Hermine Finck (1 January 187231 October 1932) was a German opera singer. She created the role of The Witch in the world premiere of Humperdinck's ''

Hansel and Gretel "Hansel and Gretel" (; german: Hänsel und Gretel ) is a German fairy tale collected by the German Brothers Grimm and published in 1812 in ''Grimm's Fairy Tales'' (KHM 15). It is also known as Little Step Brother and Little Step Sister. Hansel ...

'' and appeared in numerous leading soprano roles in the opera houses of Germany. Also known as Hermine d'Albert, she was the third wife of the composer

Eugen d'Albert Eugen (originally Eugène) Francis Charles d'Albert (10 April 1864 – 3 March 1932) was a Scottish-born pianist and composer. Educated in Britain, d'Albert showed early musical talent and, at the age of seventeen, he won a scholarship to stud ...

to whom she was married from 1895 until their divorce in 1911. Finck was born in

Baden-Baden Baden-Baden () is a spa town in the state of Baden-Württemberg, south-western Germany, at the north-western border of the Black Forest mountain range on the small river Oos, ten kilometres (six miles) east of the Rhine, the border with Fra ...

and died at age 60 in Berlin, where she had taught singing in her later years.

Life and career

Finck was born in Baden-Baden to a prosperous middle-class family. She began her musical education at Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium in Frankfurt and later studied singing at the

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as ...

conservatory with Gustav Borchers and Auguste Götze. Finck made her stage debut in the title role of '' Carmen'' at the Weimar Court Theater in 1892 and became a regular member of the company. She came to wider attention in 1893 when she sang the role of The Witch in the world premiere of Humperdinck's ''

''. Finck and the composer

met that same year through his friendship with Richard Strauss who had conducted the ''Hansel and Gretel'' premiere. They began an affair, although d'Albert was still in a tempestuous marriage with his second wife,

Teresa Carreño María Teresa Gertrudis de Jesús Carreño García (December 22, 1853June 12, 1917) was a Venezuelan pianist, soprano, composer, and conductor. Over the course of her 54-year concert career, she became an internationally renowned virtuoso piani ...

. To be close to Finck, d'Albert took a job as Kapellmeister at the Weimar Court Theatre. Following his divorce from Carreño, the couple married on 21 October 1895 at the Protestant church in Gersbach. In 1897, Finck created the role of Waltrudis in the world premiere of d'Albert's three-act opera ''Gernot'' at the Mannheim Court Theater. However, after her marriage, she largely devoted herself to concert singing and touring with her husband and became known as the principal interpreter of d'Albert's vocal music. He wrote nearly 60 songs for her as well as ''Seejungfräulein'', a cantata for soprano and orchestra loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "

The Little Mermaid "The Little Mermaid" ( da, Den lille havfrue) is a literary fairy tale written by the Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. The story follows the journey of a young mermaid who is willing to give up her life in the sea as a mermaid to gain a ...

". Her marriage to d'Albert ended in divorce in 1911, two years after the birth of their only child, Violante Giovanna d'Albert. It had been the longest and most stable of d'Albert's six marriages. After their divorce, d'Albert married three more times. Finck moved to Berlin, where she resumed her stage career. She was engaged by the Berlin Court Opera from 1911 until 1912 and in the summer of 1912 appeared at the Bayreuth Festival as Gerhilde in ''

Die Walküre (; ''The Valkyrie''), WWV 86B, is the second of the four music dramas that constitute Richard Wagner's ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'' (English: ''The Ring of the Nibelung''). It was performed, as a single opera, at the National Theatre Munich on ...

''. During the course of her career, Finck's other major roles included Bedura in d'Albert's ''Der Rubin'', Donna Anna in '' Don Giovanni'', Leonore in ''

Fidelio ''Fidelio'' (; ), originally titled ' (''Leonore, or The Triumph of Marital Love''), Op. 72, is Ludwig van Beethoven's only opera. The German libretto was originally prepared by Joseph Sonnleithner from the French of Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, wi ...

'', and the title roles of ''

Mignon ''Mignon'' is an 1866 ''opéra comique'' (or opera in its second version) in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's 1795-96 novel '' Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre''. ...

'' and

Max von Schillings Max von Schillings (April 19, 1868 – July 24, 1933 in Berlin) was a German conductor, composer and theatre director. He was chief conductor at the Berlin State Opera from 1919 to 1925. Schillings' opera ''Mona Lisa'' (1915) was internationall ...

's ''Ingwelde''. In her later years, Finck continued to perform as a concert singer and taught singing in Berlin. She died there in 1932 at the age of 60. Eugen d'Albert had died earlier that year. Their daughter, Violante Bergel-d'Albert (as she was known after her marriage), became a journalist and writer and died in 1990.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Finck, Hermine 1872 births 1932 deaths German operatic sopranos People from Baden-Baden 19th-century German women singers 20th-century German women singers