Death of a pianist puppeteer
RIPThe death has been communicated of the Iowa-born Austrian pianist Norman Shetler, a professor in Vienna who made his own puppets and toured his creations as a musical cabaret.
Early in his career he competed in the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and toured as accompanist with Nathan Milstein and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau.
Norman was 93.
Norman Shetler also recorded with violinist Robert Gerle on the old Westminster label back in LP days, including Gerle’s pioneering recording of all the Brahms Hungarian Dances in the Joachim arrangements, and the Berg Concerto for Violin and Piano with chamber orchestra, under Herman Scherchen.
He was an accompanist of Peter Schreier. The last time I saw them in the Berlin Philharmonie the enthusiastic applause from the audience brought Peter Schreier out for at least 5/6 encores. It stopped only because Norman Shetler, as he walked behind Schreier exiting the stage, made a hand gesture with his hands behind his back asking the audience to stop applauding, so that, presumably Schreier could go home and not exhaust himself. A nice guy!
His Schumann song cycles with Peter Schreier were unsurpassable.