Klaus Geitel

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Klaus Geitel (born August 14, 1924 in Berlin ; † June 14, 2016 there ) was a German music , dance and ballet critic and entrepreneur .

Life

Klaus Geitel was born as the son of the entrepreneur Gustav Geitel in Berlin-Karlshorst . His father founded a flag factory which, during the Nazi era, produced swastika flags and Jewish stars, among other things . Geitel was involved in the company BEST Berliner Stoffdruckerei GmbH, which was newly founded in 1948 with his brother Rolf . After he returned from the war at the age of 21, he ran the spirits factory in Stendal, which his father had taken over .

As a student, Geitel took part in a number of performances of the Berlin Kroll Opera and as an extra in the theater on Gendarmenmarkt . Later Geitel studied musicology , archeology , German , Romance studies and above all art history with Wilhelm Worringer in Halle . He then continued his studies as well as frequent theater and concert visits in Berlin, and Edwin Redslob arranged for the doctoral student to do a three-month research stay at the Sorbonne in Paris. There, however, he broke off his dissertation on the painter Jean Fouquet after he discovered that he had been adequately researched in recent years. Instead, Geitel soon became enthusiastic about the current cultural events of the metropolis, stayed in Paris for a year and a half and attended more than 178 ballet and dance performances there alone. He got to know artists like Alberto Giacometti , Hans Bellmer , Wols and Lou Albert-Lasard personally and became friends a. a. with Hans Werner Henze . Then he returned to Berlin and worked commercially in his father's business again; in the evening he was a regular visitor to the music, ballet and later opera performances.

It was not until 1958 that his first contribution (about the Warsaw Autumn Festival ) appeared in the daily newspaper Die Welt at the invitation of a Polish music journalist . A short time later, the ballet critic Horst Koegler quit there , and Geitel began working as a freelancer to report on ballet and music. After two years he received an editor's contract without editorial duties, and from 1976 he also wrote for the Berliner Morgenpost . He became one of the most prominent German music journalists and ballet critics of his time. Geitel wrote around fifteen thousand reviews; he published ten of his own books and numerous others as a co-author. According to his own statement, he spent “thousands of hours in front of radio microphones” (including in “Classic for Breakfast” at Sender Freies Berlin ) and also worked for various television stations. He also moderated his own programs on the concert stages, for example with or for the countertenor Jochen Kowalski or the soprano Dame Gwyneth Jones .

He divided up his archive during his lifetime and handed over the ballet and dance section to the German Dance Archive in Cologne , and the inventory on composers, instrumentalists and singers to the archive of the Academy of Arts in Berlin. His life partner, adopted son and heir Rodney Geitel-Bautista was co-editor of a band with a selection of Geitel's dance reviews in 2019.

Publications (selection)

  • Paris Ballet Center. Rembrandt, Berlin 1960.
  • Ballet before the premiere. Rembrandt, Berlin 1961.
  • Stars on top. Rembrandt, Berlin 1963.
  • The dancer today. Rembrandt, Berlin 1964.
  • The dancer Rudolf Nurejev. Rembrandt, Berlin 1967.
  • Hans Werner Henze. Rembrandt, Berlin 1968.
  • The Béjart adventure. Rembrandt, Berlin 1970.
  • Questions to Friedrich Gulda. Rembrandt, Berlin 1973, ISBN 978-3-7925-0202-0 .
  • John Cranko. Ballet for the world. Thorbecke, Sigmaringen 1977. ISBN 978-3-7995-2005-8 .
  • Born to be amazed: stations of a music critic. Henschel, Berlin 2005, ISBN 978-3-89487-496-4 .
  • Frank-Manuel Peter , Thomas Thorausch (ed.): “One is bold enough to be unfashionable”. Klaus Geitel's dance reviews 1959–1979. Henschel, Leipzig 2019, ISBN 978-3-89487-804-7 .

literature

  • Horst Koegler, Helmut Günther : Reclams Ballettlexikon. Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 1984, p. 171.
  • Dieter Strunz: Critics out of love. He prefers foil instead of mallet: The music journalist Klaus Geitel turns 80 today. In: Berliner Morgenpost. August 14, 2004, p. 10 ( online ).
  • Joachim Kaiser : A lover of beautiful women's voices. In: Berliner Morgenpos. August 14, 2004, p. 10 ( online ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Born to be amazed. In: the orchestra. Retrieved June 26, 2020 (German).
  2. ↑ “Scream what you can do” - DER SPIEGEL 39/1988. Retrieved June 26, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Manuel Brug: The flags of the classical period are flying at half-mast . In: THE WORLD . June 16, 2016 ( welt.de [accessed June 26, 2020]).
  4. ↑ Klaus Geitel: Born to be amazed. Henschel, Berlin 2005, p. 175.
  5. ↑ Klaus Geitels 90. “I wasn't interested in how Karajan showered” . The world . August 14, 2014, accessed October 23, 2016.
  6. ↑ He knew God and wrote for the world: Klaus Geitel. SK Foundation for Culture . Retrieved October 23, 2016.
  7. ↑ Mihaela: Klaus Geitel's dance critics “one is bold enough to be unfashionable”, 1959–1979. In: Dance for You Magazine. Accessed June 30, 2020 (German).
personal data
SURNAME Geitel, Klaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German music journalist, ballet critic and book author
DATE OF BIRTH August 14, 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH June 14, 2016
Place of death Berlin