Professional career

Born in Bretzenheim

Bretzenheim

Bretzenheim was a minor Principality in pre-Napoleonic Germany. It was created in 1790 for Charles Augustus of the line of Wittelsbach-Bretzenheim. Its territory in central Germany was mediatised to Hesse-Darmstadt in 1803, and its territory north of Lake Constance was mediatised to Austria in...

, his initial musical ambition was to become a conductor, but in the end he decided on a singing career. His first engagement was at the Cologne Opera

Cologne Opera

The Cologne Opera refers both to the main opera house in Cologne, Germany and to its resident opera company.-History of the company:...

 in 1903. During the 1904-1905 season he was engaged at the Stadttheater in Aachen

Aachen

Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...

. In 1905 he moved to the Frankfurt Opera: he was a member of this opera house for the remainder of his professional career, singing more than 200 roles in over 4000 performances. His repertoire included several major 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...

 bass roles (Gurnemanz in 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...

, King Marke 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...

, Fasolt and Hunding in Der Ring des Nibelungen

Der Ring des Nibelungen

Der Ring des Nibelungen is a cycle of four epic operas by the German composer Richard Wagner . The works are based loosely on characters from the Norse sagas and the Nibelungenlied...

a.o.). He sang in several world premiere performances: Franz Schreker

Franz Schreker

Franz Schreker was an Austrian composer, conductor, teacher and administrator. Primarily a composer of operas, his style is characterized by aesthetic plurality , timbral experimentation, strategies of extended tonality and...

's Der ferne Klang

Der ferne Klang

Der ferne Klang is an opera by Franz Schreker, libretto by the composer.-Composition history:Drafted in 1901, Schreker completed the three-act libretto in 1903. However, composing the music would take about ten years. Criticism from his composition teacher Robert Fuchs caused Schreker to abandon...

(18 August 1912), Das Spielwerk und die Prinzessin (15 March 1913) and Die Gezeichneten

Die Gezeichneten

Die Gezeichneten is an opera in three acts by Franz Schreker, libretto by the composer.-Composition history:...

(25 April 1918), Frederick Delius

Frederick Delius

Frederick Theodore Albert Delius, CH was an English composer. Born in the north of England to a prosperous mercantile family of German extraction, he resisted attempts to recruit him to commerce...

's Fennimore and Gerda

Fennimore and Gerda

Fennimore und Gerda is a German-language opera in 11 "pictures," with four interludes, by the English composer Frederick Delius. It is usually performed and recorded in English, as "Fennimore and Gerda," in a translation by Philip Heseltine. The German libretto, by the composer himself, is based on...

(21 October 1919), Rudi Stephan

Rudi Stephan

Rudi Stephan , was a German composer of great promise who shortly before the First World War was considered one of the leading talents among his generation....

's Die ersten Menschen (1 July 1920), and Eugen d'Albert

Eugen d'Albert

Eugen Francis Charles d'Albert was a Scottish-born German pianist and composer.Educated in Britain, d'Albert showed early musical talent and, at the age of seventeen, he won a scholarship to study in Austria...

's Der Golem (14 November 1926). In December 1934 he made his final appearance in Frankfurt as Mephisto in Charles Gounod

Charles Gounod

Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...

's Faust

Faust (opera)

Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...

, the same role in which he had made his Frankfurt debut nineteen years earlier. He died in Frankfurt on 22 May 1935.