Ignatz Waghalter - Biography

English | German

Return to Germany and Subsequent Exile

After the conclusion of his first season, Waghalter decided to return to Germany. Not knowing what lay in store for German Jews, Waghalter could not have imagined the fateful consequences of this decision. When he was to return to America, 13 years later, it would be as an obscure refugee.

In the immediate aftermath of his return to Germany, Waghalter was among the most widely recorded conductors, and a large portion of his studio work is still in existence. He composed several operettas, including Der späte Gast, Der Weiberkrieg, Bärbel and Lord Tommy. Waghalter was also active as a guest conductor throughout Europe - even in Moscow’s Bolshoi Opera, where he served as guest conductor for a half-year in 1930. In 1931-32 he was appointed general musical director of the National Opera in Riga (Latvia). Waghalter enjoyed close friendships with composers Eugen D’Albert, Paul Hindemith, the young Kurt Weill, and Franz Schreker; the pianists Joseph Hoffman and Leopold Godowsky; the singers Richard Tauber, Leo Slezak and Joseph Schmidt; the dramatist Max Reinhardt; and an amateur violinist by the name of Albert Einstein. The latter often visited Waghalter’s apartment in Charlottenburg to participate in an informal chamber music group that Waghalter directed from the piano.

With the rise of the Nazis to power, Waghalter’s situation became untenable. In 1934 he and his wife fled to Czechoslovakia. While there Waghalter wrote an autobiography, Aus dem Ghetto in die Freiheit (From the Ghetto into Freedom). He concluded his story with the following words:

“Destiny has placed before the Jewish people new struggles - as if to demand that they strengthen themselves spiritually and intellectually. And so I as well am forced again onto the path of a difficult struggle for existence. But to where? Perhaps to the land of Israel... or to the eternally young North America? But wherever it may be, I am determined to serve the cause of Art and Mankind, in accordance with the words of Moses, “You were brought out of Egypt to serve your brothers.”

From Prague Waghalter went to Vienna, where he composed an anti-fascist opera entitled Ahasaverus und Esther, based on the Biblical Purim story of the Jewish princess who thwarted Haman’s plan to carry out the murder of all the Jews of ancient Persia. Waghalter himself managed to escape Austria shortly after the Anschluss in March 1938.

Now in his late 50s, Waghalter found little opportunity in the United States. He was one of hundreds of immensely gifted European refugees who found themselves cut off from a milieu appreciative of their great talent. Waghalter attempted to establish a classical orchestra of African-American musicians, but the social climate was too inhospitable to make the project viable.

The last years of his life were spent in isolation. Within the German émigré community he was widely respected. Ahasaverus und Esther was performed over radio in New York City in 1940. But there were still in America too few orchestras to accommodate the many gifted conductors who had fled Nazi Germany. He continued to compose, and a final work, an operetta entitled Ting-Ling, was performed at the well-known theater in Ogunquit, Maine, in the summer of 1948. On April 7, 1949, Waghalter died suddenly of a heart attack in New York City at the age of 68. The New York Times recorded his death with a lengthy obituary, and hundreds of European refugees who admired him as a conductor and composer attended his funeral. The noted rabbi Joachim Prinz, who had known Waghalter in Berlin, delivered a memorable funeral oration. Pointing at his coffin, he asked, “Who can believe that this coffin contains all that was once Ignatz Waghalter?” But as the years passed, Waghalter was largely forgotten.

But there were some who did remember Waghalter. In 1981 the Deutsche Oper (as it is now known) commemorated the 100th anniversary of his birth. A bust of Waghalter, cast in 1925, was placed alongside those of other major conductors who had led the orchestra of the Deutsches Opernhaus. In April 1989, the Deutsche Oper gave a concert performance of Waghalter’s Jugend.

Previous | Next