‘The only thing worth emphasizing is that Theresienstadt has not hampered my musical activity, but actually encouraged it and supported it.’ The final entry in Viktor Ullmann’s journal referred to ‘Theresienstadt’, the town of Terezín, 60 kilometres northeast of Prague, which was remote enough for the Nazis to pursue their barbarism in relative seclusion. Yet within the ...
(Vikh’-tor Uhl’-man) 1898–c. 1944 Czech composer Ullmann studied in Vienna with Schoenberg and also in his native Prague with the pioneer of microtonal music, Alois Hába. In his own music their influence is joined by those of Mahler, Zemlinsky (with whom he studied conducting), Debussy and Weill, among others. His powerful opera Der Sturz des Antichrists (‘The Rise ...
1898–1944, Austrian Among the most heart-breaking of musicians’ stories is the brutally curtailed life and career of Viktor Ullmann. A Jewish victim of the Nazi genocide, he reached his creative zenith during two harrowing years inside Terezín (known as Theresienstadt by the Nazis). As he noted about himself and other musician prisoners before their death in the concentration camp ...
The opera house and, more specifically, opera audiences, were among the last to be receptive to the new musical language that developed during the twentieth century. Slow, as well as reluctant to vary their traditional musical tastes, perceptions and expectations, many viewed the opera house with nostalgia; as a symbol of the establishment, holding ...
Stories of chaotic and bungled performances of Tosca abound, but there are two in particular that have become legendary. The first concerns a production in New York in 1960. The prima donna singing the title role had, through her various demands and irascibility, made herself unpopular with everyone – so much so, in fact, that the ...
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