Clemens Carl Otto Schmalstich (8 October 1880, Posen – 15 July 1960, Berlin) was a German composer, conductor, and Nazi politician.
There he 'learnt' piano with Professor Ernst Rudorff, but then two years later he transferred as a student of composition to the master-class of Engelbert Humperdinck (best known as the creator of the opera Hänsel and Gretel), who became a fatherly friend to him and arranged for him to obtain a position as conductor at the New Theatre in Berlin, where, among other works, he conducted Humperdinck's music for Shakespeare's The Tempest.
After some years of freelance activity on numerous foreign tours, in 1927 he took on the artistic directorship of the Electrola Company in Berlin, and in 1931 was able to follow the call to become a teacher at the State High School Academy.
[2] Above all he composed the music for the culture-films Das Wort aus Stein (1939) and Nürnberg, die Stadt der Reichsparteitage[3] (1940).
Clemens Schmalstich was for more than 50 years married to Lissi Schmalstich-Kurz, formerly a celebrated concert and oratorio singer and author, who most notably wrote the libretto for his opera Beatrice.