Alfred Walter

Alfred Walter (born May 8, 1929 in Wallern , Czechoslovakia , † March 7, 2004 in Brussels ) was an Austrian conductor .

Live and act

Born as the son of former Austrian parents in the Sudetenland , he studied at the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz and in 1948 became second conductor at the Theaterhaus in Ravensburg . In 1951 he was committed to the Graz Opera , where he worked until 1965. He was also assistant to Hans Knappertsbusch and Karl Böhm at the Bayreuth Festival . From 1966 Walter was chief conductor of the Durban Symphony Orchestra in South Africa for three years and from 1969 to 1970 chief conductor of Radio Reykjavík . From 1970 he was appointed general music director of the Munster Municipal Theaters for 15 years , but also appeared as a guest conductor, including several times at the Vienna State Opera . In Münster he was particularly fond of the works of Richard Wagner , Anton Bruckner and Gustav Mahler and those of contemporary composers such as Isang Yun , Viktor Kalabis and Gottfried von Eine .

After 1985 Walter became chief conductor of the Brussels Radio Symphony Orchestra for two years and then only worked as a freelance conductor.

His discography was mainly created for the labels Naxos and Marco Polo and includes works by Johann Strauss (Sohn) (over 20 CDs) and all symphonies by Wilhelm Furtwängler and Louis Spohr as well as selected works by Gottfried von Eine, Max von Schillings , Franz Schubert , Oscar Straus and Carl Reinecke .

Ruth Renée Reif: The Stuttgart Philharmonic . Published by the Society of Friends of the Stuttgart Philharmonic. Silberburg-Verlag , Tübingen 1999, ISBN 978-3-87407-319-6 , p. 161 ff.
Wolfgang Hildemann: General Music Director Alfred Walter Sudetenland. 22, Münster 1980, pp. 142-143.