John Bröcheler

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Bröcheler (born February 21, 1945 in Vaals ) is a Dutch baritone in operas and concerts.

Life

Bröcheler was born in the province of Limburg , a few kilometers from the German border. His father was a tailor . The male members of the Bröcheler family were considered to be extremely “happy to sing”. Bröcheler's uncle was the opera singer Caspar Bröcheler (1912–1971) , who was engaged for many years at the Bremen Theater as a hero and character baritone .

After completing secondary school, Bröcheler, who had left school “prematurely” and “ingloriously”, worked as an assembly line worker in the production of an industrial company in Aachen . In 1961 John Bröcheler became a member of the men's choir Het Koninklijk Mannenkoor Cecilia in 1837, where he played solo parts at the age of 17. He studied singing at the Maastricht Conservatory with Leo Ketelaars , who was a customer of Bröcheler's father, and who had accepted Bröcheler into his singing class after an audition, and later in Paris with Pierre Bernac . In 1966 he gave his first recital in Utrecht . In 1969 he won first prize at the Landelijk Concours van Nederlandse Vocalisten singing competition in 's-Hertogenbosch . After his studies he was awarded a first stage commitment in Amsterdam for the role of Leonetto in Suppé -Operette Boccaccio ; However, he initially decided on a career as a concert singer and had initial success in the concert hall. In the Concertgebouw Amsterdam he sang with José van Dam in L'enfance du Christ by Berlioz , and he gave the invitation of the conductor Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos , the first guest performances in Spain .

In 1974, after a telephone request from Berlin , he was engaged for the world premiere of Henri Pousseur's Die Verprobung des Petros Hebraicus at the Berliner Festwochen , and there the following year for the world premiere of Mauricio Kagel 's Mare Nostrum . From then on Bröcheler was regarded as a specialist in the music of the "avant-garde" and made guest appearances with modern roles in Paris, Avignon and Florence.

Bröcheler's success abroad led to an engagement with the Nederlandse Operastichtig , whose management now wanted to present Bröcheler as an opera singer in his home country. Bröcheler made his debut as an opera singer at De Nederlandse Opera in 1973 as Sid in Britten's Albert Herring . In a performance of Donizetti's Maria Stuarda staged by Tito Capobianco , he took on the role of Talbot alongside Joan Sutherland in the title role, with whom the Nederlandse Operastichtig promoted Bröcheler's career. He has appeared in leading roles such as Mozart's Don Giovanni (1984), Germont in Verdi's La Traviata , Marcello in Puccini's La Bohème and Mandryka in Arabella by Richard Strauss. He also took on this role in 1984 at the Glyndebourne Festival .

From 1977 onwards, Bröcheler appeared in the United States through the agency of Tito Capobianco, first at the San Diego Opera , as Ford in Verdi's Falstaff , and as Sharpless in Puccini's Madama Butterfly . Capobianco also recommended Bröcheler for the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti's La Loca in June 1979 in San Diego alongside Beverly Sills in the title role. Beverly Sills then engaged Bröcheler for several seasons at the New York City Opera, which she directed . He was Verdi's Nabucco , with Grace Bumbry as Abigail, at the Los Angeles Opera and in Toronto . In Hamlet by Ambroise Thomas he sang alongside Sutherland as Ophelia.

After first concerts in Stuttgart under Wolfgang Gönnenwein and Helmuth Rilling , Bröcheler's operatic career began in Germany. For the 1984/85 season he was signed by the then GMD Michael Gielen for twenty evenings (Amfortas, Marcello in La Bohème , Guglielmo, Germont-père) at the Frankfurt Opera . In Germany, Bröcheler took part in 1985 as the governor in the first performance of the completed King Hirsch von Henze at the Stuttgart State Opera , conducted by Dennis Russell Davies . An excerpt from the third act was later used for the documentary Musik in Deutschland 1950-2000 , with Julia Conwell as the girl and Helmut Holzapfel as the king. In the same year Bröcheler sang for the first time at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, first as Jochanaan in Salome by Richard Strauss, then as Orest in Elektra and as Golaud in Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande . In the season 1987/88 he sang Jochanaan in a production of the Nederlandse Operastichting in Amsterdam in a new production of Salome by Harry Kupfer . In 1988 he made his debut as Golaud at the Vienna State Opera , where he later (February 2001) also sang Mandryka in Arabella . In the 1990/91 season he made his role debut as Cardinal Borromeo in the revival of the Palestrina production by Filippo Sanjust at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich with “vocal nobility, intelligent text capture and dramatic engagement” . Bröcheler also made guest appearances at the Bonn Opera House (1989, as Wolfram in Tannhäuser ), at the Stuttgart State Opera (1992–1993) and at the Dresden State Opera (1993). In 1995 he made his first guest appearance at the Salzburg Festival . He had great success as Wotan / Wanderer in the Amsterdam Ring Cycle in 1997/98.

In 2000 he sang the four villains in a production by Joachim Schlömer in a new production of Hoffmann's Tales at the Stuttgart State Opera . In 2001 he sang the title role in Lear in Amsterdam , where he showed “a level of intensity that could hardly be surpassed” and offered “with many vocal nuances one of the best Lear interpretations since the opera's premiere in 1978”. In 2002 Bröcheler joined De Nederlandse Opera as Dr. Nice in Alban Berg's Lulu alongside Anja Silja in the title role. In 2003 he sang again the four villains in Hoffmann's stories at the Stuttgart State Opera . In the 2003/04 season he also sang Lear at the Dresden State Opera. In 2004 he appeared at the State Opera of South Australia in Adelaide (Australia) as Wotan in the Ring cycle.

Bröcheler recorded Schumann's Dichterliebe with the pianist Tan Crone , in a recording that was awarded the German Record Critics' Prize.

After his career as a singer, Bröcheler ran a bed and breakfast , Huize Bröcheler , in the Eperheide district in Epen in the Limburg province, together with his wife .

Awards

In 2005 Bröcheler became the Ridder of the Orde van de Nederlandse Leeuw appointed.

literature

  • Hans Toonen: John Bröcheler - levenslang zingen . 2006, ISBN 90-90-20180-7 (biography).
  • Gerhart Asche: John Bröcheler . Portrait. In: Opera world . Edition 7/1982, pages 13–15.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Gerhart Asche: John Bröcheler . Portrait. In: Opera world . Edition 7/1982, pages 13–15.
  2. ↑ a b Marcel Wolff: 2017 the Cecilia year (part 4). In: kmkcecilia1837.nl. Koninklijk Mannenkoor Cecilia 1837 Vaals, October 12, 2017, accessed on February 18, 2020 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Bröcheler, John . In: Karl-Josef Kutsch (Hrsg.): Großes Sängerlexikon . 4th edition. tape 1 : Aarden Castles . KG Saur, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-598-11598-9 , pp. 601 ( books.google.com ).
  4. ↑ John Bröcheler (bass baritone). Melba Recordings, accessed February 4, 2020 .
  5. ↑ a b c d Nederlandse baritone John Bröcheler wordt 75 jaar. Nederlandse Opera , February 21, 2020, accessed on March 17, 2020 (Dutch).
  6. ↑ a b King Hirsch / Opera in three acts (excerpt from the 5th scene of the 3rd act). Hans Werner Henze Foundation, 2012, accessed on February 18, 2020 .
  7. ↑ Marcello Santi: TASTES A LA CARTE . Performance reviews. In: Orpheus . Edition January 1, 1991, p. 54
  8. ↑ Manuel Brug: The last muse turns off the light. In: Welt Online . July 15, 2000, accessed March 12, 2020 (performance review).
  9. ↑ Michael Stenger: There is a lot of mischief in the world. In: Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung . November 8, 2001, accessed March 12, 2020 (performance review; reproduced on haenchen.net).
  10. ↑ a b Bröcheler John. In: Operissimo. Retrieved March 12, 2020 (biography).
  11. ↑ Rosalind Wadley: The Ring of the Nibelung. In: musicweb-international.com. 2004, accessed March 12, 2020 (English, performance review).
personal data
SURNAME Bröcheler, John
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch baritone
DATE OF BIRTH February 21, 1945
PLACE OF BIRTH Vaals