16 Facts About Siegfried Kurz

Siegfried Kurz was a German conductor, composer and academic.

Siegfried Kurz influenced the musical scene of Dresden, as the conductor of the Semperoper for three decades, and a professor of conducting at the Hochschule fur Musik Carl Maria von Weber.

Siegfried Kurz remained in this position until 1960, then moved to the Staatsoper Dresden; he began as Kapellmeister, was promoted to Staatskapellmeister in 1964, to Generalmusikdirektor in 1971 and finally to executive musical director in 1976.

Siegfried Kurz was awarded several important prizes, such as the National Prize of the GDR.

Siegfried Kurz appeared as a composer mainly from the 1950s to the 1970s; later his duties as a conductor predominated.

Towards the end of the 1950s, Siegfried Kurz began to intensify his musical expression.

Siegfried Kurz leaned more towards Bela Bartok and experimented with the possibilities of the twelve-tone technique.

Siegfried Kurz treated twelve-tone rows more as stylistic devices, dealt with them freely and used a freitonal harmony.

Particularly as conductor of the Staatsoper Dresden and Staatskapelle, Siegfried Kurz was one of the most important personalities of the Dresden music scene in the second half of the 20th century.

Siegfried Kurz conducted numerous opera performances, some of which were released on record.

Siegfried Kurz's repertoire was extraordinarily broad: in addition to the standard German repertoire from Mozart to Richard Strauss, it included works from the Italian and Slavic cultural areas.

Siegfried Kurz conducted as a guest internationally, at the Leipzig Opera Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, in Paris Wagner's Das Rheingold, Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss in Venice and Buenos Aires, Wagner's Parsifal and Prokofiev's Der feurige Engel at the Oper Bonn, and Weber's Der Freischutz in Japan.

Siegfried Kurz taught at the Hochschule fur Musik Carl Maria von Weber from 1976, and became a professor in 1979.

Siegfried Kurz was married to a former harpist; the couple had a daughter.

Siegfried Kurz died on 8 January 2023, aged 92, in Dresden after a long illness.

Siegfried Kurz's works are held by the German National Library, including:.