George Maran

George Alfred Maran (July 25, 1926 – November 26, 2011) was an American tenor whose career encompassed opera, oratorio, and concert performance across Europe and the United States, as well as an appearance on Broadway. Born in Attleboro, Massachusetts, the younger of two children, Maran came from a musically rooted family. His father, Jacob C. Maran, born Agop Marangossian in 1899 in Smyrna, was an Armenian who spoke seven languages and was naturalized in 1923, working as a clerk and jeweler before leaving the family when Maran was seven. His mother, born Persis M. Weeman around 1903, taught piano and voice. Her family carried a notable musical legacy: Maran's grandfather, Walter O. Weeman, and great-grandfather, Orin Weeman, were violin makers recognized at the time as belonging to America's oldest violin-making family. It was the combined influence of his mother and grandfather that set Maran on his musical path.

Maran appeared on Broadway in 1940 in the musical Hold on to Your Hats. He subsequently pursued formal education at Harvard University, joining the Harvard Glee Club at age twenty. During his time there, between enrollment and his graduation in 1948, he came to the attention of Leonard Bernstein, who heard him perform at one or more concerts. Maran also encountered composer Paul Hindemith through attending his lectures at Harvard.

In late 1950, Maran and his wife, Edit Engel, whom he had married on September 15, 1950, relocated to Salzburg. Engel, a Jewish refugee who was studying medicine at Tufts College, played a significant role in arranging the move. In Salzburg, Maran studied church music under Domkapellmeister Joseph Messner and Mozart operas under Professor Bernhard Paumgartner, and served as solo tenor at the Salzburg Cathedral for five years. In 1954, composer Herbert Feuerstein wrote three Dehmel-Gedichte songs, settings of texts by Richard Dehmel, for Maran. Those songs received their public premiere at Maran's eightieth birthday celebration at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, with Feuerstein at the piano.

Maran first drew international recognition in 1956 when he was awarded the Mozart Medal from the Mozarteum International Foundation in Salzburg, presented on the occasion of Mozart's two-hundredth birthday. That same year he joined the Opera in Darmstadt, where he would remain as a soloist for the following forty years, through 1996. He opened his tenure there in the title role of the premiere of Mozart's La clemenza di Tito. During his decades at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, Maran's artistic collaboration with Harro Dicks contributed to a revival of Monteverdi's work, with Darmstadt as its starting point; Maran performed leading roles in Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria and L'incoronazione di Poppea. His work with director Hans Drewanz culminated in a 1980 production of Britten's Death in Venice, directed by Kurt Horres, in which Maran's portrayal of Aschenbach was noted for its intensity and expressiveness.

Among the most prominent events of Maran's career was his participation in the world premiere of Benjamin Britten's opera A Midsummer Night's Dream, performed on June 11, 1960, at the Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh as part of the Aldeburgh Festival. Britten himself conducted, and the production was directed by choreographer John Cranko. Maran sang the role of Lysander, a part Britten had asked him to take after hearing his voice, with Maran involved in the final production preparations. In subsequent performances, the role of Lysander was taken by Peter Pears, who had played the part of Flute in the original production.

Beyond Darmstadt and Aldeburgh, Maran appeared as a guest artist in Frankfurt, Hamburg, Zurich, and Amsterdam, and performed at festivals including those in the Netherlands, Strasbourg, Schwetzingen, and Kranichstein. In 1958 he sang the role of Belmonte opposite soprano Phyllis Curtin at the New York City Opera. He also participated in the Salzburger Festspiele between 1952 and 1971.

Maran's recording work includes performances with several major ensembles and conductors. He recorded Handel's Messiah with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Sir Adrian Boult, and Mendelssohn's Elijah with the same orchestra under Josef Krips. Additional recordings include Britten's The Rape of Lucretia with the English Opera Group Orchestra conducted by Charles Mackerras; Handel's Riccardo Primo with the Südwestdeutsches Kammerorchester Pforzheim under Günther Weißenborn; Bertus van Lier's The Holy Song with the Concertgebouw Orchestra under Bernard Haitink; Mozart's Mass in C minor with the Mozarteum-Orchester under Bernhard Paumgartner; Mozart's La finta semplice and a collection of excerpts from Zaide, Lo sposo deluso, and L'oca del Cairo with the Camerata Salzburg under Paumgartner; and Vaughan Williams's On Wenlock Edge with pianist Ivor Newton and the London String Quartet.

Upon concluding his forty-year association with the Staatstheater Darmstadt in 1996, Maran was named an Ehrenmitglied, or Honored Member, of the institution, a distinction that had been conferred on only four others at that time. Maran died in Darmstadt on November 26, 2011, at the age of eighty-five, from heart and cardiovascular disease. He was survived by his two children, Elizabeth Ann and Joseph. His grave was planned for the Waldfriedhof in Darmstadt.