Kálmán, Imre (EN)

Kálmán Imre, Emmerich, *24 October 1882 Siófok, †30 October 1953 Paris, Hungarian operetta composer. He made his debut as a pianist in 1897, but chronic neuritis prevented him from continuing his piano practice. Between 1900 and 1904, he studied composition with H. Koessler at the Academy of Music in Budapest, and for a time also studied law at the local university. From 1904 to 1908, he wrote music reviews for the newspaper “Pesti Napló” and composed symphonic music and cabaret songs (the latter under the pen name Imrey Koloman). In 1908, after the successful Budapest premiere of the operetta Tatárjárás, Kálmán moved to Vienna and devoted himself exclusively to operetta composition. His works quickly gained popularity in Europe and the United States. In 1938, after annexation of Austria to the Third Reich, Kálmán left for Zurich, then Paris and New York (1940), where he became an American citizen in 1942. In 1949, he returned to Europe, staying in Vienna and, from 1951, in Paris.

Alongside Lehár, Kálmán was the most prominent representative of Viennese operetta in the 20th century and one of the last great composers of this genre. Gifted with a sense of drama and an instinct for theatrical effect, he carefully selected and modified his librettos, preferring plots with Hungarian elements. In his music, he drew on the tradition of the Viennese waltz, as well as the all’ongarese style popularized in the 19th century (by Liszt and Brahms, among others), which was a mixture of stylized Hungarian (czardas) and Gypsy (melancholic, effusive melodics) folklore elements. He skilfully combined the romantic lyricism of love duets and arias with the realism of characteristic cabaret-style couplets. He emphasized the role of choirs, making them an integral part of the stage action and the backbone of spectacular finales constructed in the style of opera. He used traditional 19th-century musical means; attempts to adapt the musical language to new trends in popular music (e.g., experiments with jazz in Die Herzogin von Chicago) were not very successful. Kálmán’s “Hungarian” operettas were the most popular, especially Autumn Maneuvers, The Csárdás Princess, and Countess Marica, which are still part of the basic repertoire of musical theatres today. 

Literature: R. Oesterreicher Emmerich Kálmán. Der Weg eines Komponisten, Vienna 1954; V Kálmán Grüss’ mir die süssen, die reizenden Frauen. Mein Leben mit Emmerich Kálmán, Bayreuth 1966.