Günter Wand

Günter Wand (January 7, 1912, in Elberfeld, Germany – February 14, 2002, in Ulmiz near Bern, Switzerland) was a German orchestra conductor and composer. Wand studied in Wuppertal, Allenstein and Detmold. At the Cologne conservatory, he was a composition student with Philipp Jarnach and a piano student with Paul Baumgartner. He was a conducting pupil of Franz von Hoesslin in Munich, but was otherwise largely self-taught as a conductor. During his 65-year-long career as a conductor, he was honoured with many significant awards, including the German Record Award and the internationally important Diapason d'Or.

In February 1924, aged 12, Wand attended a performance of Der Zigeunerbaron at the Thalia Theatre in Wuppertal-Elberfeld, and was so entranced he decided to become a conductor. The role of Sandor Barinkay that evening was sung by Richard Tauber.

Wand started his career in Cologne, where he was to stay for several decades, as a conductor of the Cologne Opera in 1939. After World War II his position in Cologne was consolidated as he became Generalmusikdirektor in charge of both the opera and the Gürzenich Orchestra, which he conducted until 1974.

In 1948, he also started teaching conducting at a music school in Cologne. From the early 1950s he guest-conducted a number of orchestras, making his London debut in 1951 with the London Symphony Orchestra. Other orchestras who invited him included the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne and Munich Philharmonic Orchestra.

After several recordings of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven with the Gürzenich for a French subscription collection in the mid-1950s, he made no studio recordings for nearly two decades with the exception of an appearance with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra on Decca Records, accompanying Wilhelm Backhaus in Robert Schumann's Piano Concerto (his only recording with that orchestra). In the 1970s he recorded the complete symphonies of Franz Schubert and Anton Bruckner with the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne.

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