Customer Reviews (2)

Review of Pitschi by Hans Fischer
This is a lovely, gentle children's story. The story is of a little kitten that wishes she were something other than a kitten. As she tries to act like different animals she learns a lesson about the value of being who she is. The illustrations are simple and engaging and the ending is happy for everyone.

My favorite book when I was 3
This was my favorite book when I was a young child. My mother says that I demanded that she read it to me every night. It's about a kitten who doesn't fit in with the other kittens, so he goes around the farm seeing if he'd be a better duck, chicken, etc. But he nearly drowns when the ducks go swimming (the ducks save him), and so on. In the end he comes home and is happy to be a kitten with his family. Looking back now that I'm 41, Pitschi's adventures symbolize much of my life. It's surprising to think that when I was 3 I must have had some idea of the future "story of my life."
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Review by Thomas David Kehoe, author of "Hearts and Minds: How Our Brains Are Hardwired for Relationships" ... Read more

Book Description
Hans Hotter (1909-2003) was one of opera's most influential and profoundly moving artists of the twentieth century. His imposing frame and austere, high-browed profile made him an ideal figure of tragic dignity, unequaled in his era as Wotan, Amfortas the Dutchman, Scarpia and the Grand Inquisitor in Don Carlo, and several Strauss roles, including three world premieres of that composer's works. Hotter made his debut at age twenty-one in Troppau, Germany (now Oppava, Czech Republic), and by the age of thirty was a leading artist at the prestigious Bavarian State Opera in Munich. Although he never joined the Nazi party and avoided appearances at Bayreuth while under Nazi control, Hotter remained active in German theaters throughout the war. He achieved his vocal prime after the war and was a featured performer in Munich, Vienna, Bayreuth, New York, San Francisco, London's Covent Garden, and Salzburg. In addition to his long and acclaimed opera career, Hotter was also a distinguished stage director, teacher, and an incomparable lieder singer, celebrated for his mastery of Schubert's song cycle Die Winterresise.

Translator and editor Donald Arthur conducted a series of interviews with Hotter during the final years of his life. The result is not merely an English translation of Hotter's memoirs (originally published as Der Mai war mir gewogen in Germany in 1996), but a significantly more critical, probing, and engaging account of the great singer's life. In particular, Hotter now confronts both his personal resistance to, and professional concessions toward, the Third Reich, and he speaks in greater detail about his musical and theatrical insights and his associations with such European luminaries as Richard Strauss, Herbert von Karajan, Otto Klemperer, and Clemens Krauss, to name but a few. Accompanied by more than seventy photographs, some never before published, this volume is a cause for celebration among his fans and general opera lovers everywhere. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Hans Hotter an inspiring artist and human being
In the book Hans Hotter: Memoirs, Donald Arthur captures with tact the life, courage and humor of this incredible singer. In his informative introduction Mr. Arthur gives sincere keys elements about Hotter's conception in art and as a person. Hans Hotter who had a diversified career which is transcended here does not unfortunately always witnessed on records due to lack of music directors' initiatives or either due to unfortunate circumstances. The fact that Hans Hotter would sing operas and then diminish his voice volume to interpret German lieder was quite unusual at this time (singers would sing melodies after having a lasting career in operas and after loosing part of their voice). For the first time and perfectly illustrated in this book not only stylistically Hans Hotter was among the very first to acknowledge the importance of melodies as a Major art form but also avoiding the usual pitfalls of being excessive in expression like most of his colleagues.
As a teacher Hans Hotter had the phenomenal faculty of inspiring his students, musically of course, technically with very healthy tips and eventually metamorphosis a student in just a couple of days. Text and conception was always part of his interpretation in forming only one but without forgetting the expression.
The modesty throughout the book and Hotter's personality are very well represented and with taste. Also underlined is his generosity and I had the very good fortune to assist many of his master classes and witnessed his endless share of knowledge. His knowledge was always to help and guide a singer and in a constructive way.
In master classes, he would Very often propose options to singers but then as he said: "you need to demonstrate". To do so he would enlighten these sessions with mini-recitals. Having been thought very early on, how to teach, it was natural for him to forward his experiences to others. In main occasions the book explains how life and art are bounded together and how it was crucial for Hans Hotter to act in life and music with the same honesty.Mr. Arthur emphasis also the fact of how crucial encounters can be in the artistic development of an artist's career and how human relationships are equally important for Hans Hotter. These elements make this book a must, not only for the anecdotes which is full of funny stories but helps the reader to understand what tools is necessary for a complete artistic development.
The book is so lively written that sometimes you would think that you are in the room with Hans Hotter. Luckily for us and as it is explained by the author in his introduction highly unexpected circumstances gave birth to the book.
Emmanuel Benador
... Read more

Book Description

Book Description
Ph.D. students, supervisors, and lecturers presented a multitude of research goals in science education and the variety of theoretical frameworks. Topics include: teachers' thinking and beliefs and teachers' actions in the classroom, the interaction between specific programs of science museums and teachers' and classes' plans for engagement with them, teaching, learning and understanding of new subject matter for science classes, different interaction processes in the classroom, discourse analysis, decision making processes in science classes and the use of models in chemistry lessons, and specific characters and the function of text when learning physics by means of computer-based multimedia. ... Read more

Amazon.com
This book celebrates the art and life of the great German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau from his debut recital in 1947 to his retirement almost five decades later. Born in 1925 into an upper middle-class, intellectual Berlin family that prized patriotism, culture, literature, and music, he first made his name as a lieder singer, but recordings and operatic engagements soon followed. His repertoire was enormous, ranging from Bach cantatas to many premieres of contemporary works. This biography documents the scope of Fischer-Dieskau's unceasing performing and recording activity; it enumerates his operatic roles, describing his musical, literary, and historical preparation for "becoming the character he impersonated." It also discusses the singer's vocal and musical working methods, often quoting his own words from his books and letters, notably his famously controversial views on the relationship of words and music, and the tension between his inquiring intellect and his emotional musical response.

Dominated by a sense of artistic responsibility, Fischer-Dieskau worked obsessively in pursuit of perfection, gaining stimulation and renewal by frequent changes of accompanists. To satisfy his constant need for more self-expression, he took up writing, conducting, painting, and teaching. Inevitably, his personal relationships and private life were subordinated to the relentless demands of his life onstage. In his memoirs, Fischer-Dieskau confesses: "I worshipped my profession and my career; I was under the spell of opera and my recitals."

Of his four marriages, the first ended in tragedy when his beloved young wife died in childbirth; the next two ended in divorce; and the last one, to soprano Julia Varady--with whom he has often appeared in opera and concert--has given both lasting happiness. Not surprisingly, his three sons inherited his artistic gifts and courageously followed in his footsteps as stage designer, conductor, and cellist. By their own account, they grew up mostly without their father, who himself recalls isolated moments of shared activity.

The book suffers from repetitiousness and chronological incoherence. Neunzig has an irritating habit of explicating quotes both before and afterward, and of exaggerating the obstacles the singer encountered on his meteoric rise to fame and subsequent illustrious career. The biography's greatest flaw is its lack of objectivity: obviously written by a starstruck admirer, it is an uncritical hymn of praise; indeed, the constant hyperbole becomes self-defeating. Even the copious quotes from reviews and comments on the singer's performances are carefully chosen to express approbation; adverse responses are brushed off, though there are excerpts from his own replies to his critics. Yet despite Neunzig's adulation, his portrait of a great artist cannot conceal that total dedication to a successful career can lead to total self-absorption; indeed the singer himself was aware of the danger of "avoiding reality and rejecting life's day-to-day affairs." This includes not only the familiar controversy about the separation of art and politics but the special problems of living in Germany after the rise of Nazism. Though Neunzig clearly states his own opposition to the regime, Fischer-Dieskau's views are expressed mostly in assertions of kinship with idealistic operatic characters, and complaints about the discomforts and deprivations of life in the army, POW camps, and postwar Berlin, for which anyone who survived the war on the other side hardly feels much sympathy. A single paragraph recounts the 13-year-old's shock at finding a Jewish shop smashed, and another the "elimination" by the Nazis of a handicapped older brother; the reader is left to infer the singer's political attitude.

The book is written in a somewhat heavy style, perhaps partly due to the translation, and includes a chronology of Fischer-Dieskau's life, lists of his books and innumerable CDs, and many excellent photographs, on and off stage. --Edith Eisler Book Description
The predominant lieder singer of his generation, Fischer-Dieskau also had a distinguished career on the operatic stage. This biography provides a comprehensive and frank account of his extraordinary career, from his debut in Verdi's Don Carlos in 1948 to his farewell concert appearance in 1992. Hardcover. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Just the facts, ma'am
What a bore this book is. No sense of style (welll, it's a translation after all). No sense of narrative line. Just facts printed on the page. If you want the facts, here they are. I'd suggest you wait for the movie.

Frustrating glimpses of a fascinating man and artist.
Despite nearly 50 years of performing before the public, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau has remained a rather mysterious figure, and this biography does nothing to change that impression. The more one seeks the private Fischer-Dieskau, the more he retreats behind a preoccupation, more accurately, an obsession with art. On the other hand, as this biography confirms, no one has made the essence of what he is more evident and accessible than Fischer-Dieskau. Neunzig traces the development of F-D the artist, pursuing the influences and events that shaped one of the most talented and controversial musical performers of the 20th century, and he makes it clear that the conflicts and contradictions were there from the beginning, that they are, in fact, the forces that drive him. This book has a lot to offer those who know relatively little about F-D and are willing to put up with its reverential tone, which hasn't exactly been diminished by the equally effusive translation of Kenneth S. Whitton. However, if what you want is a serious, scholarly consideration of how Fischer-Dieskau became the man and artist he is, you are doomed to disappointment. Natterings about genius, no matter how flattering, just aren't sufficient. ... Read more