Elisabeth Schumann

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Elisabeth Schumann
Birthplace in Merseburg
Elisabeth Schumann with Richard Strauss

Elisabeth Schumann (born June 13, 1888 in Merseburg , Germany ; † April 23, 1952 in New York , USA ) was a German-American opera singer , oratorio singer , chamber singer ( soprano ) and vocal teacher .

Life

Elisabeth Schumann was the younger daughter of the Merseburg teacher, organist and conductor Alfred Schumann at Gotthardstraße 27. The prima donna Henriette Sontag is said to have been one of her direct ancestors . Elisabeth Schumann initially left her voice in Berlin a . a. train with Valerie Zitelmann and Marie Dietrich and in Dresden with Natalie Haenisch .

In Hamburg she took lessons from Alma Schadow, and in 1909 she made her stage debut as a shepherd boy in Wagner's Tannhäuser at the local opera house (city theater), to which she belonged until 1919. She caused a stir in 1912 as Cherubino , later as Susanna , in Mozart's opera Le nozze di Figaro . Roles like Zerlina in Don Giovanni and Eva in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg followed . 1914-1915 sang Elisabeth Schumann at the Metropolitan Opera New York , as the debut Sophie in Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss , with whom she was for decades friendship. This season she took on ten roles at the Metropolitan Opera, including Musetta in Puccini's La Bohème, Gretel in Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel and Marzelline in Beethoven's Fidelio . Despite the outbreak of the First World War, Elisabeth Schumann was able to return to Hamburg from the USA in May 1915, where she appeared in the world premiere of the opera Meister Grobian by Arnold Winternitz in 1918.

In 1919 Elisabeth Schumann was appointed to the Vienna State Opera and from 1922 to 1935 she took part in the Salzburg Festival under Hugo von Hofmannsthal , Max Reinhardt and Richard Strauss. She undertook extensive concert tours through Europe, the USA and South America, where she was accompanied on the piano by Richard Strauss, among others.

In addition to operas, Elisabeth Schumann also appeared in oratorios. In addition, she was a popular song interpreter and published two song collections.

Through the takeover of the National Socialists her career in 1938 was abruptly ended by a prohibition, as well as that of her former husband, the conductor Karl Alwin , with whom she was married from 1920 to 1933. In 1938 Alwin emigrated to Mexico , she to England and, a few months later with her third husband, to the USA, whose citizenship she accepted in 1944. There she was accepted into the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia in 1938 , where she taught until 1947. After the end of the war, she returned to Europe for a concert tour in the autumn of 1945 and planned to settle in England, which she was no longer able to do because of her sudden death in New York.

In memory of the artist, the Merseburger Altstadtverein eV put a plaque on the house where she was born. The theater and concert hall on the ground floor of the Merseburg Ständehaus is named after her. Since August 2020, a stumbling block in Salzburg has been a reminder of their eviction.

family

Elisabeth Schumann's first marriage was to the architect Walther Puritz (1882–1957). After a liaison with the conductor and composer Otto Klemperer during her time in Hamburg, she divorced and in 1919 married the conductor, composer and pianist Karl Alwin, who also accompanied her on the piano. In later years she married Hans Krüger.

Elisabeth Schumann's son Gerd Puritz (1914–2007) dedicated a detailed text and photo biography to his mother, while his daughter Joy Puritz is co-editor of the book Life Stations of the World-Famous Merseburg Soprano .

Audio documents

Videos

(Examples, partly in shellac record quality)

See also

Opera casts at the Salzburg Festival from 1922 to 1926

literature

Own publications:

  • Elisabeth Schumann: Elisabeth Schumann song book . First edition: Verlag Universal Edition , Vienna / Leipzig / New York 1928; Revised editions: Verlag Universal Edition , 1955, 1974.
  • Elisabeth Schumann: German Song (translation by David Millar Craig). Chanticleer Press, London 1948.

Secondary literature:

  • Sabine Keil, Joy Puritz, Elisabeth Schumann: Stations in the life of the world-famous Merseburg soprano . AXON, Querfurt 2008, ISBN 978-3-939325-09-3 .
  • Gerd Puritz, Elisabeth Schumann: A Biography / edited and translated by Joy Puritz . André Deutsch, London 1993, ISBN 0-233-98794-0 .
  • Joy Puritz: Schumann, Emma Elisabeth, divorced Puritz-Schumann, divorced Alwin-Schumann, divorced Kruger . In: Eva Labouvie (Ed.): Women in Saxony-Anhalt . Volume 2: A biographical-bibliographical lexicon from the 19th century to 1945 . Böhlau, Cologne a. a. 2019, ISBN 978-3-412-51145-6 , pp. 415-419.

Web links

Commons : Elisabeth Schumann  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Memorial plaque Gotthardstraße 27 in Commons category Gotthardstraße (Merseburg)
  2. ↑ Natalie Haenisch at Operissimo  on the basis of the Great Singer LexiconTemplate: Operissimo / maintenance / use of parameter 2
  3. ↑ Elisabeth Schumann Hall in the Merseburg Ständehaus near Merseburg Ständehaus
  4. ↑ Stolpersteine ​​Salzburg - Places & Biographies. 28 stumbling blocks, including one for Elisabeth Schumann, relocated on August 17, 2020 at Max-Reinhardt-Platz. Retrieved August 17, 2020 .
  5. ↑ Hamburg Years in Die Welt (2012)

Remarks

  1. ↑ lives at Overbeck Strasse 20 in the Uhlenhorst district (according to the Hamburg address book for 1918 at sub.uni-hamburg.de)
  2. ↑ see Gerd Puritz in the English language Wikipedia
personal data
SURNAME Schumann, Elisabeth
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-American opera singer, oratorio singer, chamber singer (soprano) and vocal teacher
DATE OF BIRTH June 13, 1888
PLACE OF BIRTH Merseburg , Germany
DATE OF DEATH April 23, 1952
Place of death New York , USA