Kurt Masur

Kurt Masur
Masur conducting the San Francisco Symphony in 2007
Born	(1927-07-18)18 July 1927 Brieg, Lower Silesia, Weimar Republic
Died	19 December 2015(2015-12-19) (aged 88) Greenwich, Connecticut, U.S.
Citizenship	East Germany, Germany
Alma mater	University of Music and Theatre Leipzig
Occupation	Conductor
Website	http://www.kurtmasur.com/

Kurt Masur (18 July 1927 – 19 December 2015) was a German conductor. Called "one of the last old-style maestros", he directed many of the principal orchestras of his era. He had a long career as the Kapellmeister of the Gewandhaus, and also served as music director of the New York Philharmonic.

Masur was born in Brieg, Lower Silesia, Germany (now Brzeg in Poland), and studied piano, composition and conducting in Leipzig, Saxony. Masur was married three times. His first marriage ended in divorce. He and his second wife, Irmgard, had a daughter, Carolin. Irmgard Masur died in 1972 in a car accident in which Masur was severely injured. His marriage to his third wife, the former Tomoko Sakurai, produced a son, Ken-David, a classical singer and conductor.

Masur died at the age of 88 in Greenwich, Connecticut, from complications of Parkinson's disease. He is survived by his third wife and their son, as well as his daughters Angelika and Carolin, his two other sons, Michael and Matthias, and nine grandchildren.

At 10 until 16, he took piano lessons with Katharina Hartmann. In 1943 and 1944, he had piano lessons at the Landesmusikschule Breslau, until the schoolboy was forced to join the national militia "Volkssturm" late in 1944.

From 1946 until 1948, he studied conducting, composition and piano at the University of Music and Theatre Leipzig. He left at 21, never finishing his studies, when offered a job as répétiteur at the Landestheater Halle an der Saale.

Masur conducted the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra for three years ending in 1958 and again from 1967 to 1972. He also worked with the Komische Oper of East Berlin. In 1970, he became Kapellmeister of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, serving in that post until 1996. With that orchestra, he performed Beethoven's ninth symphony at the celebration of German reunification in 1990.