Guest
Max Bloch (1881-1930) was a Polish tenor who, despite his magnificent voice, was relegated to character roles during much of his career. Born to a Jewish family in Bolek, Bloch began his musical training in Berlin with Keva Pockal, a native of St. Louis who had settled in Germany. After working with Madame Pockal for several years, Bloch became part of the roster of Berlin’s Komische Oper in 1910. The following year, the tenor signed a contract with the Kurfürstenoper and also sang at the Berlin Municipal Opera from 1912 to 1914. Unfortunately, there is no record of the roles or operas sung by Bloch during his years in Berlin, so it is impossible to know whether or not he was singing leading roles. During the spring of 1914, Bloch was offered a contract by the Metropolitan Opera and sailed to the U.S. that fall. The tenor made his Met debut as the Majordomo in Der Rosenkavalier on November 20, 1914. Although he never sang leading roles, Bloch became a valued member of the company’s German wing, singing a wide variety of character roles. The tenor expanded his repertoire to include French, Italian and even English language works, and participated in a number of premieres. One of them, the U.S. premiere of Rabaud’s Marouf, led the critic for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle to remark, “Praise should go to…Max Bloch, who delivered his one air from the roof of the temple, in the second act, in a smooth legato that was an oasis in a desert of declamation.” Sadly, Bloch was dismissed from the Met in the spring of 1918. Some 20 dedicated artists were victims of the paranoid xenophobia that swept the U.S. during WWI. With anti-German sentiment at a fever pitch, the Metropolitan, in its infinite wisdom, fired any artist of Germanic origin. Bloch, a Polish Jew, was labeled as an “enemy alien” and found himself out of a job. Despite the bigotry of his former employers, Bloch considered himself an American and bravely remained in New York. He managed to eke out a career as a concert and oratorio singer and sang principal roles with smaller opera companies. He was Eleazar in a Yiddish language presentation of La Juive given by the Jewish-American Grand Opera Company at the Lexington Theater in May of 1921. According to Pierre Key (writing for The Ithaca Journal), “Max Bloch, a former second tenor at the Metropolitan with a beautiful voice, but who is handicapped through being physically undersized, sang some beautiful phrases allotted to Eleazar.” In spite of Bloch’s performance, the production was haphazardly put together and closed after only two performances. In the summer of 1922, The Met contacted Bloch, who was visiting his brother in Germany. Old biases had been forgotten and the management wanted the tenor to come back. Bloch, who apparently harbored no hard feelings, sailed back to New York and picked up where he had left off. He also applied for U.S. citizenship, which was granted in February of 1923. He worked steadily at the Met and made a series of appearances at the Teatro Colón in 1926. With his pedigree as a Met artist, Bloch was also a very popular featured soloist with numerous municipal chorales, music clubs and civic orchestras. Much of his concert repertoire consisted of lighter music, mostly sung in English, which always delighted his audiences. He also took advantage of the new medium of radio, adding yet another dimension to his career. By the summer of 1930, Bloch was extremely busy and was booked solidly (including a new contract with the Met) through the following spring. Sadly, Bloch never got the chance to see the new season. During a visit to his brother in Düsseldorf, the lifelong bachelor suffered a heart attack and died on August 30. He was only 49 years old. Max Bloch was a remarkable…and underappreciated…artist. During his 12 seasons with the Met, he sang 435 performances of over 40 roles from a wide variety of works such as Boris Godunov, Das Rheingold, Siegfried, Die Meistersinger, Die Zauberflöte, The Taming of the Shrew, Guillaume Tell and The Bartered Bride. He sang the world premieres of Madame Sans-Gêne, Goyescas, The King’s Henchman and The Canterbury Pilgrims as well as the U.S. premieres of L’Oracolo, Francesca da Rimini, Lodoletta and Jonny Spielt Auf. He was also an accomplished cantata and oratorio singer, performing such works as Messiah, The Mozart Requiem, Schubert’s Mass No. 6 and Bach’s Cantata BWV 201. Unfortunately, his short, portly figure…5 foot 2 and 185 pounds…prevented him from making his mark in the leading roles to which his voice was suited. Luckily, Bloch recorded prolifically for Columbia, Victor and Edison…and, under the name Mario (or Martino) Brefelli, for Banner, Emerson and The National Music Lovers of New York.
