Ernst Kunwald

A review of a concert he led with the New York Philharmonic in February 1906 described him as “not a great conductor; not one with the finest feelings or a subtle sense for the deeper things in music; but he is a capable one, in many ways an intelligent one, a vigorous and energetic one”.

A Stokowski detractor, J. Herman Thuman, wrote a review in The Cincinnati Enquirer that Kunwald “…does not find it necessary to resort to vaudeville stunts to gain the acclaim of the crowd”.

On November 17, 1917 the Daughters of the American Revolution brought pressure on the public safety director of Pittsburgh to forbid Kunwald’s conducting his orchestra in that city.

According to a memo dated December 19, 1917 from J. Edgar Hoover to the United States Attorney General, Kunwald conducted the Star-Spangled Banner before one concert after allegedly telling the orchestra and audience (many of whom were fellow immigrants) that his sympathies were with the House of Hapsburg and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

According to internment records, Ernst Kunwald was 5 feet 9 inches tall, with dark hair and blue eyes, and was married to Lina, a German citizen born in 1869.