ABT, FRANZ (1819-1885), German composer, was born at Eilenburg, Saxony, and died at Wiesbaden. His songs and part songs enjoyed an extraordinary vogue throughout the world in the middle of the 1 gth century, and are still popular. Abt was kapell meister at Bernburg in 1841, at Zurich in the same year and at Brunswick from 1852 to 1882, when he retired to Wiesbaden.