Paula Salomon-Lindberg (''née'' Levi; 21 December 1897 – 17 April 2000) was an internationally renowned German classical

contralto A contralto () is a type of classical female singing voice whose vocal range is the lowest female voice type. The contralto's vocal range is fairly rare; similar to the mezzo-soprano, and almost identical to that of a countertenor, typically b ...

before the Second World War. She was specialised in

Lied In Western classical music tradition, (, plural ; , plural , ) is a term for setting poetry to classical music to create a piece of polyphonic music. The term is used for any kind of song in contemporary German, but among English and French s ...

oratorio An oratorio () is a large musical composition for orchestra, choir, and soloists. Like most operas, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an instrumental ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias. However, opera is mus ...

and

cantata A cantata (; ; literally "sung", past participle feminine singular of the Italian verb ''cantare'', "to sing") is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir. The meaning of ...

, but occasionally also performed opera.

Parents

Salomon-Lindberg's original name was Paula Levi. Her father was the Jewish and

hazzan A ''hazzan'' (; , lit. Hazan) or ''chazzan'' ( he, חַזָּן , plural ; Yiddish ''khazn''; Ladino ''Hasan'') is a Jewish musician or precentor trained in the vocal arts who helps lead the congregation in songful prayer. In English, this pr ...

Lazarus Levi, who had a special reputation as a singer, far beyond the town of Frankenthal. He was born on 16 July 1862 in and came to Frankenthal in 1896, which at that time belonged to

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

. On 9 March 1897, he married Sophia Mayer, who had been born in Frankenthal on 29 December 1872. His only child from the marriage was his daughter Paula. Lazarus Levi died on 17 November 1919, his wife on 26 November 1930, both in Frankenthal. The family graves are maintained in the new Jewish cemetery in Frankenthal.

Life

Salomon-Lindberg received her education mainly in

Mannheim Mannheim (; Palatine German: or ), officially the University City of Mannheim (german: Universitätsstadt Mannheim), is the second-largest city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg after the state capital of Stuttgart, and Germany's 2 ...

and Berlin by Julius von Raatz-Brockmann.

counterpoint In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more musical lines (or voices) which are harmonically interdependent yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. It has been most commonly identified in the European classical tradi ...

she learned from

Ernst Toch Ernst Toch (; 7 December 1887 – 1 October 1964) was an Austrian composer of classical music and film scores. He sought throughout his life to introduce new approaches to music. Biography Toch was born in Leopoldstadt, Vienna, into the family ...

. She became famous in the 1920s and appeared mainly in works of the

Baroque period The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

such as J. S. Bach's ''

St Matthew Passion The ''St Matthew Passion'' (german: Matthäus-Passion, links=-no), BWV 244, is a '' Passion'', a sacred oratorio written by Johann Sebastian Bach in 1727 for solo voices, double choir and double orchestra, with libretto by Picander. It sets ...

'', Handel's ''

Messiah In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of ''mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach'' ...

'', but also in more modern works such as Gustav Mahler's ''

Das Lied von der Erde ''Das Lied von der Erde'' ("The Song of the Earth") is an orchestral song cycle for two voices and orchestra written by Gustav Mahler between 1908 and 1909. Described as a symphony when published, it comprises six songs for two singers who alte ...

''. In 1929, she gave a guest performance at the

Grand Théâtre de Genève Grand Théâtre de Genève is an opera house in Geneva, Switzerland. As with many other opera houses, the Grand Théâtre de Genève is both a venue and an institution. The venue is a majestic building, towering over Place Neuve, official ...

. Between 1930 and 1933, she sang the alto parts in performances of

Bach Cantata The cantatas composed by Johann Sebastian Bach, known as Bach cantatas (German: ), are a body of work consisting of over 200 surviving independent works, and at least several dozen that are considered lost. As far as known, Bach's earliest can ...

s in the

St. Thomas Church, Leipzig , native_name_lang = , image = Leipzig Thomaskirche.jpg , imagelink = , imagealt = , caption = , pushpin map = , pushpin label position = , pushpin map alt ...

. On 4 September 1930, she married the surgeon Albert Salomon in Frankenthal (1883-1976), became stepmother of the painter

Charlotte Salomon Charlotte Salomon (16 April 1917 – 10 October 1943) was a German-Jewish artist born in Berlin. She is primarily remembered as the creator of an autobiographical series of paintings ''Leben? oder Theater?: Ein Singspiel'' (Life? or Theater?: A ...

and from then on appeared under the name Lindberg-Salomon instead of Paula Lindberg. She was friends with numerous personalities such as

Siegfried Ochs Siegfried Ochs (19 April 1858 – 6 February 1929) was a German choral conductor and composer. Life Born in Frankfurt, Ochs first studied medicine and chemistry at the Polytechnikum Darmstadt (today the Technische Universität Darmstadt) and at ...

, Kurt Singer,

Erich Mendelsohn Erich Mendelsohn (21 March 1887 – 15 September 1953) was a German architect, known for his expressionist architecture in the 1920s, as well as for developing a dynamic Functionalism (architecture), functionalism in his projects for department ...

Alfred Einstein Alfred Einstein (December 30, 1880February 13, 1952) was a German-American musicologist and music editor. He was born in Munich and fled Nazi Germany after Hitler's ''Machtergreifung'', arriving in the United States by 1939. He is best known for b ...

Paul Paul may refer to: *Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name) *Paul (surname), a list of people People Christianity *Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Chris ...

and

Rudolf Hindemith Rudolf Hindemith, since 1951 officially Paul Quest, pseudonym Hans Lofer (9 January 19007 October 1974) was a German cellist, composer and conductor. He was solo cellist of the Vienna State Opera, and played chamber music in the Amar Quartet. H ...

and

Albert Schweitzer Ludwig Philipp Albert Schweitzer (; 14 January 1875 – 4 September 1965) was an Alsatian-German/French polymath. He was a theologian, organist, musicologist, writer, humanitarian, philosopher, and physician. A Lutheran minister, Schwei ...

, and her house became a frequent meeting place for musical and social evenings. The rooms were equipped with a small art collection that was established from about 1928 to 1935, among others with works by

Theodoor van Loon Theodoor van Loon (1581 or 1582, in Erkelenz – 1649, in Maastricht) was a Flemish Baroque painter. Life Theodoor van Loon traveled twice to Italy, from 1602 to 1608 and from 1628 to 1629. He is known as a follower of Caravaggio. Together with ...

, Gustav Schönleber and

Ambrosius Bosschaert Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (18 January 1573 – 1621) was a Flemish-born Dutch still life painter and art dealer.Kulturbund Deutscher Juden which she helped to build up under the direction of Kurt Singer. Among others she performed here with the pianist

Grete Sultan Grete Sultan (born Johanna Margarete Sultan) (June 21, 1906June 26, 2005) was a German-American pianist. Born in Berlin into a musical Jewish family, she studied piano from an early age with American pianist Richard Buhlig, and later with Leonid ...

. From 1935, she took lessons with the singing teacher

Alfred Wolfsohn Alfred Wolfsohn (23 September 1896 – 5 February 1962) was a German singing teacher who suffered persistent auditory hallucination of screaming soldiers, whom he had witnessed dying of wounds while serving as a stretcher bearer in the trenches o ...

. Through determined behaviour and many administrative steps, she was able to obtain the release of her husband from

Sachsenhausen Sachsenhausen () or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a German Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used from 1936 until April 1945, shortly before the defeat of Nazi Germany in May later that year. It mainly held political prisoners ...

concentration camp, where he had been imprisoned following ein 1938

Kristallnacht () or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...

. In the Künstlerhilfe she supported other people in danger and was able to help many of them to emigrate. In 1939, she fled with her husband to Amsterdam, where they were both interned in the

Westerbork transit camp Camp Westerbork ( nl, Kamp Westerbork, german: Durchgangslager Westerbork, Drents: ''Börker Kamp; Kamp Westerbörk'' ), also known as Westerbork transit camp, was a Nazi transit camp in the province of Drenthe in the Northeastern Netherlands, d ...

in 1943, but later escaped and survived the occupation in hiding until 1944. After the war, Lindberg-Salomon lived in the Netherlands, was able to fit into Dutch concert life without any problems and worked as a singing teacher at the Amsterdam Music Lyceum and at the summer courses of the

Mozarteum Mozarteum University Salzburg (German: ''Universität Mozarteum Salzburg'') is one of three affiliated but separate (it is actually a state university) entities under the “Mozarteum” moniker in Salzburg municipality; the International Moz ...

in Salzburg. In 1947, she travelled with her husband to Southern France, where they were presented with the pictures of Charlotte, which the couple donated to the

Joods Historisch Museum The (; en, Jewish Museum), part of the Jewish Cultural Quarter, is a museum in Amsterdam dedicated to Jewish history, culture and religion, in the Netherlands and worldwide. It is the only museum in the Netherlands dedicated to Jewish history. ...

in Amsterdam in 1971. She visited Germany in 1986 on the occasion of an exhibition with works of her stepdaughter. In 1989, she founded an international song competition named after her, which since then has been held every two years by the

Universität der Künste Berlin The Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK; also known in English as the Berlin University of the Arts), situated in Berlin, Germany, is the largest art school in Europe. It is a public art and design school, and one of the four research universiti ...

, and which she actively supervised until her death. She rejected a classification or assessment of people according to religious or national affiliation with the following words: Salomon-Lindberg died in Amsterdam at the age of 102.

Recognition

On 21 April 2012, a

Stolperstein A (; plural ; literally 'stumbling stone', metaphorically a 'stumbling block') is a sett-size, concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution. The project, initiat ...

for Salomon-Lindberg was laid in front of her former residence, in

Berlin-Charlottenburg Charlottenburg () is a Boroughs and localities of Berlin, locality of Berlin within the borough of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. Established as a German town law, town in 1705 and named after Sophia Charlotte of Hanover, Queen consort of Kingdom ...

, Wielandstraße 15.

References

External links

*
Paula Lindberg-Salomon (contralto)
Bach Cantatas Website {{DEFAULTSORT:SalomonLindberg, Paula German contraltos Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the Netherlands 1897 births 2000 deaths People from Frankenthal German centenarians Women centenarians 20th-century German women

Parents

Life

Recognition

Further reading

References

External links