Nicholas Goldschmidt

Nicholas Goldschmidt , CC (born December 6, 1908 in Tavíkovice / Moravia , † February 8, 2004 in Toronto ) was a Czech-Canadian conductor, music teacher, pianist and singer.

Life

Adalbert von Goldschmidt's great-nephew studied composition with Joseph Marx , piano with Paul Weingarten and singing with Corneille de Kuyper at the Vienna Music Academy . He worked as a conductor in various cities in Czechoslovakia and Belgium before emigrating to the USA in 1937. There he was from 1938 to 1942 director of the opera department of the San Francisco Conservatory and Stanford University and then until 1944 of Columbia University .

At the invitation of Arnold Walter he came to Toronto, where he was the first director of the Royal Conservatory Opera School from 1946 to 1957 . In addition, he worked from 1949 to 1957 as director of the CBC Opera Company and from 1950 to 1957 as director of the Opera Festival Association . During this time he conducted thirteen opera productions, including Rigoletto , The Marriage of Figaro and Hansel and Gretel .

In addition, Goldschmidt was director of the University of British Columbia summer school from 1950 to 1958 and director of the Vancouver International Festival from 1957 to 1962 . As head of the artistic performance department of the Centennial Commission , he was responsible for the events of the Festival Canada 1967 (on the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the British North America Act ) and founded the Centennial Choir in Ottawa , which he conducted until 1972.

In 1967 Goldschmidt became artistic director of the Edward Johnson Music Foundation . From 1968 to 1975 he was music director at the University of Guelph . Here he founded the Guelph Spring Festival , whose artistic director he remained until 1987. During the festival he conducted several operas by Britten (including the North American premiere of The Prodigal Son and the adaptation of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera ), the Two Widows by Bedřich Smetana , Acis and Galatea by Handel , the world premiere of Derek Healey's Seabird Island and other. In 1976 he organized a concert with works by Krzysztof Penderecki .

In 1984 Goldschmidt was artistic advisor to the Toronto International Festival , 1985 director of the International Bach Piano Competition , 1989 artistic director of the International Choral Festival and 1991 director of the Glory of Mozart Festival . In 1993 and 2002 he organized the Joy of Singing International Choral Festival and in 2003 the Benjamin Britten Festival .

Occasionally Goldschmidt also appeared as an oratorio and lieder singer, famous were his performances of Schubert's song cycle Winterreise , in which he accompanied himself on the piano. He also gave master classes in singing; his most famous students were Jon Vickers and Maureen Forrester .

Goldschmidt received the Canadian Music Council Medal in 1976 and the National Prize for Music from the University of Alberta in 1979 . He became an officer in 1978 and Companion of the Order of Canada in 1989 . In 1983, the CBC radio honored him with the three-part program Nicholas Goldschmidt: Reminiscences . On his 80th birthday in 1988 a concert was held in the St. Lawrence Center in Toronto. In 1997 he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award .