Wilhelm Gericke

Who was Wilhelm Gericke?

Wilhelm Gericke was an Austrian-born conductor and composer who worked in Vienna and Boston.

He was born in Schwanberg, Austria. Initially he trained in Graz to be a schoolmaster. This didn't work out, though he did get a position playing violin in a theatre orchestra. In 1862 he entered the Vienna Conservatory, where he studied under Dessoff. Leaving the conservatory in 1865, he became kapellmeister of the theatre at Linz, directing opera there and in Vienna. In 1874, he became second kapellmeister and chorus master at the Vienna Court Opera, where his lifelong friend Hans Richter was first kapellmeister. There he gave the Viennese premiere of Richard Wagner's Tannhäuser. He also made a name for himself producing French and Italian operas. On the retirement of Brahms from the conductorship of the Vienna Society concerts in 1880, Gericke succeeded him, and also became the conductor of its choral society.

His fame as a conductor, and particularly as a drillmaster, induced Henry Lee Higginson of the Boston Symphony Orchestra to secure him as its leader after attending one of Gericke's concerts in Vienna. He spent two periods in the United States conducting the BSO, 1884–1889 and 1898–1906. During his first stay, he eliminated the lighter music that his predecessor had allowed in the programs, scheduled extra rehearsal time, and hired more foreign musicians. The orchestra improved noticeably in the quality of its playing.