Gustav Hölzel
Gustav Hölzel (2 September 1813 – 3 December 1883) was an Austro-Hungarian bass-baritone and composer who sang in the opera-houses of Austria, Germany and elsewhere for nearly fifty years. He is principally remembered as the first Beckmesser in Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Early life He was born in Pest, Hungary, the son of the actor, singer and theatre director Nikolaus Alois Hölzel (1785–1848) who managed the Landestheater in Linz from 1819 until 1924. His mother Elisabeth Hölzel (née Umlauf) was an operatic contralto, daughter of composer Ignaz Umlauf, and sister of composer Michael Umlauf. At the age of sixteen, Gustav made his operatic debut in Sopron, and his career continued in Graz (1830–1832), the Theater in der Josefstadt in Vienna (1833–1837), and the Königsstädtisches Theater in Berlin (1837–1838). He pursued further training in Paris in 1838 before joining the Stadttheater Zürich where he was engaged from 1838 until 1840. In 1840, he joined the Court Opera at the Theater am Kärntnertor in Vienna. Later career in Austria and Germany Hölzel sang at the Hofoper for twenty-three years, during which he created the small role of De Fiesque in Gaetano Donizetti's penultimate opera Maria di Rohan in 1843. But