Greindl, Josef

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Greindl, Josef

Greindl, Josef, German bass; b. Munich, Dec. 23, 1912; d. Vienna, April 16, 1993. He was a student in Munich of Paul Bender and Anna Bahr- Mildenburg. In 1936 he made his formal operatic debut as Hunding in Krefeld. After singing in Diisseldorf (1938-42), he was a member of the Berlin State Opera (from 1942); in 1949 he became a member of the Berlin Stadtische (later Deutsche) Oper. In 1943 he made his first appearance at the Bayreuth Festival as Pogner, and returned to sing there regularly from 1951 to 1969. On Nov. 15, 1952, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut in N.Y. as Wagner’s Heinrich, but remained on the roster for only a season. From 1956 to 1969 he sang at the Vienna State Opera. In 1963 he appeared at London’s Covent Garden. In 1961 he was made a prof, at the Saarbröcken Hochschule fur Musik, and in 1973 at the Vienna Hochschule fur Musik. Greindl was equally convincing in dramatic and buffo roles. Among his other roles were Sarastro, Don Alfonso, Hans Sachs, and the Wanderer in Siegfried.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire

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