The batonless frustrations of a great conductor’s son
mainThe actor Karlheinz Böhm, who died on Friday, was renowned first as a film actor, then as a kind of Austrian Bob Geldof, who from the 1980s on raised millions for hunger-stricken Ethiopians.
But he started life as the son of Karl Böhm and never really lost the urge to match his father.
Playing piano as a boy, he was told by the pedagogue Rudolph Backhaus: ‘Not good enough for the son of Karl Böhm’.
In the 1960s, he became his father’s manager for a while.
In return, he was allowed to direct Elektra in Stuttgart. ‘Very nice,’ was his father’s only comment.
He found fulfilment elsewhere, among Africans, far from home.
It’s Always hard to carry the burden of a famous name, witness the two Kleibers, Erich and Carlos.
He sounds a lot nicer than his father. Klemperer’s son was also an actor.
He’s also quite handsome – again, unlike his father!
Karlheinz Böhm helped way more people than most actors or great musicians did.
Better compare him to Bob Geldof, as Norman rightly did, than to Werner Klemperer or Carlos Kleiber.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menschen_für_Menschen
And Michael Powell’s astounding “Peeping Tom” was a career-killer (in the Anglophone film world), unfortunately.