It might seem incredible that a world-famous conductor and darling of Bayreuth could be locked up for, among other alleged misdemeanours, sending diseased prostitutes into US military bases to infect American soldiers, but that was precisely the fate that befell Karl Muck.

Karl Muck

Born in Darmstadt in 1859, Muck’s family moved to Switzerland where he acquired Swiss citizenship. A stellar career in Europe saw him become principal conductor of the Berlin State Opera and succeed Hermann Levi as Cosima Wagner’s chosen conductor of Parsifal. However, it was his stint with the Boston Symphony Orchestra that was to prove his downfall.

Muck’s aristocratic manners were at first a perfect fit for the high-minded Bostonians, but in 1917 the US declared war on Germany and matters took a turn for the worse. That year, BSO founder Henry Lee Higginson was asked to make a patriotic gesture and include The Star-Spangled Banner in a concert in Providence, Rhode Island. Believing the request to be the work of John R. Rathom, a publisher whose motto was “Raise hell and sell newspapers”, Higginson declined on the snooty grounds that nationalist anthems had no place in “art concerts”....