Benno Ziegler (8 January 1887 – 18 April 1963) was a German operatic

baritone A baritone is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the bass and the tenor voice-types. The term originates from the Greek (), meaning "heavy sounding". Composers typically write music for this voice in the r ...

Life

Born in Munich the son of the opera singer Wilhelm Ziegler (1857-1931), Ziegler studied at the

University of Music and Performing Arts Munich The University of Music and Performing Arts Munich (german: Hochschule für Musik und Theater München), also known as the Munich Conservatory, is a performing arts conservatory in Munich, Germany. The main building it currently occupies is ...

. One teacher there was the Kammersinger Paul Bender. He had his debut in 1909 as Silvio in ''

Pagliacci ''Pagliacci'' (; literal translation, "Clowns") is an Italian opera in a prologue and two acts, with music and libretto by Ruggero Leoncavallo. The opera tells the tale of Canio, actor and leader of a commedia dell'arte theatrical company, who m ...

'' at the

Theater Augsburg The Staatstheater Augsburg is a theatre of Augsburg, Germany. Until 1999 it was called Städtische Bühnen Augsburg, from then until the end of August 2018 it was called ''Theater Augsburg''. It offers on four stages musical theatre, plays and bal ...

. Further engagements took him to Dortmund, Stuttgart, Karlsruhe and Berlin and in 1925 he was engaged as a lyricist and baritone at the Oper Frankfurt. With the soprano

Else Gentner-Fischer Else Gentner-Fischer (5 September 1883 – 26 April 1943) was a German operatic soprano. Although she appeared in operas internationally, her career was mainly centered at the Oper Frankfurt where she was a resident artist from 1907-1935. She exce ...

, who was married to him in a second marriage, he appeared there on the 1 January 1925. In February 1930 she appeared in the role of the spouse in the world

premiere A première, also spelled premiere, is the debut (first public presentation) of a play, film, dance, or musical composition. A work will often have many premières: a world première (the first time it is shown anywhere in the world), its first ...

of Arnold Schönberg's '' Von heute auf morgen'', directed by

Herbert Graf Herbert Graf (10 April 1903 – 5 April 1973) was an Austrian-American opera producer. Born in Vienna in 1903, he was the son of Max Graf (1873–1958), and Olga Hönig. His father was an Austrian author, critic, musicologist and member of Sig ...

and conducted by

William Steinberg William Steinberg (Cologne, August 1, 1899New York City, May 16, 1978) was a German-American conductor. Biography Steinberg was born Hans Wilhelm Steinberg in Cologne, Germany. He displayed early talent as a violinist, pianist, and composer, ...

. Ziegler was dismissed from the city stage for racist reasons in 1933 after the transfer of power to the National Socialists. Else Ziegler's engagement in Frankfurt was also terminated in 1935 because of her marriage to a non-Aryan, so that she lived in complete seclusion in

Prien am Chiemsee Prien am Chiemsee (official: , High German [], Bavarian (local) dialect []) is a municipality in the Upper Bavarian Rosenheim (district), district of Rosenheim in Germany. The town is a certified Luftkurort, air and Sebastian Kneipp, Kneipp spa o ...

and died there in 1943. Ziegler took himself to safety in Great Britain in 1939, where he had to make his living as an unskilled worker. Ziegler owned a property in

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the third-largest city of the German state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital of Stuttgart and Mannheim, and the 22nd-largest city in the nation, with 308,436 inhabitants. ...

, which had been administered by his brother Edmund (1879-1943) until the Aryanization. Edmund was deported to Gurs in 1940 and killed in 1943 in the

Majdanek concentration camp Majdanek (or Lublin) was a Nazi concentration and extermination camp built and operated by the SS on the outskirts of the city of Lublin during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It had seven gas chambers, two wooden gallows, a ...

. His nephew Paul-Alexander (1922-) was saved in 1938 by a kindertransport to England.Memorial Book for the Jews of Karlsruhe
. The property is listed there as Karlstraße 8. After the war Ziegler returned to Germany in 1947 and lived in Prien and Munich. Today Ziegler is represented in editions of historical recordings by

Lotte Lehmann Charlotte "Lotte" Lehmann (February 27, 1888 – August 26, 1976) was a German soprano who was especially associated with German repertory. She gave memorable performances in the operas of Richard Strauss, Richard Wagner, Ludwig van Beethoven, ...

, Richard Tauber,

Elisabeth Rethberg Elisabeth Rethberg ( Lisbeth Sättler; 22 September 1894 – 6 June 1976) was a German operatic soprano singer who was active from the period of the First World War through the early 1940s. Early years Rethberg was born Lisbeth Sättler in ...

Sabine Kalter Sabine Kalter (28 March 1889 in Jarosław – 1 September 1957 in London) was a British mezzo-soprano singer, mostly operatic. She made her professional opera debut at the Vienna Volksoper in 1911. From 1915–34 she was a leading artist at ...

, Emmy Bettendorf and Karin Branzell.

External links

Benno Ziegler
on LexMusic
Oper Frankfurt (Memento des Originals vom 22. Juni 2011 im Internet Archive)
on *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ziegler, Benno German operatic baritones 20th-century German male opera singers 1887 births 1963 deaths Musicians from Munich

Life

Further reading

External links

References