Blessed with a silvery lyric soprano, true in timbre and beautifully trained, Maria Stader was unable to enjoy the opera career she deserved. Only 4'9" in height, she was deemed too diminutive to be a viable figure on-stage. Thus, she was confined to recording congenial opera roles and to making concert appearances. Despite what some might have regarded as a setback, she achieved genuine celebrity and became an artist favored by many first-rank conductors. Orphaned in Hungary during WWI, Stader was brought by the International Red Cross to Switzerland, where she was adopted by fisherman Hans Stader. She began her music training near her home on the shores of Lake Constance. Later, she studied with Hans Keller in Karlsruhe, Germany, with the famous dramatic soprano Giannina Arangi-Lombardi in Milan and with Therese Schnabel in New York. She attracted international attention when she won first prize for singing in the Concourse International d'Execution Musicale in Geneva in 1939. After WWII, Stader taught at the Musikacademie in Zurich while at the same time launching a concert career. Recognized as an exemplary Mozart singer, she was heard in other parts of Europe, Africa and the Far East, and eventually, in the United States. A rare opera appearance presented her as the Queen of the Night at Covent Garden during the 1949-1950 season. One of four sopranos to sing the role in that production, Stader did not attract sufficient attention to bring about reengagement. Her first American appearances took place in 1954 when she sang with the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the Cleveland Orchestra. In 1956, she sang a series of concert performances in Israel of both Lucia di Lammermoor and Judas Maccabaeus under conductor Ferenc Fricsay. Among Stader's recordings, her Konstanze, Pamina, and Marzelline are attractive realizations. In the concert repertory, recordings of the Dvorák Requiem, several Mozart masses, and Mozart's Exsultate, jubilate are worthy examples of her art. Before her retirement in 1969, Stader published a text on the performance of Bach arias. During her career, she was honored with several awards, among them the Lilli Lehmann Medal, the Silver Mozart Medal (City of Salzburg), and the Austrian Order of Merit.

Ernst Haefliger was one of the better known and more versatile tenors of his day. He was impressive both on the operatic stage and as a recitalist, and in each of these realms his repertory was broad, from Baroque era (J.S. Bach's St. Matthew Passion and St. John Passion) to the contemporary (Boris Blacher's Zwischenfälle bei einer Notlandung). Haefliger received high praise for his Schubert lieder, particularly for Winterreise and Die schöne Müllerin. His 1949 Salzburg Festival debut as Tiresias in Orff's Antigonae received critical acclaim. Haefliger was probably best known for his Mozart (Pamina, Ferrando, Don Ottavio, and others), and for his portrayals of the Evangelist in the Bach Passions. He was one of the first tenors to record Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde in stereo (Bruno Walter, conducting; 1960). The tone of Haefliger's voice, while appealing, was generally regarded as not particularly outstanding; yet, because of his precision in articulation and deft sense for phrasing, he achieved a vocal style quite unforgettable, quite distinct from other tenors of his generation. Though most of his recordings are decades old, many remain available on Philips (the largest source), Decca, Sony, DG, Naxos, Orfeo, Berlin Classics, Preiser Records, Testament, and other labels.

Ernst Haefliger was born in Davos, Switzerland, on July 6, 1919. He studied at the Zurich Conservatory and at the Geneva Conservatory, where his most important teacher was Fernando Capri; he later took vocal lessons in Vienna from iconic tenor Julius Patzak. Haefliger debuted in 1942 in Geneva singing the Evangelist in the St. John Passion. The following year he joined the Zurich Opera, remaining there until 1952.

From 1952-1974 he was a member of the Deutsche Oper, but frequently appeared at other major operatic venues and in recitals and orchestral concerts. Many important debuts took place during this 22-year run, including at Glyndebourne (1956) singing Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Chicago's Lyric Opera (1966), in the same role, and Moscow (1968) as the Evangelist.

Haefliger remained active well past his 1972 retirement from the Deutsche Oper. In fact, he was singing Schubert's Winterreise in recital as late as 1995 (London's Wigmore Hall), when he was 76! Even after he finally retired from singing, Haefliger made concert appearances in speaking roles, as in the 2002 performance of Schoenberg's Gurrelieder at the Proms (in London), where he was narrator. Haefliger died in Davos on March 17, 2007.

German conductor Eugen Jochum is considered by many to have been the foremost Bruckner conductor of the mid- to late twentieth century; he producing many outstanding recordings of Bruckner's symphonies (as well as worthy interpretations of a great many other composers). He also left to posterity a number of written articles on the interpretation of that composer.

Musical studies began in early childhood (both of Eugen's brothers, Otto Jochum and Georg Ludwig Jochum, went on to become successful musicians in their own right), and Jochum attended the Augsburg Conservatory until he was 20 years of age. He enrolled in the Munich Academy of Music as a composition student of Hermann von Waltershausen, but soon diverted his energies to conducting (working with Siegmund von Hausegger). He worked as a rehearsal assistant at the Munich National Theater, and, after a successful Munich debut in 1926, was invited to join the conducting staff at the Kiel opera. In 1926, having developed a sizable operatic repertory, he moved to Mannheim (1929-1930) and then to Duisburg (1930-1932). Although relatively young, he was asked to serve as music director for Berlin Radio in 1932, and while in that city built an association with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra which would led to many guest conductor appearances in the following decades.

Jochum became music director of the Hamburg opera (and, along with that title, principal conductor of the Hamburg Philharmonic) in 1934, remaining at that post until 1949 -- effectively avoiding Nazi interference with his musical activities. During the 1930s, Jochum continued to champion a number of contemporary composers who had been officially banned by the Nazi party (such as Hindemith and Bartók), though his great love remained the late Romantic repertory.

After forming the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in 1949, Jochum spent the 1950s developing that organization (in conjunction with his new role as music director for Bavarian radio) and building his stature as a guest conductor around Europe; his Bayreuth debut was in 1953, and he took partial charge of the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam from 1961-1964. He conducted the Bamburg Symphony orchestra from 1969 to 1973, and was appointed conductor laureate of the London Symphony Orchestra for the 1978-1979 season. From 1950 on Jochum served as the president of the German chapter of the International Bruckner Society.

Jochum's conducting was marked by a fluent, lyric approach (which nevertheless proved capable of drawing tempestuous results from his players when necessary). Above all else he valued a rich, warm sound perfectly suited to the music of Bruckner and Wagner, though recordings show a wealth of insight into the music of other German masters, notably Beethoven, Bach, and Haydn. Jochum died in 1987, after a decade of semi-retirement.