Gustav Kobbé

Gustav Kobbé A.M. (born New York City, 4 March 1857;Lewis Randolph Hamersly, "et al." [http://books.google.com/books?id=e0tzRbahzckC "Who's who in New York (city and State)"] . New York: L.R. Hamersly, 1904. p. 353.] died Great South Bay off Bay Shore, New York, 27 July 1918 [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B02E0D8143EE433A2575BC2A9619C946996D6CF "Hydroplane Kills Kobbe in his Boat; Naval Pilot Unaware He Had Struck Art Critic's Craft."] "New York Times". 28 July 1918. p. 1. Accessed 30 January 2008.] ) was an American music critic and author, best known for his guide to the operas, "The Complete Opera Book", first published (posthumously) in the United States in 1919 and the United Kingdom in 1922.

Biography

Kobbé was born in March 1857 in New York City to William (Wilhelm) Kobbé and Sarah Lord Sistare Kobbé. William was born in Idstein, near Wiesbaden, in the Duchy of Nassau (now part of Germany) and represented that country in New York until it was absorbed by the Kingdom of Prussia in 1866. Sarah was born in New London, Connecticut to a prominent New England family.

When Gustav Kobbé was ten years old, he was sent to Wiesbaden to study composition and the piano with Adolf Hagen. Following five years of study in Germany, he returned to New York City for additional study under Joseph Mosenthal. Afterward, he graduated from Columbia College in 1877 and two years later from Columbia Law School. In 1882, he married Carolyn Wheeler.

His hobby was sailing, and it was while he was out in the Great South Bay off Bay Shore, Long Island, New York, in July 1918, that a seaplane, coming down for a landing, struck his boat and killed him instantly. [The Earl of Harewood (Ed.), "Kobbé's Complete Opera Book". London and New York: Putnam, 1954. p. xiii.] His grandson, Francis Thorne, is a well known composer.

Literary career

Kobbé began his literary career as co-editor of the "Musical Review", and in 1882 was sent as correspondent to Bayreuth in Bavaria, Germany by the "New York World" for the first performance of "Parsifal". He contributed many articles on music to the leading American magazines of his day - "The Century Magazine", "Scribner's Magazine", "The Forum", "North American Review", etc - and became music critic of the New York "Herald" when that newspaper was owned by James Gordon Bennett, remaining with it for eighteen years.

He was on the point of completing the book which was afterwards published as "The Complete Opera Book" when he died. Various additions were made to it before publication, and the work in its original form was edited by Katharine Wright, who at the same time included some additional operas in sections that bear her initials. Its full title was "The Complete Opera Book : the Stories of the Operas, Together with 400 of the Leading Airs and Motives in Musical Notation".

Notable works

* "The Ring of the Nibelung" (1889)
* "Wagner's Life and works" (two volumes, 1890)
* "New York and its Environs" (1891)
* "Plays for Amateurs" (1892)
* "My Rosary, and Other Poems" (1896)
* "Miriam" (1898)
* "Wagner's Music-Dramas Analyzed" (1904), with which were combined his other later Wagner works
* "The Loves of Great Composers" (1905)
* "Opera Singers" (1905, sixth edition revised, 1913)
* "Famous American Songs" (1906)
* "Portrait Gallery of Great Composers" (1911)
* "A Tribute to the Dog-Including the Famous Tribute by Senator Vest" (1910 & 1911)
* "The Complete Opera Book" (1919 & 1922)

Notes

References

*G. Kobbé, "The Complete Opera Book" (Putnam and Sons, New York 1919, London 1922).
*The Earl of Harewood (Ed.), "Kobbé's Complete Opera Book" (Putnam, London and New York 1954).

External links

* [http://www.bobsuniverse.com/BOW/Books/Kobbe_Complete/index.htm "The Complete Opera Book"] text at Bob’s Opera World
*gutenberg|no=18138|name=The Loves of Great Composers by Gustav Kobbé text at Project Gutenberg