RIP Franz Kraemer

[Bruce Cross <b.cross2@sympatico.ca>]

Yesterday's Globe and Mail carried the obituary of Franz Kraemer.  He was a
colleague of Glenn Gould and appears in Off the Record as a guest at the
cottage.  If memory serves, he is shown on a boat ride with Gould and
discussing Schubert, at which time Gould pretends he has total call of the
repertoire and starts to play Symphony #5 at the piano.  Since the article
does not appear on their web site, I will quote a few lines relevant to
Glenn Gould:

"Muscian, composer, producer.  Born in Vienna on June 1, 1914.  Died in
Toronto of congestive heart failure on Aug. 27, aged 85....studies with the
great Viennese composers Alban Berg and Anton Von Webern, and with
conductor-composer Hermann Scherchen.  He escaped persecution in Austria and
became a wartime alien in Canada.  It included a lifetime of friendships
cast asunder, sometimes by circumstances but mainly by him...In 1946, Franz
joined the international service of the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. in
Montreal.  In 1952, he moved to Toronto.  One of the first generation of CBC
television producers, Franz emerged as a major figuere in quality Canadian
TV, the producer of programs featuring pianist Glenn Gould, conductor Seiji
Ozawa...The deaths of Franz's grandfather and Mr. Berg, the truncation of
his promising career in Austria, the sudden, sharp removal from England all
combined to make him wary of deep connections.  Despite his resistance, he
had them: to his work, to Ozawa, Gould, to impresario Walter Homburger, to
me...He was often cruel, ungenerious, and routinely neglectful.  Yet he was
always interested in hearing about how the lives of people he knew played
out.  That being so, what kept him from acting in ways that would have
created ordinary pleasures for himself and others?  Questioned about this,
he told me simply: "Mr. Hitler ruined me."    -by Ethel Teitelbaum"