Carlos Kleiber - Early Career

Early Career

Kleiber was born as Karl Ludwig Kleiber in Berlin, the son of the Austrian conductor Erich Kleiber and American Ruth Goodrich, from California. In 1940, the Kleiber family emigrated to Buenos Aires. Karl's name became Carlos. As a youth, he had an English governess, grew up in English boarding schools. He also composed, sang, and played piano and timpani. While his father noticed his son's musical talents, Erich Kleiber nevertheless dissuaded Carlos from pursuing a musical career: "What a pity the boy is musically talented", wrote his father to a friend.

Carlos Kleiber initially studied chemistry in Zürich, but soon decided to dedicate himself to music. He was repetiteur at the Gärtnerplatz Theatre in Munich in 1952, and made his conducting debut with the operetta Gasparone at Potsdam theatre in 1954. From 1958 to 1964 he was Kapellmeister at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf and Duisburg, and then at the Opera in Zürich from 1964 to 1966. Between 1966 and 1973 he was first Kapellmeister in Stuttgart, his last permanent post. During the following years, he often conducted at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich.