Batka, Richard

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Batka, Richard (b Prague, 1868; d Vienna, 1922). Austrian critic and music scholar of Cz. ancestry. Ed. (with Richard Specht) periodical Der Merker and the Notebooks of Anna Magdalena Bach. Admirer of Mahler and Strauss. Taught history of opera at Vienna Acad. 1909–14. Trans. Czech, It., and Fr. opera libretti into Ger. and wrote several himself.