Wolfgang Rosenthal

Wolfgang Rosenthal (8 September 1882 – 10 June 1971) was a German oral surgeon. Until the mid-1930s, he also pursued a parallel career as a bass-baritone singer.

After the destructive bombing of the Saint John's Church in Leipzig, it became necessary to identify the physical remains of Johann Sebastian Bach before they could be reburied at the Thomaskirche nearby: Rosenthal was able to combine his knowledge of anatomy with his insights (confirmed by further anatomical investigations) into the physical effect of a lifetime of organ playing on a musician's legs to provide the necessary identification. Both parents were musical: his father played the violin and his mother was an excellent pianist. Wolfgang's musical talent was strongly encouraged and, in 1896, he was sent away to Leipzig to join the Thomanerchor, with which he continued to sing for the next eight years. His parents hoped that singing in the choir and studying at the school attached to it would help cure his stuttering. He received his practicing certificate (Approbationsordnung) the next year. Between 1911 and 1914, he worked as an assistant doctor at the Leipzig Surgical-polyclinic Institute, where he was trained in surgery and also, through extensive cooperation with the adjacent dental clinic, developed a close understanding of the interface between oral surgery and dentistry. On the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914, he took over leadership of the institute when his boss went immediately to the front-line.

Musical His training as a concert and oratorio baritone was filled out with lessons from Robert Leideritz in Leipzig and then in Weimar with Karl Scheidemantel. Under the artist name "Wolfgang Zeuner-Rosenthal" he was much in demand for bass-baritone parts in concert and oratorio performances in Leipzig, to the point at which in November 1913 he abandoned his university medical studies to be able to spend more time on his musical career. He never abandoned medicine, however, broadening his experience of cancer treatments at the Heideberg Samaritan Centre under Vincenz Czerny, and then undertaking further medical work at the private clinic of Dr.Karl Schulze in Saalfeld, undertaking work which could be combined with his singing duties. and the tenor Hans Lissmann (tenor). which will have done his career no harm. On 1 September 1957, now in his mid-70s, Rosenthal retired, according to some sources in connection with his perceived "political unreliability" at a time when the political leadership of the country was still going through a period of nervousness in the wake of the crushed uprising of 1953 and in the unsettling context of historical re-evaluations coming out of The Kremlin. The assessment concerning Rosenthal's political unreliability seems to have been the result of informant reports received by the Ministry for State Security.