Fritz Wunderlich
Encyclopedia
Friedrich "Fritz" Karl Otto Wunderlich (September 26, 1930September 17, 1966) was a German lyric tenor
, famed for his singing of the Mozart repertory and Italian and German opera and lieder. He died in an accident when he was only 35. In a survey published in the BBC Music Magazine
of April 2008, Wunderlich was voted the fourth greatest tenor of all time.
in the Palatinate. His mother was a violin
ist and his father was a choir-master
. For a short time, the family kept the inn "Emrichs Bräustübl". Fritz's father lost his job due to pressure imposed upon him by local Nazis, in addition to suffering from a severe battlefield injury. He committed suicide when Fritz was five years old.
The story regarding Wunderlich's discovery parallels many of his contemporaries (notably Nicolai Gedda
and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
). As a young man Wunderlich worked in a bakery. At the insistence of neighbors and passers-by who had witnessed his musical gifts and beautiful voice, Wunderlich decided to begin studies in music. He managed to obtain a scholarship in order to pursue his studies at the Freiburg
Music Academy
where he studied French horn and voice.
Wunderlich was soon noted as a brilliant young tenor, especially in Mozart
ian roles, but he later expanded his reach to the full range of the lyric tenor repertoire.
He occasionally sang minor Wagner
roles such as the Steuermann in The Flying Dutchman
, Walther von der Vogelweide in Tannhäuser
, and the Hirt in Tristan und Isolde
.
's Rigoletto
and Don Carlos
. (He sang his recording of the Verdi Requiem
in distinctly Germanic Latin.) Wunderlich achieved the highest distinction within the German repertory. Of special importance is a recording of Mozart's The Magic Flute
, conducted by Karl Böhm
, in which Wunderlich gave a critically acclaimed performance as Prince Tamino, opposite baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau in the role of Papageno.
Wunderlich's crystal-clear voice and intelligent, restrained interpretation also led him to impressive renditions of the Lied
er cycles of Schubert
and Schumann
with pianist Hubert Giesen. His famous recording of Schumann's Dichterliebe
remains a gold standard of this genre. Many tenors since have emulated Wunderlich's interpretation of this cycle.
Another notable recording he left is J. S. Bach
's Christmas Oratorio
, with fellow singers Gundula Janowitz
, Christa Ludwig
, and Franz Crass
, conducted by Karl Richter. Also astonishing is an album of pre-Bach sacred songs, featuring music of Schütz
, Telemann
, Buxtehude
, and other less well-known composers.
At the time of his death, he had been recording Haydn
's The Creation, with the Berlin Philharmonic and the Wiener Singverein
under Herbert von Karajan
, the other soloists being Christa Ludwig, Gundula Janowitz, Walter Berry and Fischer-Dieskau. Wunderlich had completed recording his arias, but Werner Krenn was hired to record the recitatives. Several recorded live performances of Wunderlich singing the whole part, under Karajan, survive.
Available videos include a full-length performance (in German) as Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville
, and a recital of operatic arias.
near Maulbronn
, and died in the University Clinic of Heidelberg
just days before his 36th birthday. He is buried in Munich
's Waldfriedhof
cemetery.
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
, famed for his singing of the Mozart repertory and Italian and German opera and lieder. He died in an accident when he was only 35. In a survey published in the BBC Music Magazine
BBC music magazine
BBC Music Magazine is a magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom by BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the BBC. Reflecting the broadcast output of BBC Radio 3, the magazine is devoted primarily to classical music, though with sections on jazz and world music. Each edition comes...
of April 2008, Wunderlich was voted the fourth greatest tenor of all time.
Biography
Fritz Wunderlich was born in KuselKusel
Kusel is a municipality in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, capital of the district of Kusel. It is situated approx. 30 km north-west of Kaiserslautern....
in the Palatinate. His mother was a violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
ist and his father was a choir-master
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
. For a short time, the family kept the inn "Emrichs Bräustübl". Fritz's father lost his job due to pressure imposed upon him by local Nazis, in addition to suffering from a severe battlefield injury. He committed suicide when Fritz was five years old.
The story regarding Wunderlich's discovery parallels many of his contemporaries (notably Nicolai Gedda
Nicolai Gedda
Nicolai Gedda is a Swedish operatic tenor. Having made some two hundred recordings, Gedda is said to be the most widely recorded tenor in history...
and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is a retired German lyric baritone and conductor of classical music, one of the most famous lieder performers of the post-war period and "one of the supreme vocal artists of the 20th century"...
). As a young man Wunderlich worked in a bakery. At the insistence of neighbors and passers-by who had witnessed his musical gifts and beautiful voice, Wunderlich decided to begin studies in music. He managed to obtain a scholarship in order to pursue his studies at the Freiburg
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau is a city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. In the extreme south-west of the country, it straddles the Dreisam river, at the foot of the Schlossberg. Historically, the city has acted as the hub of the Breisgau region on the western edge of the Black Forest in the Upper Rhine Plain...
Music Academy
Hochschule für Musik Freiburg
The Staatliche Hochschule für Musik Freiburg is a public music academy subsidized by the State of Baden-Württemberg for academic research and artistic and pedagogical training in music.-History:The Hochschule was initially founded as a municipal institution in 1946 under the direction of Gustav...
where he studied French horn and voice.
Wunderlich was soon noted as a brilliant young tenor, especially in Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
ian roles, but he later expanded his reach to the full range of the lyric tenor repertoire.
He occasionally sang minor Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
roles such as the Steuermann in The Flying Dutchman
The Flying Dutchman (opera)
Der fliegende Holländer is an opera, with music and libretto by Richard Wagner.Wagner claimed in his 1870 autobiography Mein Leben that he had been inspired to write "The Flying Dutchman" following a stormy sea crossing he made from Riga to London in July and August 1839, but in his 1843...
, Walther von der Vogelweide in Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser (opera)
Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...
, and the Hirt in Tristan und Isolde
Tristan und Isolde
Tristan und Isolde is an opera, or music drama, in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the romance by Gottfried von Straßburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered in Munich on 10 June 1865 with Hans von Bülow conducting...
.
Recordings
It was the fashion during Wunderlich's career for German theaters to perform operas in the local rather than original language. Therefore, most of his recordings of the standard operatic repertoire are sung in German, including VerdiGiuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
's Rigoletto
Rigoletto
Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. It was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851...
and Don Carlos
Don Carlos
Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
. (He sang his recording of the Verdi Requiem
Requiem (Verdi)
The Messa da Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi is a musical setting of the Roman Catholic funeral mass for four soloists, double choir and orchestra. It was composed in memory of Alessandro Manzoni, an Italian poet and novelist much admired by Verdi. The first performance in San Marco in Milan on 22 May...
in distinctly Germanic Latin.) Wunderlich achieved the highest distinction within the German repertory. Of special importance is a recording of Mozart's The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
, conducted by Karl Böhm
Karl Böhm
Karl August Leopold Böhm was an Austrian conductor. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest symphonic and operatic conductors of the 20th century.- Education :...
, in which Wunderlich gave a critically acclaimed performance as Prince Tamino, opposite baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau in the role of Papageno.
Wunderlich's crystal-clear voice and intelligent, restrained interpretation also led him to impressive renditions of the Lied
Lied
is a German word literally meaning "song", usually used to describe romantic songs setting German poems of reasonably high literary aspirations, especially during the nineteenth century, beginning with Carl Loewe, Heinrich Marschner, and Franz Schubert and culminating with Hugo Wolf...
er cycles of Schubert
Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...
and Schumann
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....
with pianist Hubert Giesen. His famous recording of Schumann's Dichterliebe
Dichterliebe
Dichterliebe, 'The Poet's Love' , is the best-known song cycle of Robert Schumann . The texts for the 16 songs come from the Lyrisches Intermezzo of Heinrich Heine, composed 1822–1823, published as part of the poet's Das Buch der Lieder. Following the song-cycles of Franz Schubert , those of...
remains a gold standard of this genre. Many tenors since have emulated Wunderlich's interpretation of this cycle.
Another notable recording he left is J. S. Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
's Christmas Oratorio
Christmas Oratorio
The Christmas Oratorio BWV 248, is an oratorio by Johann Sebastian Bach intended for performance in church during the Christmas season. It was written for the Christmas season of 1734 incorporating music from earlier compositions, including three secular cantatas written during 1733 and 1734 and a...
, with fellow singers Gundula Janowitz
Gundula Janowitz
Gundula Janowitz is an Austrian lyric soprano singer of operas, oratorios and concerts. She is one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century and was pre-eminent in the 1960s and 1970s.-Career:...
, Christa Ludwig
Christa Ludwig
Christa Ludwig is a retired German mezzo-soprano, distinguished for her performances of opera, Lieder, oratorio and other major religious works like masses and passions, and solos contained in symphonic literature...
, and Franz Crass
Franz Crass
Franz Crass is a German bass.A native of Wipperfürth, Crass studied with Gerda Heuer in Wiesbaden and with Professor Clemens Glettenberg at the Hochschule für Musik in Köln. He won numerous competitions throughout Germany in the 1950s...
, conducted by Karl Richter. Also astonishing is an album of pre-Bach sacred songs, featuring music of Schütz
Heinrich Schütz
Heinrich Schütz was a German composer and organist, generally regarded as the most important German composer before Johann Sebastian Bach and often considered to be one of the most important composers of the 17th century along with Claudio Monteverdi...
, Telemann
Georg Philipp Telemann
Georg Philipp Telemann was a German Baroque composer and multi-instrumentalist. Almost completely self-taught in music, he became a composer against his family's wishes. After studying in Magdeburg, Zellerfeld, and Hildesheim, Telemann entered the University of Leipzig to study law, but eventually...
, Buxtehude
Dieterich Buxtehude
Dieterich Buxtehude was a German-Danish organist and composer of the Baroque period. His organ works represent a central part of the standard organ repertoire and are frequently performed at recitals and in church services...
, and other less well-known composers.
At the time of his death, he had been recording Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
's The Creation, with the Berlin Philharmonic and the Wiener Singverein
Wiener Singverein
The Vienna Singverein is the concert choir of the Vienna Musikverein with around 230 members. It is regularly requested by top orchestras and conductors for large and varied projects.- History :...
under Herbert von Karajan
Herbert von Karajan
Herbert von Karajan was an Austrian orchestra and opera conductor. To the wider world he was perhaps most famously associated with the Berlin Philharmonic, of which he was principal conductor for 35 years...
, the other soloists being Christa Ludwig, Gundula Janowitz, Walter Berry and Fischer-Dieskau. Wunderlich had completed recording his arias, but Werner Krenn was hired to record the recitatives. Several recorded live performances of Wunderlich singing the whole part, under Karajan, survive.
Available videos include a full-length performance (in German) as Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville, or The Futile Precaution is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchais's comedy Le Barbier de Séville , which was originally an opéra comique, or a mixture of spoken play with music...
, and a recital of operatic arias.
Accidental death
Wunderlich's promising career was cut short by an accident while he was on a hunting vacation (his hobbies included hunting, guns, and fast cars). He fell from a stairway in a friend's country house in OberderdingenOberderdingen
Oberderdingen is a municipality in the district of Karlsruhe, in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated 30 km east of Karlsruhe, and 32 km west of Heilbronn....
near Maulbronn
Maulbronn
Maulbronn is a city in the district of Enz in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany.-History:Founded in 1838, it emerged from a settlement, built around a monastery, which belonged to the Neckar Community in the Kingdom of Württemberg. In 1886, Maulbronn officially became a German town and was an...
, and died in the University Clinic of Heidelberg
Heidelberg
-Early history:Between 600,000 and 200,000 years ago, "Heidelberg Man" died at nearby Mauer. His jaw bone was discovered in 1907; with scientific dating, his remains were determined to be the earliest evidence of human life in Europe. In the 5th century BC, a Celtic fortress of refuge and place of...
just days before his 36th birthday. He is buried in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
's Waldfriedhof
Munich Waldfriedhof
The Munich Waldfriedhof is one of 29 cemeteries of Munich in Bavaria, Germany. It is one of the larger and more famous burial sites of the city due to its park like design and tombs of notable personalities. The Waldfriedhof is widely considered the first woodland cemetery.-Description:The Munich...
cemetery.
External links
- Website of the Fritz Wunderlich Gesellschaft
- Biography from Bach-Cantatas.com
- [ Wunderlich at Allmusic.com]
- Wunderlich fan's comprehensive website