Elena Gerhardt
Encyclopedia
Elena Gerhardt was a German
mezzo-soprano
singer associated with the singing of German classical lied
er, of which she was considered one of the great interpreters. She left Germany for good to live in London in October 1934.
, the Mignon
of Ambroise Thomas
and Hermann Goetz
's Katharina
, interspersed with Lieder. She won the Carl Reinecke
Scholarship. Leipzig provided many opportunities to hear international artists and to hear the early masters.
In 1902 Arthur Nikisch
became director of the Leipzig Conservatory, and approved her to sing publicly in Leipzig, which she first did in November 1902: he also gave her a solo in Liszt
's Entfesselte Prometheus. On graduating in 1903, and with many engagements, she mentioned her wish to give a lieder recital, and Nikisch offered to be her accompanist, their first (victorious) performance being at the Kaufhaus in Leipzig on her twentieth birthday. Concert engagements poured in, and she sang lieder in almost every university town as supporting artist to names such as Ysaye, Teresa Carreño
or Max Reger
. By 1905 she made her first appearances (with Nikisch) in Hamburg and Berlin (the Bechsteinhall), and in Berlin made the friendship of Richard Strauss
. From summer 1905 she spent holidays with the Nikisch family near Ostend
.
there, under Nikisch, being coached by his student Albert Coates
as Korrepetitor. Nikisch arranged and accompanied her 1906 London debut, first in a Mischa Elman concert, and then in a Lieder recital (songs of Schubert, Schumann
, Brahms, Hugo Wolf
, etc.) at the Bechstein Hall
. In April 1907 she first sang at the Royal Albert Hall
, with an orchestra under Nikisch. Thereafter she returned to England annually until 1914 for autumn seasons, including regular tours of the provinces with Hamilton Harty
or her loyal accompanist Paula Hegner.
The partnership with Nikisch was preserved in two series of records made in 1907 and 1911, made in Berlin. A particular triumph was their appearance in the 1908 season of the Philharmonic Society in London
. She sang by invitation to entertain royal guests to the Coronation of George V and Queen Mary in 1911. Nikisch introduced her into the highest circles, including the Villa Wahnfried
. She sang in many European capitals - Vienna
, Budapest
, Prague
, Copenhagen
, Christiania
(Oslo) - and with old musical Societies at Cologne
and Frankfurt
, annually in Paris
and London, and under Mengelberg
at The Hague
. Nikisch usually accompanied the first Lieder concert at each centre, after which other accompanists took over. Alexander Siloti
arranged her first visit to Russia (to Moscow
) in 1909, and until the War she sang there and in St Petersburg.
Gerhardt made her American debut at the Carnegie Hall
in January 1912, with Paula Hegner, and was then in Cincinnati and Philadelphia with Leopold Stokowski
(singing the Wesendonck Lieder
), and with the Boston Symphony Orchestra
under Max Fiedler
, before finally combining there with Nikisch and the London Symphony Orchestra
tour. In London in 1912 she performed the angel in Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius
, a role more associated with her 'rival' and friend Julia Culp
. Her second American tour was in early 1913, opening with the Boston Symphony under Karl Muck
, and with Karl Wolff as accompanist, who died during the tour. They visited Boston, New York, Baltimore
, Washington
and Baton Rouge, Louisiana
. Next season she sang in Paris, Moscow, Scandinavia, Hungary, Austria, Holland, Italy, Scotland and England, culminating in London in July 1914 at the Queen's Hall
under Richard Strauss - her last appearance there for eight years.
at Laon
, through efforts of her brother the singer Reinhold Gerhardt, a pupil of Karl Scheidemantel
. Meanwhile in late 1916 she returned to the USA to give the east coast tour with Karl Muck, and in April 1917 was singing in Los Angeles
and San Francisco. As America entered the war she was shipped back to Germany with many other artists. She visited the Front again in summer 1918 with Wilhelm Backhaus
(in uniform) as accompanist and concert partner. She continued to tour, from Norway to Hungary, through the chaos following the armistice, and was in Munich
when Kurt Eisner
was assassinated.
with Paula Hegner, and later that year to the USA again, where her collaboration with the model accompanist Coenraad van Bos began. This partnership was renewed in the winter season of 1921-22 in New York. In March 1922 (soon after the death of Nikisch) she braved the return to London (Queen's Hall) with Paula Hegner, where her German art was received with an ovation. That was the start of an unbroken tie with England, which later became her home. The following years saw annual winter tours in USA (and the Pacific coast from San Francisco to Vancouver in 1925), with extensive tours in UK, Europe and Germany. There were further Spanish tours, including one in winter 1928 with van Bos. She was then singing Schubert's Winterreise
which, as a female singer, she made particularly her own. At the start of 1929 she became head teacher of singing at the Leipzig Conservatory, and after October 1930 she discontinued her American tours, though still touring intensively in Britain and Europe.
In 1928 she met and fell in love with Dr Fritz Kohl, Director of Administration of the Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk in Leipzig, and they married in November 1932. In London she reappeared before the Royal Philharmonic Society
in January 1931, under John Barbirolli
, to perform Wolf songs with orchestral accompaniment, and the Kindertotenlieder
of Mahler. Her Hugo Wolf Song Society recordings were made in 1932. Following Hitler's rise to power Kohl was arrested and imprisoned, and not until June 1935 was he released, the only one of the German Broadcasting Directors to be acquitted by the Reichsgericht in Leipzig. With the help of Landon Ronald
at the Guildhall School of Music, Elena meanwhile got a foothold in London in 1934, and after a last visit to Bayreuth to see Strauss conduct Parsifal
('It was no longer Richard Wagner's Bayreuth, but Hitler's'), London became the settled home of the couple. Over the following years, as the storm gathered, Elena gave recitals in Holland, France and Britain, often with Gerald Moore
accompanying, and developed a circle of singing pupils.
home programmes. However, Myra Hess
insisted upon involving her in the National Gallery mid-day concerts, where she first appeared in December 1939, and afterwards in twenty-two concerts with Myra Hess or Gerald Moore, being very greatly appreciated. With Myra Hess and Lionel Tertis
she sang the Brahms viola songs and other Lieder recitals in many parts of England and Scotland, including a complete Winterreise in Reading
, and in 1942 gave BBC Lieder broadcasts to Argentina
. Her teaching picked up again after 1941. With Myra Hess she sang at Haslemere
for Tobias Matthay
and his pupils. She gave a sixtieth birthday concert in the Wigmore Hall in 1943, and further National Gallery and Wigmore Hall concerts in 1944. News of the destruction of Leipzig and Dresden, of course, filled her with deep sadness.
Third Programme (i.e., Radio 3, the classical music station) was inaugurated, she gave three broadcasts, including Lieder recitals and talks about her career and the interpretation of Winterreise. She also recorded the Frauenliebe und -leben
in that year. She made a broadcast on Brahms's songs in May 1947. That was soon after her formal retirement from the platform in March 1947. Her husband Dr Kohl died in May 1947, and the remainder of her professional life was devoted to teaching in London. She managed to arrange the escape of her brother Reinhold and his family from Eastern Germany, and he joined the staff of the Guildhall School of Music.
Gerhardt was one of the very great interpreters of German Lieder, a singer who made her career almost entirely in this genre. She published her autobiography in 1953 and died in 1961.
, with titles and number listings. Dates may be of recording or of issue.)
Acoustic recordings:
Electric recordings:
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
mezzo-soprano
Mezzo-soprano
A mezzo-soprano is a type of classical female singing voice whose range lies between the soprano and the contralto singing voices, usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above...
singer associated with the singing of German classical 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, of which she was considered one of the great interpreters. She left Germany for good to live in London in October 1934.
Training, and first recitals with Nikisch
Elena Gerhardt, daughter of a Leipzig restaurateur, studied at the Leipzig Conservatory from 1899 to 1903, first with Professor Carl Rebling and then with Marie Hedmondt (d. 1941), who remained her friend and vocal adviser for many years. After a year of only technical study, she began work on operatic roles, such as Cherubino, DorabellaCosì fan tutte
Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....
, the Mignon
Mignon
Mignon is an opéra comique in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The Italian version was translated by Giuseppe Zaffira. The opera is mentioned in James Joyce's The Dead,...
of Ambroise Thomas
Ambroise Thomas
Charles Louis Ambroise Thomas was a French composer, best known for his operas Mignon and Hamlet and as Director of the Conservatoire de Paris from 1871 till his death.-Biography:"There is good music, there is bad music, and then there is Ambroise Thomas."- Emmanuel Chabrier-Early life...
and Hermann Goetz
Hermann Goetz
Hermann Gustav Goetz was a German composer.After studying in Berlin, he moved to Switzerland in 1863. After ten years spent as a critic, pianist and conductor as well, he spent the last three years of his life composing...
's Katharina
Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung
Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung is a comic opera in four acts by the German composer Hermann Goetz. It was written between 1868 and 1872 and first performed in Mannheim, Germany on 11 October 1874 under the conductor Ernst Frank...
, interspersed with Lieder. She won the Carl Reinecke
Carl Reinecke
Carl Heinrich Carsten Reinecke was a German composer, conductor, and pianist.-Biography:Reinecke was born in Altona, Hamburg, Germany; until 1864 the town was under Danish rule. He studied with his father, Johann Peter Rudolph Reinecke, a music teacher...
Scholarship. Leipzig provided many opportunities to hear international artists and to hear the early masters.
In 1902 Arthur Nikisch
Arthur Nikisch
Arthur Nikisch ; 12 October 185523 January 1922) was a Hungarian conductor who performed internationally, holding posts in Boston, London and - most importantly - Berlin. He was considered an outstanding interpreter of the music of Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Liszt...
became director of the Leipzig Conservatory, and approved her to sing publicly in Leipzig, which she first did in November 1902: he also gave her a solo in Liszt
Liszt
Liszt is a Hungarian surname. Notable persons with that surname include:* Franz Liszt , Hungarian composer and pianist* Adam Liszt , father of Franz Liszt* Anna Liszt , mother of Franz Liszt...
's Entfesselte Prometheus. On graduating in 1903, and with many engagements, she mentioned her wish to give a lieder recital, and Nikisch offered to be her accompanist, their first (victorious) performance being at the Kaufhaus in Leipzig on her twentieth birthday. Concert engagements poured in, and she sang lieder in almost every university town as supporting artist to names such as Ysaye, Teresa Carreño
Teresa Carreño
María Teresa Carreño García de Sena was a Venezuelan pianist, singer, composer, and conductor.Born into a musical family, she was at first taught by her father, then by Mathias, Louis Moreau Gottschalk and Anton Rubinstein and her talent was recognized at an early age...
or Max Reger
Max Reger
Johann Baptist Joseph Maximilian Reger was a German composer, conductor, pianist, organist, and academic teacher.-Life:...
. By 1905 she made her first appearances (with Nikisch) in Hamburg and Berlin (the Bechsteinhall), and in Berlin made the friendship of Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
. From summer 1905 she spent holidays with the Nikisch family near Ostend
Ostend
Ostend is a Belgian city and municipality located in the Flemish province of West Flanders. It comprises the boroughs of Mariakerke , Stene and Zandvoorde, and the city of Ostend proper – the largest on the Belgian coast....
.
London, Europe, Russia and USA before 1914
Gerhardt first appeared at the Leipzig Opera as Mignon, in June 1905, and also performed Charlotte in Massenet's WertherWerther
Werther is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann based on the German epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe....
there, under Nikisch, being coached by his student Albert Coates
Albert Coates (musician)
Albert Coates was an English conductor and composer. Born in Saint Petersburg where his English father was a successful businessman, he studied in Russia, England and Germany, before beginning his career as a conductor in a series of German opera houses...
as Korrepetitor. Nikisch arranged and accompanied her 1906 London debut, first in a Mischa Elman concert, and then in a Lieder recital (songs of Schubert, 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....
, Brahms, Hugo Wolf
Hugo Wolf
Hugo Wolf was an Austrian composer of Slovene origin, particularly noted for his art songs, or lieder. He brought to this form a concentrated expressive intensity which was unique in late Romantic music, somewhat related to that of the Second Viennese School in concision but utterly unrelated in...
, etc.) at the Bechstein Hall
Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall is a leading international recital venue that specialises in hosting performances of chamber music and is best known for classical recitals of piano, song and instrumental music. It is located at 36 Wigmore Street, London, UK and was built to provide London with a venue that was both...
. In April 1907 she first sang at the Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
, with an orchestra under Nikisch. Thereafter she returned to England annually until 1914 for autumn seasons, including regular tours of the provinces with Hamilton Harty
Hamilton Harty
Sir Hamilton Harty was an Irish and British composer, conductor, pianist and organist. In his capacity as a conductor, he was particularly noted as an interpreter of the music of Berlioz and he was much respected as a piano accompanist of exceptional prowess...
or her loyal accompanist Paula Hegner.
The partnership with Nikisch was preserved in two series of records made in 1907 and 1911, made in Berlin. A particular triumph was their appearance in the 1908 season of the Philharmonic Society in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. She sang by invitation to entertain royal guests to the Coronation of George V and Queen Mary in 1911. Nikisch introduced her into the highest circles, including the Villa Wahnfried
Wahnfried
Wahnfried may refer to:*Wahnfried, Richard Wagner's villa in Bayreuth*Richard Wahnfried , the long-time alias for German composer and musician Klaus Schulze...
. She sang in many European capitals - Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
, Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
, Christiania
Oslo
Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
(Oslo) - and with old musical Societies at Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
and Frankfurt
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
, annually in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and London, and under Mengelberg
Mengelberg
Mengelberg:*Augustin Mengelberg , abbot of Kloster Heisterbach*Egidius Mengelberg , German portrayer*Friedrich Wilhelm Mengelberg, , German-Dutch sculptor, grandson of Egidius Mengelberg...
at The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
. Nikisch usually accompanied the first Lieder concert at each centre, after which other accompanists took over. Alexander Siloti
Alexander Siloti
Alexander Ilyich Siloti was a Russian pianist, conductor and composer. Alexander Ilyich Siloti (also Ziloti, , Aleksandr Iljič Ziloti) (9 October 1863, near Kharkiv - 8 December 1945, New York) was a Russian pianist, conductor and composer. Alexander Ilyich Siloti (also Ziloti, , Aleksandr Iljič...
arranged her first visit to Russia (to Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
) in 1909, and until the War she sang there and in St Petersburg.
Gerhardt made her American debut at the Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
in January 1912, with Paula Hegner, and was then in Cincinnati and Philadelphia with Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...
(singing the Wesendonck Lieder
Wesendonck Lieder
The Wesendonck Lieder is a song cycle composed by Richard Wagner while he was working on Die Walküre. This, and the Siegfried Idyll, are his only two non-operatic works that are still regularly performed....
), and with the Boston Symphony Orchestra
Boston Symphony Orchestra
The Boston Symphony Orchestra is an orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts. It is one of the five American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five". Founded in 1881, the BSO plays most of its concerts at Boston's Symphony Hall and in the summer performs at the Tanglewood Music Center...
under Max Fiedler
Max Fiedler
Max Fiedler was a German conductor and composer, born August Max Fiedler in Zittau, Saxony, Germany...
, before finally combining there with Nikisch and the London Symphony Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
The London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:...
tour. In London in 1912 she performed the angel in Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius, popularly called just Gerontius, is a work for voices and orchestra in two parts composed by Edward Elgar in 1900, to text from the poem by John Henry Newman. It relates the journey of a pious man's soul from his deathbed to his judgment before God and settling into Purgatory...
, a role more associated with her 'rival' and friend Julia Culp
Julia Culp
Julia Bertha Culp , the "Dutch nightingale", was an internationally celebrated mezzo-soprano in the years 1901–1919....
. Her second American tour was in early 1913, opening with the Boston Symphony under Karl Muck
Karl Muck
Karl Muck was a German-born conductor of classical music. He based his activities principally in Europe and mostly in opera. His American career comprised two stints at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He endured a public outcry in 1917 that questioned whether his loyalties lay with Germany or the...
, and with Karl Wolff as accompanist, who died during the tour. They visited Boston, New York, Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
, Washington
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
and Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge is the capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is located in East Baton Rouge Parish and is the second-largest city in the state.Baton Rouge is a major industrial, petrochemical, medical, and research center of the American South...
. Next season she sang in Paris, Moscow, Scandinavia, Hungary, Austria, Holland, Italy, Scotland and England, culminating in London in July 1914 at the Queen's Hall
Queen's Hall
The Queen's Hall was a concert hall in Langham Place, London, opened in 1893. Designed by the architect T.E. Knightley, it had room for an audience of about 2,500 people. It became London's principal concert venue. From 1895 until 1941, it was the home of the promenade concerts founded by Robert...
under Richard Strauss - her last appearance there for eight years.
The First World War
Returning from Ostend to Leipzig in August 1914, her English tours were impossible to fulfil, but she sang from Hamburg to Vienna and Budapest and returned triumphantly to America in 1915, and that winter sang in Denmark and Norway. In August 1916 she sang to German troops on the Western FrontWestern Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
at Laon
Laon
Laon is the capital city of the Aisne department in Picardy in northern France.-History:The hilly district of Laon, which rises a hundred metres above the otherwise flat Picardy plain, has always held strategic importance...
, through efforts of her brother the singer Reinhold Gerhardt, a pupil of Karl Scheidemantel
Karl Scheidemantel
Karl Scheidemantel was a baritone singer, and later an opera director.-Life and career:...
. Meanwhile in late 1916 she returned to the USA to give the east coast tour with Karl Muck, and in April 1917 was singing in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and San Francisco. As America entered the war she was shipped back to Germany with many other artists. She visited the Front again in summer 1918 with Wilhelm Backhaus
Wilhelm Backhaus
Wilhelm Backhaus was a German pianist and pedagogue.Born in Leipzig, Backhaus studied at the conservatoire there with Alois Reckendorf until 1899, later taking private piano lessons with Eugen d'Albert in Frankfurt...
(in uniform) as accompanist and concert partner. She continued to tour, from Norway to Hungary, through the chaos following the armistice, and was 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...
when Kurt Eisner
Kurt Eisner
Kurt Eisner was a Bavarian politician and journalist. As a German socialist journalist and statesman, he organized the Socialist Revolution that overthrew the Wittelsbach monarchy in Bavaria in November 1918....
was assassinated.
Between the wars
In early 1920 she made a prolonged tour of SpainSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
with Paula Hegner, and later that year to the USA again, where her collaboration with the model accompanist Coenraad van Bos began. This partnership was renewed in the winter season of 1921-22 in New York. In March 1922 (soon after the death of Nikisch) she braved the return to London (Queen's Hall) with Paula Hegner, where her German art was received with an ovation. That was the start of an unbroken tie with England, which later became her home. The following years saw annual winter tours in USA (and the Pacific coast from San Francisco to Vancouver in 1925), with extensive tours in UK, Europe and Germany. There were further Spanish tours, including one in winter 1928 with van Bos. She was then singing Schubert's Winterreise
Winterreise
Winterreise is a song cycle for voice and piano by Franz Schubert , a setting of 24 poems by Wilhelm Müller. It is the second of Schubert's two great song cycles on Müller's poems, the earlier being Die schöne Müllerin...
which, as a female singer, she made particularly her own. At the start of 1929 she became head teacher of singing at the Leipzig Conservatory, and after October 1930 she discontinued her American tours, though still touring intensively in Britain and Europe.
In 1928 she met and fell in love with Dr Fritz Kohl, Director of Administration of the Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk in Leipzig, and they married in November 1932. In London she reappeared before the Royal Philharmonic Society
Royal Philharmonic Society
The Royal Philharmonic Society is a British music society, formed in 1813. It was originally formed in London to promote performances of instrumental music there. Many distinguished composers and performers have taken part in its concerts...
in January 1931, under John Barbirolli
John Barbirolli
Sir John Barbirolli, CH was an English conductor and cellist. Born in London, of Italian and French parentage, he grew up in a family of professional musicians. His father and grandfather were violinists...
, to perform Wolf songs with orchestral accompaniment, and the Kindertotenlieder
Kindertotenlieder
Kindertotenlieder is a song cycle for voice and orchestra by Gustav Mahler...
of Mahler. Her Hugo Wolf Song Society recordings were made in 1932. Following Hitler's rise to power Kohl was arrested and imprisoned, and not until June 1935 was he released, the only one of the German Broadcasting Directors to be acquitted by the Reichsgericht in Leipzig. With the help of Landon Ronald
Landon Ronald
Sir Landon Ronald was an English conductor, composer, pianist, singing teacher and administrator...
at the Guildhall School of Music, Elena meanwhile got a foothold in London in 1934, and after a last visit to Bayreuth to see Strauss conduct Parsifal
Parsifal
Parsifal is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner. It is loosely based on Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the 13th century epic poem of the Arthurian knight Parzival and his quest for the Holy Grail, and on Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval, the Story of the Grail.Wagner first conceived the work...
('It was no longer Richard Wagner's Bayreuth, but Hitler's'), London became the settled home of the couple. Over the following years, as the storm gathered, Elena gave recitals in Holland, France and Britain, often with Gerald Moore
Gerald Moore
Gerald Moore CBE was an English pianist best known for his career as one of the most in-demand accompanists of his day, accompanying many of the world's most famous musicians...
accompanying, and developed a circle of singing pupils.
Wartime recitals in England
With the outbreak of war, Gerhardt expected that her singing career was at an end as there should be no taste for German music in Britain, especially as she would only sing in German, and the broadcast of the German language was forbidden on the BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
home programmes. However, Myra Hess
Myra Hess
Dame Myra Hess DBE was a British pianist.She was born in London as Julia Myra Hess, but was best known by her middle name. At the age of five she began to study the piano and two years later entered the Guildhall School of Music, where she graduated as winner of the Gold Medal...
insisted upon involving her in the National Gallery mid-day concerts, where she first appeared in December 1939, and afterwards in twenty-two concerts with Myra Hess or Gerald Moore, being very greatly appreciated. With Myra Hess and Lionel Tertis
Lionel Tertis
Lionel Tertis, CBE was an English violist and one of the first viola players to find international fame.Tertis was born in West Hartlepool, the son of Polish-Jewish immigrants, and initially studied the violin in Leipzig and at the Royal Academy of Music in London...
she sang the Brahms viola songs and other Lieder recitals in many parts of England and Scotland, including a complete Winterreise in Reading
Reading, Berkshire
Reading is a large town and unitary authority area in England. It is located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet, and on both the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, some west of London....
, and in 1942 gave BBC Lieder broadcasts to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
. Her teaching picked up again after 1941. With Myra Hess she sang at Haslemere
Haslemere
Haslemere is a town in Surrey, England, close to the border with both Hampshire and West Sussex. The major road between London and Portsmouth, the A3, lies to the west, and a branch of the River Wey to the south. Haslemere is approximately south-west of Guildford.Haslemere is surrounded by hills,...
for Tobias Matthay
Tobias Matthay
Tobias Augustus Matthay was an English pianist, teacher, and composer.-Biography:Matthaw as born in London in 1858 to parents who had come from northern Germany and were naturalised British subjects...
and his pupils. She gave a sixtieth birthday concert in the Wigmore Hall in 1943, and further National Gallery and Wigmore Hall concerts in 1944. News of the destruction of Leipzig and Dresden, of course, filled her with deep sadness.
Late career
In 1946, when the BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Third Programme (i.e., Radio 3, the classical music station) was inaugurated, she gave three broadcasts, including Lieder recitals and talks about her career and the interpretation of Winterreise. She also recorded the Frauenliebe und -leben
Frauenliebe und -leben
Frauenliebe und -leben is a cycle of poems by Adelbert von Chamisso, written in 1830. They describe the course of a woman's love for her man, from her point of view, from first meeting through marriage to his death, and after. Selections were set to music as a song-cycle by masters of German Lied,...
in that year. She made a broadcast on Brahms's songs in May 1947. That was soon after her formal retirement from the platform in March 1947. Her husband Dr Kohl died in May 1947, and the remainder of her professional life was devoted to teaching in London. She managed to arrange the escape of her brother Reinhold and his family from Eastern Germany, and he joined the staff of the Guildhall School of Music.
Gerhardt was one of the very great interpreters of German Lieder, a singer who made her career almost entirely in this genre. She published her autobiography in 1953 and died in 1961.
Recordings
(See discography by Desmond Shawe-TaylorDesmond Shawe-Taylor (music critic)
Desmond Christopher Shawe Taylor, , was a British writer, co-author of The Record Guide, music critic of The New Statesman, The New Yorker and The Sunday Times and a regular and long-standing contributor to The Gramophone.-Biography:Shawe-Taylor was born in Dublin, the elder of two sons of...
, with titles and number listings. Dates may be of recording or of issue.)
Acoustic recordings:
- 1907 G&T recordings with Arthur NikischArthur NikischArthur Nikisch ; 12 October 185523 January 1922) was a Hungarian conductor who performed internationally, holding posts in Boston, London and - most importantly - Berlin. He was considered an outstanding interpreter of the music of Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Liszt...
(Wolf, Bungert, Brahms, Strauss, Rubinstein) - six 10" and one 12" record/seven songs. - 1911 Red Label German HMV recordings with Arthur Nikisch (Wolf, Brahms, Bungert, Strauss, Schumann, Schubert, Wagner) - ten 10" and seven 12" records/seventeen songs.
- 1913-1914 as above, with Bruno Seidler-Winkler (pno) - eleven 10" records/songs. (Strauss, Brahms, Schubert, Wolf).
- 1913-1914 as above, with orchestra cond. Seidler-Winkler - five 12" records/songs. (Strauss, Wagner, Gluck, Wolf).
- 1915 American Columbia, about 7 titles with orchestral accompaniment. (J. Strauss, Schulz, Grüber, and folk-songs)
- 1923 Aeolian Vocalion with Ivor NewtonIvor NewtonIvor Newton CBE was an English pianist who was particularly noted as an accompanist to international singers and string players. He was one of the first to bring a distinct personality to the accompanist's role. He toured extensively to all continents and appeared at music festivals such as...
(pno) - six 12" records/songs. (Schubert, Grieg, Schumann, Strauss, Brahms) - 1924 as above, with Harold CraxtonHarold CraxtonThomas Harold Hunt Craxton, OBE was an English pianist and composer.Craxton studied piano at the Tobias Matthay Pianoforte School and made a name for himself early in his career as an accompanist with performers such as Dame Nellie Melba, Dame Clara Butt, Lionel Tertis and John McCormack.In 1919...
(pno) - six 12" records/songs. (Schubert, Strauss and Brahms) - 1924-1925 HMV red label, with ?Harold Craxton (pno) - seven titles (three 10" 2-sided records and one side unissued). (Schubert, Schumann, Wolf and Brahms)
Electric recordings:
- 1926 HMV red label, with Paula Hegner - eight songs, three 10" and two 12" records. (Brahms, Schubert)
- 1927 HMV red label, with Coenraad van Bos - three songs, two 12" records. (Brahms, Reger)
- 1928 HMV Black Label Schubert Centenary Album - seven 12" and one 10" record (eight items from WinterreiseWinterreiseWinterreise is a song cycle for voice and piano by Franz Schubert , a setting of 24 poems by Wilhelm Müller. It is the second of Schubert's two great song cycles on Müller's poems, the earlier being Die schöne Müllerin...
, and ten other songs). - 1929 HMV black label, with Harold Craxton - one 12" record, three songs (Brahms).
- 1929 HMV black label, with Coenraad van Bos - two 12" records, six songs (Brahms).
- 1929 HMV red label, with van Bos - one 10" record, three songs (Schubert and Wolf).
- 1929 HMV red label, with van Bos - one 12" record, two songs (Schumann): another two sides of Schumann were recorded at this time (Wer machte dich so krank, and Alte Laute), but were not issued.
- 1932 HMV red label Hugo Wolf Society Volume I, with Coenraad van Bos - six 12" records, nineteen songs.
- 1939 HMV White Label, privately published, with Gerald MooreGerald MooreGerald Moore CBE was an English pianist best known for his career as one of the most in-demand accompanists of his day, accompanying many of the world's most famous musicians...
- six 10" records, GR16-GR21. (Brahms, Complete Zigeunerlieder (eight songs), three other songs; Schubert (four), Wolf (two)). - 1947-1948 HMV White Label, privately published, with Gerald Moore - (Schumann, Frauenliebe und -lebenFrauenliebe und -lebenFrauenliebe und -leben is a cycle of poems by Adelbert von Chamisso, written in 1830. They describe the course of a woman's love for her man, from her point of view, from first meeting through marriage to his death, and after. Selections were set to music as a song-cycle by masters of German Lied,...
Complete, three 12" records). Also Schumann's Meine Rose was recorded, on one 12"" side, but was not issued.
Sources
- Arthur Eaglefield HullArthur Eaglefield HullArthur Eaglefield Hull was an English music critic, writer, composer and organist.Hull was initially a music student of Tobias Matthay and graduated with a Doctorate of Music from Oxford University...
, A Dictionary of Modern Music and Musicians (Dent, London 1924) - R. Elkin, Royal Philharmonic (Rider & co, London 1946)
- E. Gerhardt, Recital (autobiography), (Methuen, London 1953).
- G. Moore, Am I too loud? (Penguin, Harmondsworth 1966).
- M. Scott, The Record of SingingThe Record of SingingThe Record of Singing is a compilation of classical-music singing from the first half of the 20th century, the era of the 78-rpm record.It was issued on LP by EMI, successor to the British company His Master's Voice — perhaps the leading organization in the early history of audio recording.The...
Vol II (Duckworth, London 1979) - E. Williams, (Sleevenotes), Gerhardt & Nikisch recital, Delta LP TQD 3024 (Delta Records, London 1962).
- H. Wood, My Life of Music (Gollancz, London 1938)