Georg Solti

Sir Georg Solti, KBE (pronounced [ʃolti]) (21 October, 1912 - 5 September, 1997) was a world-renowned Hungarian-British orchestral and operatic conductor. He is regarded as one the supreme practitioners in the art of conducting. His tenures as music director of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and the Chicago Symphony orchestra were highlighted by a plethora of international success and numerous Grammy nonimations and Grammy awards.

Early career

Solti was born György Stern [1] in Budapest, where he learned the piano and studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music. It was at the Liszt Academy where he met the iconic Hungarian composer, Bela Bartok. Upon hearing an orchestra performance conducted by Erich Kleiber when he was thirteen years old, he decided that conducting would be his life. He would also study with other important Hungarian musicians, includingZoltan Kodaly and Erno von Dohnanyi.

His father Germanized young György's given name to Georg and changed his family name to Solti, to shield his son from anti-semitism. By 1935, he was gaining recognition as a conductor. He served as an assistant conductor to the Italian mega-maestro, Arturo Toscanini in 1936 and 1937. He made his debut at the Budapest Opera in 1938 with The Marriage of Figaro. In 1939, with German invasion imminent, he fled Hungary because of his Jewish ancestry, and moved to neutral Switzerland, where he continued a career as a pianist but had limited opportunities to develop his conducting.

From 1939 and through the war years he found himself exiled in Swizterland. It was while he was in Zurich when he met his first wife, Hedi Oechsli. He would remain in Switzerland until 1946 and though conducting opportunities were sparse he nonetheless continued developing his piano technique and eventual won first prize the Geneva International Piano Competition.

After World War II he traveled to Germany to seek conducting opportunities only to find the country in virtual ruins. At that time Solti was invited by the American military government to conduct Beethoven's Fidelio in Munich. It was after this occasion that he was appointed music director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich and the Frankfurt Opera. In 1947 he signed his first record contract with the prestigious DECCA label---a relationship that spanned fifty year making it the longest conductor/record label relationship ever. While at DECCA he recorded over three hundred recordings, including more than forty operas.

His numerous successes in Germany would lead to opportunities in other major European opera houses and festivals. In 1951, he made his debut at the Salzburg Festival conducting Mozart's Idomeneo.

Middle Career

From 1961 to 1971, he served as the music director of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden where he began to introduce British audiences to contemporary opera. He was also devoted to the recording of modern English composers, including recoding the four symphonies of Sir Michael Tippett, perhaps England most notable twentieth-century composers. During his tenure at Covent Garden, he achieved international fame for his performances of Die Frau ohne Schatten, the British premiere of Arnold Schoenberg's ground-breaking atonal opera, Moses and Aron, as well as Wagner's Ring cycle. He recorded the entire Ring Cycle with the Vienna Philharmonic, a historic recoding project that required seven year to complete.

His first marriage to Hedi Oechsli, in 1946, ended in divorce.[2] His second marriage was to Valerie Pitts, a British television presenter whom he met when she was sent to interview him. They had two daughters. In 1972, he was naturalized as a United Kingdom citizen (and hence also a British subject). He had been awarded an honorary KBE (knighthood) in 1971, and was known as Sir Georg Solti after his naturalization.

Solti was a great supporter and mentor to many young musicians, including the fiery Hungarian soprano Sylvia Sass, with whom he recorded Mozart's "Don Giovanni" and Bartok's brooding one act opera, "Bluebeard's Castle."

Chicago Symphony

Solti was music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) from 1969 until 1991, when he was made the first and only Music Director Laureate in that orchestra's history. He was music director of the Orchestre de Paris from 1972 until 1975. From 1979 until 1983, he was principal conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Solti was as enthusiastic making music in the recording studio as in the opera house or concert hall. His long and productive partnership with the legendary producer John Culshaw at Decca continued through his tenure with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Products of this partnership included the first ever complete studio recording of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. No less distinguished and equally groundbreaking were his studio recordings of the operas of Richard Strauss, which like his Wagner have been remastered and released on CD where they are still praised for their musicianship and expert production values. His performances and recordings of works by Verdi, Mahler and Bartók were also widely admired. With the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra he recorded an extensive symphonic repertoire including the complete symphonies of Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, Elgar, Schumann, and Mahler.

He also led the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on numerous international tours including a performance at the famed Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow.

He continued to add new works to his repertoire in the latter days of his career, voicing particular enthusiasm for the music of Shostakovich, whom he admitted he failed to appreciate fully during the composer's lifetime. Solti never truly retired, and his sudden death in 1997 meant several years of planned performances and recording projects would never be realized. In total, Solti conducted 999 performances with the CSO; his 1000th performance was scheduled to be in October 1997, around the time of his 85th birthday. All told, he won thirty-eight Grammy awards, more than any other artist in any category. The City of Chicago renamed the block of East Adams Street adjacent to Symphony Center as "Sir Georg Solti Place" in his memory.

According to his last wish, he rests in Hungarian soil. After a state funeral, he has been placed beside Béla Bartók: his one-time tutor and mentor.

Solti co-wrote his memoirs with Harvey Sachs, published in the UK as Solti on Solti and in the USA as Memoirs. The book appeared in the month after his death.

Awards and Recognitions

Sir Georg Solti holds the record for having received the most Grammy awards. He personally won 31 Grammys and is listed for 38 Grammys (6 went to the engineer and 1 to a soloist); he was nominated an additional 74 times before his death in 1997. He was honored with a lifetime achievement award in 1996 from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. In 1988 we was named "Musician of the Year" by Musical America Magazine.

Preceded by: Hans Knappertsbusch	General Music Director, Bavarian State Opera 1946 – 1952	Succeeded by: Rudolf Kempe
Preceded by: Paul Kletzki	Music Director, Dallas Symphony Orchestra 1961–1962	Succeeded by: Donald Johanos
Preceded by: Rafael Kubelík	Music Director, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden 1961 – 1971	Succeeded by: Colin Davis
Preceded by: Irwin Hoffman	Music Director, Chicago Symphony Orchestra 1969 – 1991	Succeeded by: Daniel Barenboim
Preceded by: Herbert von Karajan	Music Director, Orchestre de Paris 1972 – 1975	Succeeded by: Daniel Barenboim
Preceded by: Bernard Haitink	Principal Conductor, London Philharmonic Orchestra 1979–1983	Succeeded by: Klaus Tennstedt

Also known as "The Screaming Skull" by orchestra players.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Solti, Georg, "Memoirs" A Cappella Books, with Harvey Sachs, Chicago Review Press International, Chicago, IL, 1998 ISBN 1-58652-337-8
• Robinson, Paul E., "Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music,"Copyright by iUniverse, 2006 ISBN 13-987-0-595-39953-6

Miscellaneous

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