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Engelbert Humperdinck

(b. Siegburg, 1 Sept 1854; d. Neustrelitz, 27 Sept 1921),

German composer and teacher. He studied at the Cologne Conservatory (1872-6) and at the Royal Music School in Munich (1877-9), meeting Wagner in Naples and assisting him with Parsifal at Bayreuth (1881-2). After interludes in Paris, Spain, Cologne and Mainz (working for B. Schotts Sohne), he moved to Frankfurt as a teacher and opera critic, also writing his most famous work, Hänsel and Gretel (1890-93; given its première at Weimar under Richard Strauss); by 1900 he was in Berlin, teaching, composing operas and writing Shakespearean incidental music (among his most successful work). The operatic version of Königskinder, another characteristic piece in his naïve, folklike style, was first performed in New York in 1910; like Hänsel und Gretel it started from simple song settings and went through an intermediate stage to a full opera, showing Wagnerian harmonic and textural influences.