Ignatz Waghalter
With the support of Joachim, Waghalter was admitted into the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin, where he studied composition and conducting under the direction of Friedrich Gernsheim.
Waghalter's appointment as principal conductor at the new Deutsches Opernhaus in Berlin established his position as a major figure in German music.
The Signale, a leading arts journal in Berlin, reported that "...the orchestra played with a verve, a passion, at the same time with a sensual beauty of tone, as if its salvation depended on it.
Jugend, based on the tragic naturalist work by the German dramatist Max Halbe, in February 1917; and Sataniel, inspired by a Polish fantasy tale, in May 1923.
In its review of Jugend, the Berliner Tageblatt noted that "Waghalter has always written brilliantly for the orchestra" and praised the composer's "ability to express his feelings in a natural melodic flow without becoming banal or uninteresting."
The review reported that the audience "repeatedly called Ignatz Waghalter, who conducted his work himself, onto the stage to rapturous applause, leaving no doubt that he was to be congratulated on a highly favorable reception.
"[8]The collapse of the German economy in 1923 and the resulting bankruptcy of the Deutsches Opernhaus led to the end of Waghalter's tenure as principal conductor.
Traveling to the United States, he made his American debut as a conductor at a concert held in New York's Carnegie Hall on December 7 of that year.
He is fortunate also in his manner of conducting, sufficiently graphic in gesture, turning to this choir or that in warning evocation and at a climax, flashing lightening-like upon the full band.
"[9] The immense success of his debut and subsequent concerts as a guest conductor led to his appointment as the successor of Joseph Stransky as musical director of the New York State Symphony, which he held during the 1925 season.
For UFA, Waghalter composed the original musical score for one of the most extraordinary German films of the Weimar era, Hanns Walter Kornblum's Wunder der Schöpfung.
The pathbreaking film, which premiered in Berlin in September 1925, attempted to present in a popular cinematic form the greatest discoveries of modern astronomy.
He secured the interest and support of militant New York trade unions, the noted African-American musician Alfred Jack Thomas, and such prominent representatives of the Harlem Renaissance as James Weldon Johnson.
In an interview with the Baltimore Afro-American in January 1939, Waghalter declared that "music, the strongest citadel of universal democracy, knows neither color, creed, nor nationality.
The role of Ester was sung by his daughter, Beatrice Waghalter (1913-2001), who, prior to fleeing Nazi Germany, had achieved renown as a singer performing on behalf of the Jüdischer Kulturbund.
[18] Even though he was one of many Central European musicians whose lives and careers were shattered by the Nazi catastrophe, his subsequent and protracted obscurity, when contrasted to the scale of his pre-1933 prominence, is striking.
A performance of his Concerto for Violin by the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra was broadcast in Germany by the Deutschlandradio Kultur in commemoration of the 135th anniversary of the composer's birth, in March 2016.
[23] On September 1, 2023, at an official commemorative meeting in Berlin marking the 84th anniversary of Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland, Waghalter's String Quartet was performed.
[24] The emotional authenticity and force of his lyricism, combined with the high technical quality of his compositions, may be best appreciated as a distinctive expression of a lost musical culture whose destruction was among the tragic consequences of the barbarism unleashed by fascism in Europe.
