Emmerich Kálmán

Imre Koppstein of Siófok took the name Emmerich Kálmán and, at the Budapest Academy of Music, sat in the same classes as Bartók and Kodály. Tatárjárás established him in 1908; Vienna took him next, and there he built the manner that made his fortune, the waltz set against the csárdás, and long-breathed melody. Die Csárdásfürstin, Gräfin Mariza, Die Zirkusprinzessin and Das Veilchen vom Montmartre went round the world. Jewish by birth, he left Austria after the annexation of 1938 and worked in Paris and then in the United States before returning to Europe. He died in Paris in 1953. He had meant to be a concert pianist and turned to composition after an injury affected his playing; Hans Kössler taught him, and the orchestral works Saturnalia and Endre és Johanna came before the cabaret songs that drew him towards the stage. According to his daughter Yvonne, he declined an offer of honorary Aryan status while in Paris after the Anschluss, his works were banned in Germany, and he moved to the United States in 1940, living in California and New York before returning to Europe in 1949 and moving on to Paris in 1951.