In his hometown he was taught by Alice Goldberg, in Vienna by Emilie Auer-Weißgerber, in Bucharest by Albert d'Andrée, in Munich by Rudolf Großmann and in Berlin by Josef Burgwinkel.
Still in 1942 and then again from the end of the war until 1949 he was engaged at the Tyrolean State Theatre, where he also studied musicology and obtained his doctorate in this discipline in 1948.
He mainly sang the bassbuffo parts, including operas by Domenico Cimarosa, Peter Cornelius, Friedrich von Flotow, Albert Lortzing, W. A. Mozart, Richard Strauss, Otto Nicolai, Gioacchino Rossini and Bedřich Smetana.
Already at the age of 30 he took over the part of Ochs von Lerchenau in Richard Strauss' der Rosenkavalier, which he first sang in Zurich in 1951/52 and then impersonated on all important stages.
At the Grand Théâtre de Genève in 1974 he appeared as Osmin in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, in other Swiss theatres as van Bett in Zar und Zimmermann.