Gustav Hölzel

Gustav Hölzel (2 September 1813 – 3 December 1883) was an Austro-Hungarian bass-baritone and composer who sang in the opera-houses of Austria, Germany and elsewhere for nearly fifty years. He is principally remembered as the first Beckmesser in Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.

Early life He was born in Pest, Hungary, the son of the actor, singer and theatre director Nikolaus Alois Hölzel (1785–1848) who managed the Landestheater in Linz from 1819 until 1924. His mother Elisabeth Hölzel (née Umlauf) was an operatic contralto, daughter of composer Ignaz Umlauf, and sister of composer Michael Umlauf. At the age of sixteen, Gustav made his operatic debut in Sopron, and his career continued in Graz (1830–1832), the Theater in der Josefstadt in Vienna (1833–1837), and the Königsstädtisches Theater in Berlin (1837–1838). He pursued further training in Paris in 1838 before joining the Stadttheater Zürich where he was engaged from 1838 until 1840. But in 1863, while playing the role of Friar Tuck in Heinrich Marschner's Der Templer und die Jüdin, Hölzel altered the words of the Friar's song and was dismissed from the company. and his last stage appearance was in 1877 in the role of Baculus in Albert Lortzing's Der Wildschütz. At the Opéra Comique in Paris in 1859, he appeared in the premiere of Yvonne by the Belgian composer Armand Limnander.