Paul Lincke

Carl Emil Paul Lincke (7 November 1866 – 4 September 1946) was a German composer and theater conductor. He is considered the "father" of the Berlin operetta and holds the same significance for Berlin as does Johann Strauss for Vienna and Jacques Offenbach for Paris. His well-known compositions include "Berliner Luft" ("Berlin Air"), the unofficial anthem of Berlin, from his operetta Frau Luna; and "The Glow-Worm", from his operetta Lysistrata.

Lincke was born on 7 November 1866 in the Jungfern Bridge district of Berlin. He was the son of magistrate August Lincke and his wife Emilie. His father played the violin in several small orchestras. When Paul was only five years old his father died. Emilie moved with her three children to Adalbertstaße, and later to Eisenbahnstraße, near Lausitzer Platz.

Lincke's early musical inclinations were towards military music. So his mother sent him after the completion of secondary school education to Wittenberge. Here he was trained in the Wittenberg City Band under Rudolf Kleinow as a bassoonist. He also learned to play the tenor horn, the drums, the piano and the violin.

Instead of pursuing a career as a military musician, Lincke secured employment as a bassoonist at Berlin's Central Theatre, under Adolf Ernst. After one year, he joined the orchestra of the Ostend Theatre.

In entertainment and dance music Lincke gained valuable experience at the Königsstädtischen Theater, the Belle-Alliance-Theater and the Parodie-Theater. He accompanied the musical vaudeville programs and provided his own compositions for popular singers. His Venus auf Erden ("Venus on Earth"), a revue-like one-act play was created in 1897 at the Apollo Theater in Friedrichstraße.

For two years, Paul Lincke worked at the most famous European vaudeville house, the Folies Bergère in Paris. He then returned with new compositions to the Apollo-Theater where, with huge success in 1899 Frau Luna () (Mrs Moon) was premiered. That same year, followed Im Reiche des Indra (In the Realm of Indra), and in 1902 the operetta Lysistrata. The librettos of these were by Heinrich Bolten-Baeckers.

...
Wikipedia