdam
Rotterdam
Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam on the Rotte river, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre...

, Holland in 1938 on the "SS Statendam". The ship was later destroyed in the Rotterdam Blitz
Rotterdam Blitz
The Rotterdam Blitz refers to the aerial bombardment of Rotterdam by the German Air Force on 14 May 1940, during the German invasion of the Netherlands in World War II. The objective was to support the German troops fighting in the city, break Dutch resistance and force the Dutch to surrender...

. He was naturalized
Naturalization
Naturalization is the acquisition of citizenship and nationality by somebody who was not a citizen of that country at the time of birth....

 on March 21, 1944. Other musicians who emigrated to the United States and joined the New York Metropolitan Opera include Otto Klemperer
Otto Klemperer
Otto Klemperer was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century.-Biography:Otto Klemperer was born in Breslau, Silesia Province, then in Germany...

, Fritz Stiedry
Fritz Stiedry
Fritz Stiedry was an Austrian conductor and composer.-Biography:While studying law at the University of Vienna, Stiedry's musical abilities were noticed by Gustav Mahler who appointed him his assistant at the Vienna Court Opera in 1907...

, Paul Breisach
Paul Breisach
Paul Breisach was an Austrian-born conductor. He was a pupil of Heinrich Schenker in Vienna from October 1913 for several years. New Grove 2 reports that he was a conductor at the Städtische Oper in Berlin in the early 1930s until he emigrated...

, Max Rudolf, George Szell
George Szell
George Szell , originally György Széll, György Endre Szél, or Georg Szell, was a Hungarian-born American conductor and composer...

, Rudolf Bing, and George Schick.

Life in the arts and humanities

Kurt Adler began his professional career in Germany on the musical staff of the Berlin State Opera
Berlin State Opera
The Staatsoper Unter den Linden is a German opera company. Its permanent home is the opera house on the Unter den Linden boulevard in the Mitte district of Berlin, which also hosts the Staatskapelle Berlin orchestra.-Early years:...

. He later associated with the famous German Opera Theatre in Prague
Prague State Opera
The Prague State Opera , is an opera and ballet company in Prague, Czech Republic. The theatre was originally founded in 1888 as the New German Theatre and from 1949 to 1989 it was known as the Smetana Theatre....

 (where Rudolf, Szell and Schick also served) and with the Municipal Opera House in Berlin
Deutsche Oper Berlin
The Deutsche Oper Berlin is an opera company located in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin, Germany. The resident building is also home to the Berlin State Ballet.-History:...

. He joined the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

 in 1943, under the management of Edward Johnson
Edward Johnson (tenor)
Edward Patrick Johnson CBE was a Canadian operatic tenor who was billed outside North America as Edoardo Di Giovanni, and became director of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.- Early life :...

 then in conjunction with Rudolf Bing, General Manager, from 1945 to 1973.

Maestro Adler's press announcement upon his recruitment as Chorus Master of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City said, "That since Giulio Setti
Giulio Setti
Giulio Setti was an Italian choral conductor He served as chorus master of opera houses in Italy, Cairo, Cologne, and Buenos Aires prior to coming to the United States in 1908; there he was engaged as chorus master of the Metropolitan Opera...

's time, ten years ago, there never has been a single Chorus Master for the entire Italian, French, German, English repertoire and with my appointment, the gradual reorganization and training will again be centralized in one hand."

Education

Kurt Adler began studying music at age six under cantor Jacob Fürnberg, Neuhaus), His first public appearance was at age fourteen.

His entire musical education was in Vienna, Austria. Other teachers include Prof. Richard Robert (1861–1924), Fanny Boehm-Kramer, Prof. Alexander Manhart (1875–1936) (piano); Prof. Karl Weigl
Karl Weigl
Karl Ignaz Weigl was an Austrian composer. He was born in Vienna, being the son of a bank official who was also a keen amateur musician. Alexander Zemlinsky took him as a private pupil in 1896. Weigl went to school at the Franz-Joseph-Gymnasium and graduated from there in 1899...

 (1881–1949), Prof. Guido Adler
Guido Adler
Guido Adler was a Bohemian-Austrian musicologist and writer.His father Joachim, a physician, died of typhoid fever in 1857...

 (1855–1941), Prof. Wilhelm Fischer
Wilhelm Fischer
Wilhelm "Willi" Fischer boxer, Germany at the 1992 Summer Olympics Barcelona, Spain. Nicknamed The Ox Ahmed Sarir Jerry Nijman super heavyweight Bulgaria's Svilen Rusinov....

 (1886–1962) (theory); Prof.Ferdinand Foll (1867–1929), also Hermann Weigert (1890–1955), Erich Kleiber
Erich Kleiber
Erich Kleiber was an Austrian conductor.- Biography :Born in Vienna, Kleiber studied in Prague...

 (1890–1956) (conducting). In 1925, he graduated from the classical Akademisches Gymnasium, Vienna. In 1927, he earned a degree of Musicology
Musicology
Musicology is the scholarly study of music. The word is used in narrow, broad and intermediate senses. In the narrow sense, musicology is confined to the music history of Western culture...

 from the University of Vienna
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna is a public university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world...

, corresponding to Master of Arts, Philosophical Faculty of the University of Vienna.

Engagements

  • 1927–29 Assistant Conductor, Berlin State Opera
    Berlin State Opera
    The Staatsoper Unter den Linden is a German opera company. Its permanent home is the opera house on the Unter den Linden boulevard in the Mitte district of Berlin, which also hosts the Staatskapelle Berlin orchestra.-Early years:...

    . First opera conducted, Peer Gynt
    Peer Gynt
    Peer Gynt is a five-act play in verse by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen, loosely based on the fairy tale Per Gynt. It is the most widely performed Norwegian play. According to Klaus Van Den Berg, the "cinematic script blends poetry with social satire and realistic scenes with surreal ones"...

     Grief.
  • 1929–32 Conductor, Prague German Opera Theater
    Prague State Opera
    The Prague State Opera , is an opera and ballet company in Prague, Czech Republic. The theatre was originally founded in 1888 as the New German Theatre and from 1949 to 1989 it was known as the Smetana Theatre....

    .
  • 1932–33 Conductor, Berlin Municipal Opera House
    Deutsche Oper Berlin
    The Deutsche Oper Berlin is an opera company located in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin, Germany. The resident building is also home to the Berlin State Ballet.-History:...

    .
  • 1933–38 Conducting Symphony Concerts and Opera all over Europe.
  • 1933 Conductor of orchestra concerts, Vienna Grosser Musikvereinssaal
    Musikverein, Vienna
    Wiener Musikverein, , commonly shortened to The Musikverein, has a twofold meaning: it is the name of a famous Vienna concert hall, as well as the short name for the music society, Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde [Society of Music Friends], that owns the building.This building is located on...

    .
  • 1933 Founder of the "Unio" Opera Company, Vienna.
  • 1933–35 First Conductor, Kiev
    Kiev
    Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....

    , National Opera House of Ukraine.
  • 1935–37 Founder, Musical Director, and first conductor of the Symphonic Orchestra Stalingrad (U.S.S.R.).
  • 1938–43 U.S.A. Conducting Concerts and concertizing as pianist all over U.S. and Canada.
  • 1938–39 Pianist, three transcontinental tours of the United States.
  • 1939–41 Musical Director, Friendship House
    Friendship House
    Friendship House is a missionary movement founded in the early 1930s by Catholic social justice activist Catherine de Hueck Doherty, one of the leading proponents of interracial justice in pre-Martin Luther King, Jr...

    , New York City.
  • 1943 Assistant Conductor to Leopold Stokowski
    Leopold Stokowski
    Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...

    , Metropolitan Opera, New York City.
  • 1943–73 Chorus Master, Conductor, Metropolitan Opera, New York City, New York (USA).
  • 1944–47 Musical Director, Opera Nacional and Opera de Mexico, Mexico City.
  • 1952 Musical Director, Central City Opera Festival, Central City, Colorado.
  • 1954 Musical Director of Opera performances at Greek Theatre, Hollywood, California.

Conductor of numerous broadcasts and Television performances of operatic and symphonic music.

Teaching positions

  • 1929–32 Organizer and Conductor of the Students Orchestra of the German Academy of Music (Deutsche Akademie für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Prag), Prague, Czechoslovakia
    Czechoslovakia
    Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

    .
  • 1934–35 Conductor, orchestra of the Kiev Conservatory
    Kiev Conservatory
    The Tchaikovsky National Academy of Music is a Ukrainian state institution of higher music education. Its courses include postgraduate education.-History:...

     of Music, Kiev (Ukraine
    Ukraine
    Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

    ).
  • 1935–37 Professor of the Opera class at the Conservatory of Music, Stalingrad (U.S.S.R.)
  • 1938–41 Teacher of piano, theory; classes in chamber music; coach; New York City.

Quotes

  • Asked, "What do you consider your outstanding achievement?" Response, "Having escaped Hitler, having founded and directed the first Symphonic Orchestra Stalingrad." Asked, "What has helped you most in your career?" Response, "Artistic honesty, sense of humor, treatment of fellow artists (singers, chorus, orchestra) with utmost consideration for their values as human beings." Asked, "What has been your most thrilling musical experience?" Response, "First time when I heard Toscanini conduct with the Scala in 1928." Asked, "If you hadn't chosen your present career what would your second choice be?" Response, "would not have talent for anything else." Asked, "Are most of your friends musicians?" Response, "all kinds of intellectuals."

  • "Many instrumentalists and singers insist on putting themselves into the foreground. Yet though they may be strong personalities or have complete mastery of their medium, still I would not call them real artists. A real artist must be humble. Vanity has been the core of many virtuoso careers but it also has been the end of genuine artistic growth. Psychologically, an accompanist and coach must try to search for and understand where the roots of his soloist's artistry lie. These roots are as varied as the individual artists. Faith – religious, metaphysical, or materialistic – is one of the strongest roots; faith in oneself is part of it. Some great artists – Richard Wagner, for instance – were extremely self-centered, compensating for this fault by preaching altruism in their works. This brings us to another root of artistry: compensation for shortcomings in one's makeup – atonement for real or imagined sins and errors. A third very important root is rebellion against family, upbringing, or an adverse fate. Among those who rebel are some of our greatest artists, who have become what they are by surmounting seemingly overwhelming odds. Complacency is not a good stimulus to artistry."

  • "In your world of rapidly changing values – welcome changes when they are the results of technical and scientific progress – spiritual, ethical, and artistic values tend likewise to change, but much more slowly, and not always for the better. What the future will bring, no one can say. I should like to venture the opinion that the vistas opening for us will render us more humble, more concerned with inner or spiritual values. Our technological advances should give us more time; we shall need culture and be able to afford it."

Publications

  • 1943 Adler, K.: Songs of many wars, from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. New York, Howell, Soskin 1943, 221p. Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler. (A collection of fighting songs which oppressed people of all times and nation have sung in their fight against tyranny.)
  • 1953–1956 Adler, K.: Operatic anthology: celebrated arias selected from operas by old and modern composers, in five volumes / compiled by Kurt Adler. New York, G. Schirmer c1953–1956. Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1955 Adler, K.: Famous operatic choruses. New York, G. Schirmer c1955, Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1956 Adler, K.: The Prima donna‘s album: 42 celebrated arias from famous operas. New York, G. Schirmer c1956, Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1960 Adler, K.: Songs From Light Operas for soprano. New York, G. Schirmer 1960, Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1965 Adler, K.: The art of accompanying and coaching. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press 1965.
  • 1967Adler, K.: Phonetics and diction in singing: Italian, French, Spanish, German. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press 1967.
  • 1968 Adler, K.: Duets from the great operas, for soprano and baritone. New York, G. Schirmer 1968, Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1968 Adler, K.: Duets from the great operas, for soprano and tenor. New York, G. Schirmer, Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler.
  • 1971 Adler, K.: The art of accompanying and coaching. New York, Da Capo Press
  • 1974 Adler, K.: Phonetics and diction in singing: Italian, French, Spanish, German. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2nd ed.
  • 1975–1977 Adler, K.: Operatic anthology: celebrated arias selected from operas by old and modern composers, in five volumes / Edited and arranged by Kurt Adler. Rochester, N.Y., National Braille Association 1975–1977.
  • 1976 Adler, K.: The art of accompanying and coaching. New York, Da Capo Press
  • 1980 Adler, K.: The art of accompanying and coaching. New York, Da Capo Press
  • 1985 Adler, K.: The art of accompanying and coaching. New York, Da Capo Press

Personal life

Married in Stalingrad, U.S.S.R., Nina (unknown maiden name), Russia. The couple had one daughter, Ingrid, in Stalingrad.
On March 10, 1948 he married Irene Hawthorne (1917–1986) (true name Irene McNutt), former prima ballerina soloist of the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

.

On September 16, 1965, Adler married Christiane Tocco. The couple had three children, Evelyne born 1971, Luc Pierre Philippe born 1975, and Jacques Maximilian Mueller, stepson, born 1963

On September 21, 1977 Adler died at home in his sleep, in Butler, New Jersey, of uremia
Uremia
Uremia or uraemia is a term used to loosely describe the illness accompanying kidney failure , in particular the nitrogenous waste products associated with the failure of this organ....

/chronic glomerulonephritis
Glomerulonephritis
Glomerulonephritis, also known as glomerular nephritis, abbreviated GN, is a renal disease characterized by inflammation of the glomeruli, or small blood vessels in the kidneys...

.

His hobbies included stamp and book collecting.

His athletics included soccer, field hockey (All Austrian 1926), Track and Field, swimming, tennis, and ping-pong.

His instruments were piano, organ, harmonica, harpsichord, and celeste
Celesta
The celesta or celeste is a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. Its appearance is similar to that of an upright piano or of a large wooden music box . The keys are connected to hammers which strike a graduated set of metal plates suspended over wooden resonators...


External links

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