Klaus Nomi

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
illustration

Klaus Nomi (* 24. January 1944 in Immenstadt , † 6. August 1983 in New York ; bourgeois Klaus Sperber ) was in the field of pop music active German countertenor .

Life

Klaus Sperber was born in Immenstadt and grew up in Ratholz . His mother fled Essen due to the war. When he was four years old, they moved to Langschede , and later back to Essen. Inspired by the music at home, Klaus Sperber was interested in opera and pop music as a teenager and discovered his talent as an opera singer . Initially all attempts to gain a foothold as an opera singer failed, and so he initially learned the profession of confectioner . He also worked as an extra at the Essen theaters and then completed his vocal training in Berlin, where he also worked as an usher at the Deutsche Oper . At that time he also sang opera melodies and arias in the Kleist Casino in Berlin , a nightclub frequented mainly by homosexual guests. Although he studied at a music college for a few semesters, he was not accepted by any theater.

In 1973 he moved to New York, the then Mecca of the creative scene. Sparrowhawk moved in the artistic circles of the East Village . In the first few years he got by with temporary jobs and had his voice ( tenor ) trained as a counter tenor by Ira Siff . Sparhawk, who took on the stage name Klaus Nomi around this time , performed on basement stages and, with his extraordinary demeanor and talent, developed into an underground attraction.

In 1978 David Bowie became aware of him because he liked and inspired the extraordinary style of Nomis. Bowie hired him in 1979, together with Joey Arias, as a background singer for an appearance on the NBC show Saturday Night Live , which meant Nomi’s first small breakthrough into the pop world and helped him to a record deal. As a "singing confectioner" he was invited to some television shows where he sang and presented his famous pies and cakes. He succeeded in a coup when he cleverly put the beginning of a concert in New York about two hours after the television show was broadcast, which shortly afterwards led to a crowd in front of the concert hall and a sold out hall.

His own composition Keys of Life, his first single , was released in 1980. In the early 1980s, Nomi had his first appearance on German television, on the show Bio's Bahnhof . Around 1982 Nomi was diagnosed with HIV - at that time still almost unknown. At the end of the year he went on a small tour through Europe and performed with his interpretation of the aria Oh What Power Art Thou (Cold Song) from the opera King Arthur by Henry Purcell at Eberhard Schoener's Klassik-Rock-Nacht in Munich and with his song Total eclipse in Thomas Gottschalk's first “ Well something! “ Broadcast on. The recording of the appearance at Schoener already shows a badly attacked and weakened Klaus Nomi. The small series of appearances became his farewell tour. When Nomi left Germany, he already knew that he would not come back.

Klaus Nomi died on August 6, 1983 at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center . His ashes were scattered across New York. Although Nomi gained some fame in Paris and New York and received a gold record in France, he is little known in Germany.

Musical style and image

Nomi's musical style is a mixture of New Wave in the style of Sparks and opera . His repertoire encompassed different genres and styles of music. In addition to his own compositions (e.g. Keys of Life ) and pieces from the artistic orbit of Dada (including Total Eclipse and Simple Man by Kristian Hoffman), which were heavily influenced by New Wave, Nomi mainly interpreted well-known pop songs ( Chubby Checkers The Twist , Marlene Dietrich's Falling In Love Again / I'm head to toe in love ) and opera arias (e.g. Henry Purcell's Death and Cold Song , Saint-Saëns Samson and Delilah ). His only published single in German is Der Nussbaum by Robert Schumann .

His stage show was retro-futuristic based on science fiction visions of the 1920s (especially Metropolis ); White made-up face ( kabuki mask) with black lips, complemented by cubist clothes and hairstyles were his trademark. Countertenor singing was known to date, but not in a pop context. His stylistic orientation is reminiscent of Peter Gabriel and David Bowie in many ways , who were similarly groundbreaking in this musical era. Particularly typical for Klaus Nomi were his robot-like movements on the stage and an exaggerated harsh German accent when the English-language titles were presented.

Discography

Albums

  • CD and LP Klaus Nomi , 1981
  • CD and LP Simple Man , 1982
  • CD and LP Encore , 1983 ( posthumous )
  • CD Collection , 1991 (posthumous)
  • CD Klaus Nomi , 1994 (posthumous)
  • CD Eclipsed , (posthumous)
  • CD ZABAKDAZ , (posthumously 2008, also called The Unfinished Opera , contains demos and fragments of an opera that were edited by George Elliott and Page Wood)
  • Live LP In Concert , 1986 (posthumous)
  • Ses 20 Plus Belles Chansons , 1994 (posthumous)

tribute

Klaus Nomi's interpretation of the Cold Song was used as the soundtrack for the French feature film On What We Love , released in November 1983 .

In 1998, Olga Neuwirth arranged four songs for countertenor and small ensemble under the title Hommage à Klaus Nomi , which were premiered at the Salzburg Festival . In 2009 a version for chamber orchestra followed with a total of eleven songs, which was premiered by Jochen Kowalski and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra .

In 2001 the German band Rosenstolz released a cover version of Nomi's piece Total Eclipse together with Marc Almond and thus reached number 22 in the German charts.

Andreas Scholl , a great admirer of Klaus Nomi, dedicated his version of the Cold Song to Klaus Nomi on his CD O Solitude , released in 2010 .

Movie

literature

  • Klaus Nomi , 2008, short story by Sven Bremer.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Klaus Schmidt: Klaus Nomi: Probably the shrillest singer that the Allgäu has ever produced . allgäu.life. January 23, 2019. Accessed March 31, 2020.
  2. ↑ Voice eccentric Klaus Nomi: The Singing Space Robot One Day , Spiegel Online , August 5, 2013
  3. ↑ olga neuwirth - works
  4. ↑ Rosenstolz & Marc Almond. Total Eclipse. In: Official German Charts . Retrieved October 23, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Nomi, Klaus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sparrowhawk, Klaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German singer, countertenor and pop singer
DATE OF BIRTH January 24, 1944
PLACE OF BIRTH Immenstadt in the Allgäu
DATE OF DEATH August 6, 1983
Place of death New York City