Fanchette Verhunc, also ''Fanchette Verhunck'' and ''Fandetta Verhunc'', real name ''Franja Vrhunc'', married name ''Fanchette Holzapfel'' (8 August 1874 – 11 November 1944) was a Slovenian operatic soprano and

vocal coach A vocal coach, also known as a voice coach (though this term often applies to those working with speech and communication rather than singing), is a music teacher, usually a piano accompanist, who helps singers prepare for a performance, often a ...

Life

Born in

Laibach Laibach () is a Slovenian avant-garde music group associated with the industrial, martial, and neo-classical genres. Formed in the mining town of Trbovlje (at the time in Yugoslavia) in 1980, Laibach represents the musical wing of the Neue S ...

, Verhunc was fond of music from childhood. Growing up, she took lessons from Professor

Josef Gänsbacher Josef Gänsbacher (6 October 1829 in Vienna – 5 June 1911 ibid) was an Austrian music educator. Life Gänsbacher was the son of the composer and conductor Johann Baptist Gänsbacher. He studied law at the University of Vienna. In 1855 he ...

and Felice Mancio and took to the stage. After graduating from the Vienna Conservatory, she was first engaged for a short time at the

Staatsoper Unter den Linden The (), also known as the Berlin State Opera (german: Staatsoper Berlin), is a listed building on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of Berlin, Germany. The opera house was built by order of Prussian king Frederick the Great from ...

, then came to Posen to work through her repertoire from there, and from here, after a year's work, went to the Breslau City Theater.She was also invited to participate in the

Bayreuth Festival The Bayreuth Festival (german: link=no, Bayreuther Festspiele) is a music festival held annually in Bayreuth, Germany, at which performances of operas by the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner are presented. Wagner himself conceived ...

in 1901, where she was assigned "Freia," "Ortlinde," and the "First Squire" in ''

Parsifal ''Parsifal'' ( WWV 111) is an opera or a music drama in three acts by the German composer Richard Wagner and his last composition. Wagner's own libretto for the work is loosely based on the 13th-century Middle High German epic poem '' Parziv ...

.'' In 1901 she made guest appearances at the Dresden Court Opera, in 1903 at the Vienna Court Opera and in 1905 at the Munich Court Opera. In 1907, she sang the title role of "Salome" in the eponymous opera by Richard Strauss in the Vienna premiere of this opera at the Vienna Volkstheater. She also appeared as a guest in Amsterdam and Budapest. In Breslau she gave a charity concert in 1916 and then took stage leave in 1917, after which she worked as a singing teacher in Breslau, Berlin and Frankfurt. In 1938 she lived in Frankfurt, but returned in 1944 to her Slovenian homeland. She was married to the tenor Adalbert Holzapfel and after the divorce the life partner of the conductor

Julius Prüwer Julius Prüwer (20 February 1874 – 8 July 1943) was an Austrian conductor, pianist and academic teacher. Life Born in Vienna, Prüwer studied piano at the Vienna Conservatory from 1886 to 1891 with Arthur Friedheim and Moriz Rosenthal and mu ...

. Verhunc died in Golnik,

Carniola Carniola ( sl, Kranjska; , german: Krain; it, Carniola; hu, Krajna) is a historical region that comprised parts of present-day Slovenia. Although as a whole it does not exist anymore, Slovenes living within the former borders of the region st ...

, at the age of 70.

References

External links

Verhunk (Verhunck), Fanchette
on BMLO
Verhunk Fanchette
on Operissimo

biography in slovenska biografija

Picture
in the '' of the

Goethe University Frankfurt Goethe University (german: link=no, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main) is a university located in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. It was founded in 1914 as a citizens' university, which means it was founded and funded by the wealt ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Verhunc, Fanchette Slovenian operatic sopranos Voice teachers 1874 births 1944 deaths

Singers from Austria-Hungary

Life

Further reading

References

External links