GERHARD WILLNER

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 912, 1 February 1957, Page 17

GERHARD WILLNER

[N the years following the war two wellknown artists on the New Zealand concert platform were the lieder singer Dora Willner, and her pianist husband Gerhard. We have reéently learnt that Gerhard Willner died in London on Christmas Eve. The Willners first met New Zealanders during the war in Egypt. In Cairo they had played a prominent part in the city’s

musical life, where for four years Gerhard had been choirmaster of All Saints’ Cathedral. After the arrival of servicemen they set about organising concerts and music groups to entertain them, and in recognition of this work the New Zealand Government later granted them New Zealand citizenship. After the war they ‘decided to come to New Zealand and for several years their concerts and broadcasts were a feature of our musical life. One of the most memorable of Gerhard’s achievements was a series of Beethoven recitals at which he played the 32 sonatas from memory. A few years ago they left for Melbourne and later went on to London. In England Gerhard became a friend of the Schubert authority Richard Capell, who on his death left him many of his books. He was engaged in writing his autobiography "My Passport is Music" and a book on zoo animals, and had also been asked by the chief music critic of The Times to translate some scientific treatises concerning the folk music of the Wolga Tribes. Besides stamp collecting, his main hobby was the study of zoos and zoo animals, which he photographed admirably. For his work in this field he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Zoological Society, London. The many servicemen who had the tedium of life in Egypt made more bearable by the work of the Willners will hear of his death with particular regret.