Franz von Vecsey (Hungarian: Vecsey Ferenc, March 23, 1893 – April 5, 1935) was a Hungarian violinist and composer.

He was born in Budapest^[1] and began his violin studies with his father, Lajos Vecsey, and at the age of eight he entered the studio of Jenő Hubay. Two years later, aged ten, he played for Joseph Joachim in Berlin and subsequently became known as a stellar child prodigy virtuoso.

He became one of the pre-eminent violinists in Europe in the 1910s and '20s, at one point touring with Béla Bartók as his piano accompanist. Aged only 12, he became the re-dedicatee of Jean Sibelius's Violin Concerto in D minor in 1905, after the original dedicatee, Willy Burmester, refused to play the work after he was unable to appear at the premiere of the revised version and it was premiered by Karel Halíř instead. Vecsey championed the Sibelius concerto, first performing at when he was only 13^[2], although he could not adequately cope with the extraordinary technical demands of the work.^[3] He was also the dedicatee of Hubay's Violin Concerto No. 3.^[4] He also spent time composing, and wrote a number of virtuosic salon pieces for the violin.

His career faltered somewhat after the First World War, as he grew tired of the constant touring involved in the life of a concert artist. He hoped to take up conducting. However, in 1935, he became seriously ill with pulmonary embolism that grew through much of his life. He sought medical care in Rome. However, the operation was unsuccessful, and he died at the age of 42.^[1]

Selected compositions[link]

Violin Solo

• Preludio e Fuga in C minor (1914)

Violin and Piano

• À toi (1921)
• La Campanella (1934); transcription based on the Rondo from Violin Concerto No. 2 by Niccolò Paganini
• Caprice in F♯ major (1913)
• Caprice fantastique (1933)
• Caprice No. 1 "Le Vent" in A minor (1916)

• Caprice No. 2 "Cascade" in F♯ major
• Caprice No. 3 "Valse macabre"
• Caprice No. 4 "Badinage"
• Caprice No. 5 "La Lune glisse à travers les nuages" (1917)
• Caprice No. 6 "Octaves dansantes"
• Caprice No. 7 "Claire de lune"
• Caprice No. 8 "Feu d'étincelles"
• Caprice No. 9 "Reflets dans l'eau"
• Caprice No. 10 "Pensée fantastique"
• Le Chagrin de Pierrot
• Chanson nostalgique (1933)
• Chanson triste (1913)
• Conte passionné in G major (1913)
• Devant un tombeau (1921)
• Mariä Wiegenlied (1934); transcription of Max Reger's Op. 76, No. 52
• Motus Barbarus
• Nuit du Nord (1921)
• Plainte nostalgique
• Preghiera in G♯ minor (1924)
• Préludes for 2 Violins and Piano (1921)

No. 3 – Badinage impertinant

No. 4 – Claire de lune sur le Bosphore

No. 5 – Pourquoi ...

• Souvenir (1913)
• Trois Morceaux (1912)

No. 1 – Rêve (A minor)

No. 2 – Humoresque (E minor)

No. 3 – Minuet (E major)

• Valse lente (1933)
• Valse triste in C minor (1913)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Free scores by Franz von Vecsey at the International Music Score Library Project

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Ruggiero Ricci (middle) with Gerhart Hauptmann, 1932

Ruggiero Ricci (born July 24, 1918) is an Italian-American violinist known for performances and recordings of the works of Paganini. He was born in San Bruno, California. Ricci's brother was cellist George Ricci (1923–2010) and his sister Emma played violin with the New York Metropolitan Opera.

He is the son of Italian immigrants. His father first taught him to play the violin. At age seven, Ricci studied with Louis Persinger and Elizabeth Lackey. Persinger would become his piano accompanist for many recitals and recordings.

Ricci gave his first public performance in 1928 at the age of 10 in San Francisco where he played works by Henryk Wieniawski and Henri Vieuxtemps. He gained a reputation for being a child prodigy. At the age of 11, he gave his first orchestral performance, playing the Mendelssohn concerto, and soon after he had his highly successful debut at Carnegie Hall.

In the 1930s Ricci studied in Berlin with Georg Kulenkampff, where he learned a "German style" of playing in the tradition of Adolf Busch. He also studied with Michel Piastro and Paul Stassevich.

He served in the US Army from 1942 until 1945, where he was an "Entertainment Specialist".

In 1947 Ricci was the first violinist to record the complete 24 Caprices, Op. 1 by Paganini, in their original form. However, the first recording of any version was that of the arrangement by Ferdinand David for violin and piano, made in 1940 by the Austrian-born Ossy Renardy. Ricci's first recording was on the Shellac recording label (he has since made three other recordings of the Caprices). After his time in the military, he uncovered many pieces by 19th-century composers that he would perform solo. He has also performed the world premieres of pieces by many contemporary composers.

Aside from performing over 6,000 concerts in 65 countries during his 70-year solo career, Ricci has also made over 500 recordings on every major label. He has taught violin at Indiana University, the Juilliard School and the University of Michigan. He also taught at the University Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. Ricci has held master classes in the United States and Europe. He also wrote a book Left Hand Technique published by G. Schirmer.

Ricci has owned many precious instruments, including the Guarneri Del Gesù violin known as the ex-Bronisław Huberman of 1734, a fine Storioni, a Bellini, a Curtin & Alf, a Bague and a couple of Regazzi. He played his fourth recording of the Paganini Caprices on Paganini's own Guarneri on loan to him by the City of Genoa, Italy.

External links[link]

• Ruggiero Ricci - Official Site

Jascha Heifetz (/ˈhaɪfɪts/; February 2 [O.S. January 20] 1901 – December 10, 1987) was a violinist, born in Vilnius, Lithuania. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest violinists of all time.^[1][2][3][4]

Photo by Yousuf Karsh

Early life[link]

Heifetz was born into a Litvak family in Vilnius, Lithuania, then part of the Russian Empire.^[5] His father, Reuven Heifetz, son of Elie, was a local violin teacher and served as the concertmaster of the Vilnius Theatre Orchestra for one season before the theatre closed down. Jascha took up the violin when he was three years old and his father was his first teacher. At five he started lessons with Ilya D. Malkin, a former pupil of Leopold Auer. He was a child prodigy, making his public debut at seven, in Kovno (now Kaunas, Lithuania) playing the Violin Concerto in E minor by Felix Mendelssohn. In 1910 he entered the Saint Petersburg Conservatory to study under Leopold Auer himself.

He played in Germany and Scandinavia, and met Fritz Kreisler for the first time in a Berlin private house together with other noted violinists in attendance. Kreisler, after accompanying the 12-year-old Heifetz at the piano in a performance of the Mendelssohn concerto, said to all present, "We may as well break our fiddles across our knees." Heifetz visited much of Europe while still in his teens. In April 1911, Heifetz performed in an outdoor concert in St. Petersburg before 25,000 spectators; there was such a sensational reaction that police officers needed to protect the young violinist after the concert. In 1914, Heifetz performed with the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Arthur Nikisch. The conductor was very impressed, saying he had never heard such an excellent violinist.^[6]

Career[link]

Heifetz and his family left Russia in 1917, traveling by rail to the Russian far east and thence by ship to the United States, arriving in San Francisco.

On October 27, 1917, Heifetz played for the first time in the United States, at Carnegie Hall in New York, and became an immediate sensation.^[7] Fellow violinist Mischa Elman in the audience asked "Do you think it's hot in here?", whereupon the pianist Leopold Godowsky, in the next seat, imperturbably replied, "Not for pianists."^[8] The reviews by the New York critics were rapturous.

In 1917, Heifetz was elected as an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men in music, by the fraternity's Alpha chapter at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. As he was aged 16 at the time, he was perhaps the youngest person ever elected to membership in the organization. Heifetz remained in the country and became an American citizen in 1925. When he told admirer Groucho Marx he had been earning his living as a musician since the age of seven, Groucho answered, "And I suppose before that you were just a bum."

Technique and timbre[link]

Heifetz is considered to be one of the finest violinists of all time. Heifetz's technical command of his instrument – his physical ability to play the violin with stunning precision – is regarded by many critics as unequaled. That physical control enabled Heifetz to produce a distinctive tone quality, intense and shimmering, that came to be regarded as his trademark. Yet, from time to time his near-perfect technique and conservative stage demeanor caused some critics to accuse him of being overly mechanical, even cold. Virgil Thomson called Heifetz's style of playing "silk underwear music", a term he did not intend as a compliment. Other critics argue that he infused his playing with feeling and reverence for the composers' intentions. His style of playing was highly influential in defining the way modern violinists approach the instrument. His use of rapid vibrato, emotionally charged portamento, fast tempos, and superb bow control coalesced to create a highly distinctive sound that make Heifetz's playing instantly recognizable to aficionados. The violinist Itzhak Perlman, who himself is noted for his rich warm tone and expressive use of portamento, describes Heifetz's tone as like "a tornado" because of its emotional intensity. Perlman also said that Heifetz preferred to be recorded relatively close to the microphone; as a result, one would perceive a somewhat different tone quality when listening to Heifetz during a concert hall performance as opposed to a recording.^[9]

In creating his sound, Heifetz was very particular about his choice of strings. He used a silver wound Tricolore gut g-string, plain gut unvarnished D and A strings, and a Goldbrokat steel E string medium including clear Hill brand rosin sparingly. Heifetz believed that playing on gut strings was important in rendering an individual sound.

Early recordings[link]

Jascha Heifetz around 1920

Heifetz made his first recordings in Russia during 1910–11, while still a student of Leopold Auer. The existence of these recordings was not widely known until after Heifetz's death, when several sides (most notably François Schubert's L'Abeille) were reissued on an LP included as a supplement to The Strad magazine.

Shortly after his Carnegie Hall debut on November 7, 1917, Heifetz made his first recordings for the Victor Talking Machine Company; he would remain with Victor and its successor, RCA Victor, for most of his career. For several years, in the 1930s, Heifetz recorded primarily for HMV in the UK because RCA cut back on classical recordings during the Great Depression; these discs were issued in the US by RCA Victor. Heifetz often enjoyed playing chamber music. Various critics have blamed his limited success in chamber ensembles to the fact that his artistic personality tended to overwhelm his colleagues. Some notable collaborations include his 1941 recordings of piano trios by Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms with cellist Emanuel Feuermann and pianist Arthur Rubinstein as well as a later collaboration with Rubinstein and cellist Gregor Piatigorsky, with whom he recorded trios by Maurice Ravel, Tchaikovsky, and Felix Mendelssohn. Both formations were sometimes referred to as the Million Dollar Trio.

He recorded the Beethoven Violin Concerto in 1940 with the NBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Arturo Toscanini, and again in stereo in 1955 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Charles Munch. A live performance from April 9, 1944, of Heifetz playing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto, again with Toscanini and the NBC Symphony, has also been released.

He performed and recorded Erich Wolfgang Korngold's Violin Concerto, at a time when many classical musicians avoided Korngold's music because they did not consider him a "serious" composer after he wrote many film scores for Warner Brothers.

Wartime[link]

Heifetz commissioned a number of pieces, perhaps most notably the Violin Concerto by William Walton. He also arranged a number of pieces, such as Hora Staccato by Grigoraş Dinicu, a Romanian whom Heifetz is rumoured to have called the greatest violinist he had ever heard. Heifetz also played and composed for the piano;^[7] he performed mess hall jazz for soldiers at Allied camps across Europe during the Second World War, and under the alias Jim Hoyl he wrote a hit song, "When You Make Love to Me (Don't Make Believe)", which was sung by Bing Crosby.

Decca recordings[link]

From 1944 to 1946, largely a result of the American Federation of Musicians recording ban (which actually began in 1942), Heifetz went to American Decca Records to make recordings because Decca settled with the union in 1943, well before RCA Victor resolved their dispute with the musicians. He recorded primarily short pieces, including his own arrangements of music by George Gershwin and Stephen Foster; these were pieces he often played as encores in his recitals. He was accompanied on the piano by Emanuel Bay or Milton Kaye. Among the more uncommon discs featured one of Decca's most popular artists, Bing Crosby, in the "Lullaby" from Benjamin Godard's opera Jocelyn and Where My Caravan Has Rested (arranged by Heifetz and Crosby) by Hermann Lohr (1872–1943); Decca's studio orchestra was conducted by Victor Young in the July 27, 1946, session. Recorded mostly in small studios, the digitally remastered performances (issued by MCA) have remarkably clear, high fidelity sound. However, Heifetz soon returned to RCA Victor, where he continued to make recordings until the early 1970s.^[10]

Later recordings[link]

Returning to RCA Victor in 1946, Heifetz continued to make a number of 78-rpm discs for the company, including solo, chamber, and orchestral recordings.

RCA Victor began releasing long-playing recordings in 1950, including concertos taken from 78-rpm masters. The company began to make new high fidelity recordings with Heifetz, primarily with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Charles Munch and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Fritz Reiner. Beginning in early 1954, most of RCA's classical sessions were also taped on three-track tape machines. These were eventually issued in the "Living Stereo" series, which began in 1958. RCA later reissued the recordings on a series of CDs. While many earlier Heifetz recordings used close miking, which led to a dry sound, the post 1954 RCA concerto recordings have somewhat more distant and effective miking, creating a more effective concert ambience that shows Heifetz's tone to excellent advantage. In 2000, RCA released a double CD compilation entitled Jascha Heifetz – The Supreme which gives a sampling of Heifetz's major recordings, including the 1955 recording of Brahms's Violin Concerto with Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra; the 1957 recording of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto (with the same forces); the 1959 recording of Sibelius's Violin Concerto with Walter Hendl and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra; the 1961 recording of Max Bruch's Scottish Fantasy with Sir Malcolm Sargent and the New Symphony Orchestra of London; the 1963 recording of Glazunov's A minor Concerto with Walter Hendl and the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra (drawn from New York musicians); the 1965 recording of George Gershwin's Three Preludes (transcribed by Heifetz) with pianist Brooks Smith; and the 1970 recording of Bach's unaccompanied Chaconne from the Partita No. 2 in D minor.

Third Israel tour[link]

Heifetz in Be'er Sheba, Israel, 1953

On his third tour to Israel in 1953, Heifetz included in his recitals the Violin Sonata by Richard Strauss. At the time, Strauss was considered by many to be a Nazi composer, and his works were unofficially banned in Israel along with those of Richard Wagner. Despite the fact that the Holocaust had occurred less than ten years earlier and a last-minute plea from the Israeli Minister of Education, the defiant Heifetz argued, "The music is above these factors ... I will not change my program. I have the right to decide on my repertoire." Throughout his tour the performance of the Strauss sonata was followed by dead silence.

Heifetz was attacked after his recital in Jerusalem outside his hotel by a young man who struck Heifetz's violin case, Heifetz resorting to using his right hand to protect his priceless violins from the crowbar. As the attacker started to flee, Heifetz alerted his companions, who were armed, "Shoot that man, he tried to kill me." The attacker escaped and was never found. The attack has since been attributed to the Kingdom of Israel terrorist group.^[11][12] The incident made headlines in the press and Heifetz defiantly announced that he would not stop playing the Strauss. Threats continued to come, however, and he omitted the Strauss from his next recital without explanation. His last concert was cancelled after his swollen right hand began to hurt. He left Israel and did not return until 1970.

Russian defector[link]

Soviet musicians considered Heifetz and his teacher Leopold Auer as traitors to their home country for emigrating to the US, and Heifetz especially because of his very young age. Meanwhile, musicians who remained, such as David Oistrakh, were seen as patriots. Heifetz greatly criticized the Soviet regime; he condemned the International Tchaikovsky Competition for being biased against Western competitors. During the Carl Flesch Competition in London, Oistrakh tried to persuade Erick Friedman, Heifetz's star student, to enter the Tchaikovsky Competition, of which he was the principal juror. Hearing of this, Heifetz strongly advised against it, warning Friedman, "You will see what will happen there." Consequently, the competition received international outrage after Friedman, already a seasoned performer and recording artist for RCA, who had performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, among many others, placed sixth behind players who had yet to establish themselves. Joseph Szigeti later informed Heifetz himself that he had given his student top scores.

Later life[link]

After an only partially successful operation on his right shoulder in 1972, Heifetz ceased giving concerts and making records. Although his prowess as a performer remained intact and he continued to play privately until the end, his bow arm was affected and he could never again hold the bow as high as before.

Rudolf Koelman (left) with Jascha Heifetz, 1979

Heifetz taught the violin extensively, holding master classes first at UCLA, then at the University of Southern California, where the faculty included renowned cellist Gregor Piatigorsky and violist William Primrose. For a few years in the 1980s he also held classes in his private studio at home in Beverly Hills. His teaching studio can be seen today in the main building of the Colburn School, where it is now used for masterclasses and serves as an inspiration to the students there. During his teaching career Heifetz taught, among others, Erick Friedman, Elaine Skorodin,^[13] Pierre Amoyal, Rudolf Koelman, Endre Granat, Eugene Fodor, Paul Rosenthal, and Ayke Agus.

It was rumored that Heifetz was such a strict disciplinarian that the main gate of his Beverly Hills home was closed exactly at the time his classes were to begin in order to shut out students who arrived late. Heifetz died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California in December 1987.

Heifetz owned the 1714 Dolphin Stradivarius, the 1731 "Piel" Stradivarius, the 1736 Carlo Tononi, and the 1742 ex David Guarneri del Gesù, the last of which he preferred and kept until his death. The Dolphin Strad is currently owned by the Nippon Music Foundation. The Heifetz Tononi violin used at his 1917 Carnegie Hall debut was left in his will to Sherry Kloss, Master-Teaching Assistant to Heifetz, with "one of my four good bows" (Violinist/author Kloss wrote "Jascha Heifetz Through My Eyes" and is a co-founder of the Jascha Heifetz Society). The famed Guarneri is now in the San Francisco Legion of Honor Museum, as instructed by Heifetz in his will, and may only be taken out and played "on special occasions" by deserving players. The instrument has recently been on loan to San Francisco Symphony's concertmaster Alexander Barantschik, who featured it in concertos with Andrei Gorbatenko and the San Francisco Academy Orchestra in 2006.^[14] In 1989, Heifetz received a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Family life[link]

Heifetz was married in 1928 to the silent motion picture actress Florence Vidor, ex-wife of King Vidor, whose seven year old daughter, Suzanne, Heifetz adopted. The couple had two more children, Josefa (born 1930) and Robert (1932–2001) before divorcing in 1945. In 1947, Heifetz took a sabbatical during which he married Frances Spiegelberg, with whom he had another son, Joseph (known as Jay). The second marriage ended in divorce in 1962.

Heifetz's son Jay is a professional photographer. He was formerly head of marketing for the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Hollywood Bowl, and the Chief Financial Officer of Paramount Pictures' Worldwide Video Division. He lives and works in Fremantle, Western Australia. Heifetz's daughter, Josefa Heifetz Byrne, is a lexicographer, the author of the Dictionary of Unusual, Obscure and Preposterous Words.^[15]

Heifetz's grandson Danny Heifetz is an accomplished drummer/percussionist and has played with Mr. Bungle, Dieselhed, Secret Chiefs 3 and Link Wray.

His extended family was active in Los Angeles progressive political circles in addition to music.

Heifetz had a difficult personality, and has even been described as "misanthropic". He tended to drive away the very people who could have been his most trusted allies. His own childhood had been difficult; his father was an extremely stern man who, even after Jascha had become the family's sole breadwinner, would still roundly criticise every performance.^[16]

Notable Instruments[link]

• Dolphin 1714 Stradivarius
• Heifetz-Piel 1731 Stradivarius
• Antonio Stradivari 1734
• Carlo Tononi 1736
• ex-David 1742 Guarneri

Filmography[link]

Heifetz in They Shall Have Music

Heifetz played a featured role in the movie They Shall Have Music (1939) directed by Archie Mayo and written by John Howard Lawson and Irmgard von Cube. He played himself, stepping in to save a music school for poor children from foreclosure. He later appeared in the 1947 film, Carnegie Hall, performing an abridged version of the first movement of Tchaikovsky's violin concerto, with the orchestra led by Fritz Reiner, and consoling the star of the picture, who had watched his performance. Heifetz later recorded the complete Tchaikovsky concerto with Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as one of RCA Victor's "Living Stereo" discs.^[17] In 1951, he appeared in the film Of Men and Music. In 1962. he appeared in a televised series of his master classes, and, in 1971, Heifetz on Television aired, an hour-long color special that featured the violinist performing a series of short works, the "Scottish Fantasy" by Max Bruch, and the Chaconne from the Partita No. 2 by Bach. Heifetz even conducted the orchestra, as the surviving video recording documents.

The most recent film featuring Heifetz, Jascha Heifetz: God's Fiddler, premiered on April 16, 2011 at the Colburn School of Music. It is "The only film biography of the world's most renowned violinist, featuring family home movies in Los Angeles and all over the world."^[4]

In popular culture[link]

• In season 5 episode 11 of Mad About You Fran tells Jamie that Ryan's violin teacher says he is a regular Jasha Heifetz.
• Heifetz was often mentioned by Jack Benny in his long-running radio program. Benny often cited his violin playing as being on par with Heifetz.
• Heifetz is referenced in The Muppet Show (1977) where Rowlf the Dog opposite George Burns mentions "Oh listen, I can play any key. I'm another Jascha Heifetz", to which George replies, "Jascha Heifetz played the violin." Rowlf then replies, "Nobody will know the difference, George".
• Heifetz is later mentioned in The Muppet Movie (1979) when Rowlf the Dog, after being praised by Kermit the Frog for playing an impressive piece of music on the piano, shrugged modestly and replied, "I'm no Heifetz, but I get by."
• Heifetz is mentioned by Woody Allen in Broadway Danny Rose (1984). As one of Danny Rose's clients plays a glass harmonica Danny remarks "She's the Jascha Heifetz of her instrument!"
• In Season 3, Episode 5 of The Golden Girls, "Nothing Left To Fear But Fear Itself" (1987), Sophia Petrillo (played by Estelle Getty) makes reference to Jascha Heifetz in sarcastic retort, when her daughter Dorothy (Bea Arthur) asks an obvious question: "Ma, are you going to tell a story?" Sophia: "Please! Does Heifetz rosin a bow?"
• He was mentioned by the character, Data, on the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Ensigns of Command" (1989) as one of the violinists he studied prior to his concert in Ten-Forward aboard the USS Enterprise.
• From Woody Allen's Hollywood Ending (2002): "If there's a brownout, Heifetz will still be on key, but your guitarist won't be."
• The character of Yasha the violinist in Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock is a reference to Jascha Heifetz.
• In the book The Jordan Rules, then-Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson made a reference to Heifetz by saying that, just as the musician was the featured performer no matter where he played in a performance, Michael Jordan would be the center of the Bulls' triangle offense, even when its design provided greater offensive opportunities for Jordan's teammates.
• Heifetz is one of the subjects of George Gershwin's 1922 song "Mischa, Jascha, Toscha, Sascha" recorded by the Funnyboners.^[18]

See also[link]

• Lithuanian Jews
• Strauss and the Nazis

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Jascha Heifetz

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jascha Heifetz

Wikisource has the text of a 1921 Collier's Encyclopedia article about Jascha Heifetz.

• Jascha Heifetz official website
• Jascha Heifetz fan website
• Prominent People – Jascha Heifetz
• Jascha Heifetz at Sony BMG Masterworks
• NPR Classical Music: Heifetz at War: Behind the Scenes, Near the Front
• "The Violinist of the Century" – 3-part series on AdventuresInMusic.biz
• Jascha Heifetz at Find a Grave
•  "Heifetz, Jascha". Encyclopedia Americana. 1920. 

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (April 2010)

Udo Lindenberg (1987)

Udo Lindenberg (born 17 May 1946 in Gronau) is a German rock musician and composer.

Career[link]

Lindenberg started his musical career as a drummer. In 1969 Lindenberg founded his first band Free Orbit and also appeared as a studio and guest musician (with Michael Naura, Knut Kiesewetter). In 1970 he collaborated as a drummer with jazz-saxophonist Klaus Doldinger in Munich. In 1971, a band founded by Lindenberg, Passport put out its first album, with Lindenberg on drums. He also played drums for the theme music for the German TV series Tatort. The first LP of the Jazz rock group Emergency was released in 1971 but met with little commercial success.

The LP Lindenberg (also 1971, and sung in English, already with Steffi Stephan on bass) was likewise unsuccessful. In the following year, the fist LP in German was released: Daumen im Wind (produced by Lindenberg and Thomas Kukuck, who also produced the next 5 albums together), from which the single "Hoch im Norden" became a radio hit in northern Germany. 1973 brought a breakthrough with the album Andrea Doria and its catchy "Alles klar auf der Andrea Doria" and "Cello". Over 100,000 copies sold, and Lindenberg quickly received the largest record deal of any German-language musician up to that time. Lindenberg was earning a special place in the new German-language music of the 70s: Between internationally-oriented Krautrock and pop music, he found his niche. German-language rock had previously been confined to predominantly political message bands whose music was directed at a narrow audience.

Lindenbergs brash style, everyday subject matter ("Bei Onkel Pö…") and his feel for language were an unprecedented combination in German-language music. His pioneering work helped other artists such as Stefan Waggershausen and Marius Müller-Westernhagen get record deals of their own. In 1973 Lindenberg first went on tour with his Panikorchester (Panic Orchestra).

1976 was one of Udo Lindenberg's most productive years. Besides the LP Galaxo Gang he also published under the name Das Waldemar Wunderbar Syndicat I make you feel good, a first Best of Panik Udo and the first in a series of foreign-language publications No Panic, on which Lindenberg translated his songs to English. In the same year (and on another LP: Sister King Kong) with the song "Rock ’n’ Roll Arena in Jena", Lindenberg first mentioned a Panic Orchestra tour in the GDR. In 1976, Lindenberg discovered Ulla Meinecke and produced her first two albums. She was a guest artist and co-author of the 1977 LP Panische Nächte (Panic Nights) and the 1978 Dröhnland Symphonie. On Lindenbergs Rock Revue (1978) Lindenberg and Horst Königstein "Germanized" rock classics from Little Richard to The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, and went on a big tour. The Nr.-1-Hit "We Gotta Get out of This Place" was also published with German lyrics.

The subsequent Dröhnland-Symphonie-Tour was staged by Peter Zadek as a big multimedia stage show with a plethora of costumed extras. The result was Lindenbergs first live album Livehaftig. In 1979, Der Detektiv was the second Rock Revue, in which more international hits such as "Candle in the Wind" by Elton John, "Born to Be Wild" by Steppenwolf, "My Little Town" and "As Time Goes By" (from the film Casablanca) were "Germanized". Also 1997 was published "Belcanto - Udo Lindenberg & das Deutsche Filmorchester Babelsberg" which included hits like "Horizont", "Bis ans Ende der Welt" along with a song by Bertold Brecht and Udo's own interpretation of The Windmills of Your Mind - "Under the drunkard moon" ("Unterm Säufermond")^[1] (Lyrics: Udo Lindenberg, Horst Königstein).

SS Andrea Doria		"Sonderzug nach Pankow"

One of his most famous songs is Sonderzug nach Pankow (Special train service to Pankow), an adaptation of Chattanooga Choo Choo, released as a single on 2 February 1983. It originated from the refusal of eastern German authorities to allow Lindenberg a concert in the German Democratic Republic (GDR).

On June 3, 2011 Lindenberg performed at Kampnagel unplugged. The recording was later released as an album within the MTV unplugged series. Lindenberg was the 8th German artist in that series. The album became the second number 1 album for Lindenberg declared Platin status for 200.000 sold units after two weeks.^[2] The second single from the album "Cello" (feat. Clueso) went number 4 giving Lindenberg the highest chart position in German singles charts ever reached.^[3]

Lindenberg has worked collaboratively with various local and international recording artists (Eric Burdon, Helen Schneider, David Bowie, Tom Robinson, Keith Forsey, Gianna Nannini, and Nena) on a number of projects. He currently lives in Hamburg in the Hotel Atlantic (for several years now). His somewhat hoarse voice is the result of too much liquor and cigarettes. In 1989 he survived a heart attack. In 2010 he designed two stamps, themed on his songs "Andrea Doria" and "Sonderzug nach Pankow", for the Deutsche Post.

Singles[link]

	Udo Lindenberg, "Germans" excerpt noicon An excerpt from the 1984 single: "Germans"
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

D: Germany, A: Austria, CH: Switzerland

¹Udo Lindenberg & Pascal
²Freundeskreis feat. Udo Lindenberg
³Nena & Friends (Udo Lindenberg, Sasha, Ben, ...)
⁴Udo Lindenberg feat. Inga Humpe
⁵Udo Lindenberg feat. Clueso

Albums[link]

D: Germany, A: Austria, CH: Switzerland

¹ Udo Lindenberg & Panikorchester
² Udo Lindenberg & Das Deutsche Filmorchester Babelsberg

References[link]

• "Udo Lindenberg" (in German). Who's Who. The People-Lexicon. rasscass Medien Content Verlag. http://www.whoswho.de/templ/te_bio.php?PID=696&RID=1. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Udo Lindenberg

• Official website (German)
• "Udo Lindenberg & more", Art gallery
• Udo Lindenberg in the German National Library catalogue (German)
• Udo Lindenberg at the Internet Movie Database