Franz Salmhofer

Franz Salmhofer (22 January 1900 – 22 September 1975) was an Austrian composer, clarinetist and conductor. He studied the clarinet, composition and musicology in Vienna. Salmhofer served successively as Kapellmeister of the Burgtheater, Director of the Vienna State Opera and Director of the Vienna Volksoper and composed a number of works, few of which are played today. Born in Vienna, Austria, Salmhofer came from a modest background, his father being a pianist and his mother a cook. His father became an invalid following service in the First World War and his son had to use his musical talent to assist in providing for the family. Salmhofer was educated at the Admont Abbey in the province of Styria from 1909-1914, where he was a choirboy, and in 1916 went on to study musicology, clarinet and composition at the Institute for Musicology at the University of Vienna where he was a pupil of Franz Schreker, Franz Schmidt and Guido Adler. He was part of a class that included Ernst Krenek, Wilhelm Grosz, Karol Rathaus, Joseph Rosenstock, Max Brand (composer), Friedrich Wilckens, Paul Pisk and Jascha Horenstein. Thereafter he worked as a choir conductor and organist. In 1929 he was appointed Kapellmeister of the Burgtheater where he served until 1945 when he became the first post-war Director of the Vienna State Opera, a post he filled until 1953. In this position he worked at several temporary locations until the war-damaged Opera House could be restored. Thereafter he was Director of the Vienna Volksoper until his retirement in 1963.