Georg Knepler

He studied piano with Eduard Steuermann from 1926, conducting with Hans Gál and musicology with Guido Adler, Wilhelm Fischer, Egon Wellesz, Rudolf von Ficker and Robert Lach at the University of Vienna.

At the same time he accompanied Karl Kraus at the piano from 1928 to 1931, who performed Jacques Offenbach's operettas in Vienna, Berlin, Prague, Munich and other cities.

He was the piano accompanist of Helene Weigel, who sang Eisler's Wiegenlieder einer proletarischen Mutte (Lullabies of a Proletarian Mother) at workers' meetings.

There he turned more and more intensively to the teachings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, adopted their world view and dialectics and developed his own research work on this basis.

Parallel to his musicological and journalistic work, he was active as an opera conductor as well as musical director of the emigrant theatre "Laterndl" and secretary of the "Austrian Centre".