Ferdinand Rauter

Rauter was born in Klagenfurt. From 1920 he lived in Dresden, studying music at the Orchestra College of the Saxonian Orchestra, and chemistry at Dresden Technical College. His earliest musical engagements were at Theater Münster in North West Germany. He became choir repetiteur and pianist for Kurt Jooss and his ballet company.Jutta Raab Hansen. [https://www.rcm.ac.uk/singingasong/stories/ferdinandrauter/ Biography of Ferdiand Rauter, Royal College of Music]

In 1929 in Hambourg he first accompanied the Danish-Icelandic singer Engel Lund, the beginning of a 30 year partnership. Lund was a collector and interpreter of folk music from around the world, performing the songs in their original languages. Together they toured Germany, Europe and the United States with their multi-lingual programme, including German, Yiddish, and Icelandic songs.'Miss Engel Lund', in The Times, 20 May 1939, p. 10 It was titled Folk Songs of Many Lands.[http://www.wyastone.co.uk/engel-lund-s-book-of-folk-songs.html Engel Lund's Book of Folk Songs] Album Notes, Nimbus Records 2007 They made several folk song recordings for the BBC and for EMI.[https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/page/80ebabf5d9f9481da040def2b09717f8 'Folk Songs of the Allied Nations', Home Service], 23 February 1941, Radio Times Issue 908. p. 11

When the Nazi party demanded that they remove the Yiddish songs from their programme, the duo relocated to Denmark, and in 1935 to England. Oxford University Press published two volumes of songs (1936 and 1949), in fourteen languages, with translations by Ursula Vaughan-Williams and Eileen MacLeod.A first book of folk-songs (OUP, 1936). Engel Lund, with pianoforte accompaniments by Ferdinand Rauter and a foreword by Douglas Kennedy: and A second book of folk songs (OUP, 1947) Lund returned to Iceland in 1960 to teach at the Reykjavik Conservatoire, and died there in 1996.

During World War 2 Rauter was interned as an enemy alien on the Isle of Man in 1940.[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Island_of_Barbed_Wire/BnuxDgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=ferdinand+rauter&pg=PT102&printsec=frontcover Connery Chappell. Island of Barbed Wire (2017)] While there he met Norbert Brainin, Siegmund Nissel and Peter Schidlof, encouraging them to form what was to become the Amadeus Quartet.[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Forbidden_Music/CSdE9Oqkh4kC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=ferdinand+rauter&pg=PA255&printsec=frontcover Michael Hass. Forbidden Music (2013), p. 255] He was released in November that year after intervention from Vaughan Williams and others. With Lund he was a frequent performer at the wartime National Gallery lunchtime concert series organised by Myra Hess.Jessica Duchan. Myra Hess (2025), pp. 203-5 To help fellow émigré musicians he co-founded the Refugee Musicians Committee, the Austrian Musicians Group and the Anglo-Austrian Music Society, which organised concerts that included the music of émigré composers in England. After the war he worked as music therapist in Camphill, near Aberdeen with Karl König, connected with his interest in Rudolph Steiner’s Anthroposophy movement.Carola Grindea. Great Pianists and Pedagogues: In Conversation with Carola Grindia (2007), p. 85

He married Claire Kösten on 6 January 1946. Their daughter Andrea was born in December 1946, and a son, Peter in 1948. They lived at 74 Carlton Hill, St John's Wood in London, which became an open house for émigré musicians.Malcolm Miller and Jutta Raab Hansen (eds.) Music and Exile (2003), p. 283 Their circle included Hans Gál, Egon Wellesz and Max Rostal, as well as Myra Hess, Ralph Vaughan Williams and his wife Ursula, Imogen Holst and folk song collector Maud Karpeles.

Rauter was also an expert on mushrooms and an enthusiastic cook and photogropher. Known as ‘Rau’ to his friends, he continued to perform and teach until shortly before his final illness. He died in London in 1987, aged 85 years.'Dr Ferdinand Rauter', obituary, The Times, 10 December 1987, p. 18 In 1996 his daughter Andrea was appointed as Music Project Manager at the Austrian Cultural Forum, London.[https://www.rcm.ac.uk/singingasong/oralhistorycategory3/andrearauter/ Andrea Rauter interview, Royal College of Music]

• Lund and Rauter. Folk Songs of Many Lands, Musicraft Album 39 (1940)[https://www.friktech.com/labels/MusicraftAlbums1.pdf Musicraft Records Album Discography]
• Lund and Rauter. Íslensk Þjóðlög, Parlophone (1960)
• Lieder Theatre London. Engel Lund's Book of Folk Songs, Nimbus Records NI 5813/14 (2007)Lieder Theatre London, "Engel Lund's Book of Folk Songs", Nimbus Records, Wyastone Estate 2007, http://www.wyastone.co.uk/engel-lund-s-book-of-folk-songs.html

{{Reflist}}

• [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuMNhNStlSM Ferdinand Rauter and Engel Lund]: Royal College of Music Aural History
• [https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw157853/Engel-Lund-Ferdinand-Rauter?LinkID=mp51873&role=sit&rNo=0 Engel Lund; Ferdinand Rauter], portrait by Howard Coster (1935)

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Category:1902 births

Category:1987 deaths

Category:Jewish emigrants from Austria after the Anschluss to the United Kingdom

Category:Austrian pianists

Category:British pianists

Category:Austrian emigrants to England

Category: World War II civilian prisoners held by the United Kingdom