Josef Knapp

Josef Knapp was an Austrian baritone who trained in Vienna and had his first successes at the Vienna Volksoper, broadcasting opera for Austrian Radio from 1930. He was engaged as a character baritone at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, where he created the Front-line Officer in the premiere of Strauss's Friedenstag in 1938, and remained with the company for more than three decades. He appeared at the Salzburg Festival in Strauss's Die schweigsame Frau in 1959 and Der Rosenkavalier between 1961 and 1964, and in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte in 1963, retiring from performance in 1971.