Biography

Anton Dermota was a Slovenian lyric tenor known for his interpretations of Mozart in the mid-20th century. Throughout his long career, he also performed concert music and lieder, and served as a music educator. He was born in 1910 in the town of Kropa, Slovenia, which was a community of metalworkers and blacksmiths. His father was also a metalworker and earned a small income fabricating nails for construction. As children, Dermota and his siblings supplemented their inadequate diets by foraging fruit and stealing from neighboring farmers' fields. In the late 1920s he attended the Ljubljana School of Organists, and later he changed his focus to singing. In 1934 he won a scholarship to study music in Vienna, where he received vocal lessons from Marie Radó-Danielli. He made his operatic debut that same year at the Cluj-Napoca National Opera Theater in Romania. A short while later, he accepted an invitation from Bruno Walter to join the Vienna Staatsoper. Dermota made his debut there in 1936 and sang his first major role in 1937 as Alfredo in Verdi's La Traviata. He also made his Salzburg Festival debut that same year, with Arturo Toscanini conducting Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. He became a celebrated and beloved fixture in Vienna and remained with the Staatsoper for over 40 years. In addition to his career in opera, Dermota was also an active recitalist and gave countless performances accompanied by his wife, pianist Hilde Berger-Weyerwald. For 30 years he remained in high demand and toured extensively, performing at every major opera house in Europe and Australia, and the Teatro Colón of Argentina. In the realm of concert music, he was respected for his performances of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde. In 1966 he and his wife began teaching at the University of Music and Performing Arts of Vienna. He celebrated his 40th anniversary with the Vienna Staatsoper in 1977, and in 1979 he sang in the United States for the first time, at a recital in Stanford, California. Two years later he sang the role of Tamino in Mozart's The Magic Flute, in his final performance with the Vienna Staatsoper. He continued performing in Slovenia and Austria until 1989, when he died from heart failure in Vienna. ~ RJ Lambert, Rovi