Carl Schuricht

Who was Carl Schuricht?

Carl Adolph Schuricht was a German conductor.

Schuricht was born in Danzig, German Empire; his father's family had been respected organ-builders. His mother, Amanda Wusinowska, a widow soon after her marriage, brought up her son alone. His childhood was surrounded by music - "every Sunday in summer we used to hire three large open carriages and go out into the country. After the picnic we would join in singing choral works by Bach, Handel and Mendelssohn." He showed a talent for music at an early age, studying piano and violin from the age of six. By eleven he was composing, and continued his academic and musical studies when his mother moved to Berlin, then to Wiesbaden.

At 20 he obtained the post of Korrepetitor at the Stadttheater in Mainz and two years later won the Kuczynski Foundation prize for composition and a Felix von Mendelssohn scholarship. He then returned to Berlin to study piano under Ernst Rudorff and composition with Engelbert Humperdinck, later working under Max Reger in Leipzig, publishing chamber pieces, sonatas and lieder.