German Operetta 1913 - Puppchen, du bist mein Augenstern

Puppchen, du bist mein Augenstern, aus “Puppchen” (J. Gilbert) – Proto-Orchester mit Gesang, Polyphon Record, Germany 1913 (accoustical recording)

NOTE: Jean GILBERT (b. Max Winterfeld 1879 in Hamburg; d. 1942 in Buenos Aires) was a German composer, one of the founders of the Golden Age of the German operette (1890s-1920s). He was born in a family, in which almost every male member was a singer, actor or musician (the world-famous German composer Paul Dessau was his cousin). The artistically inclined relatives encouraged the inclination of the young Jean Gilbert to music. After several years of study, including Philipp Scharwenka in Berlin, who gave him lessons in composition, he excercised to become a piano virtuoso, but after some time it took him to the theater. At 18, he became Kapellmeister in Bremerhaven. In the age of 20, he moved to Hamburg to Carl Schultze-Theater as a successor of composer Leo Fall – and in the next year he was in Berlin’s renowned Apollo-Theatre, to conduct operettas by the most famous German operetta-composer of that time, Paul Lincke. Until 1910 he toured around Europe with operetta-shows, until in 1910 he settled back in Berlin, where besides conducting he also started composing operettas – and shortly becoming, next to Paul Lincke the most popular German composer in the genre. His most succesfull premieres were Die keusche Susanne (The Chaste Susanne, 1910), Polnische Wirtschaft [The Polish Economy, 1910] and Puppchen [Dolly; 1913] from which comes this German evergreen “Puppchen, du bist mein Augenstern” [Dolly, You’re The Star Of My Eyes]. As a Jew, he went into exile in 1933, first to Madrid, then Paris in 1939 and finally to Argentina. There he conducted the orchestra of the radio station El Mundo, until his death in 1942. His son Robert Gilbert was also a composer and writer of song texts (The White Horse Inn). He was also a German translator and editor engaged in the production of such international shows, as the musical Can-Can, My Fair Lady, Hello Dolly and Cabaret. Another son is the children's book author, Henry Winterfeld.