Adam_Itzel_Jr.
Adam Itzel Jr.
American conductor and composer
Adam Itzel Jr. (November 30, 1864 – September 5, 1893) was a 19th-century American conductor, pianist, and composer active in Baltimore.
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He attended the Peabody Institute's Conservatory of Music, earning a certificate of proficiency in 1880 and (along with Hermine Hoen) the conservatory's first graduate degree 1882.[1] He was the conductor of the Academy of Music's orchestra, and directed the touring McCall Opera Company.[2] In 1890 he was hired to teach and conduct at Peabody.
Composer Eliza Woods was one of his students.[3]
Itzel's best-known composition was the light opera The Tar and the Tartar. It premiered in Chicago in April 1891 with Digby Bell and Helen Bertram in the leads,[4] then ran for 152 performances at New York's Palmer Theater. The show was not a critical success, but enjoyed popular success due to Bertram's scandalous barefoot dance. The show was performed across the continent by at least six companies.[5][6] After his death, it ran again for a week in 1894 at New York's Union Square Theater with Milton Aborn in the lead role.[7]
Adam Itzel died at the age of 29 of consumption in Baltimore, Maryland, September 5, 1893.[5] A memorial concert was held at Peabody in February 1894; Daniel Gilman gave the commemorative address.[8] The Peabody Archives at Johns Hopkins University hold his archives.[9]