HUMPERDINCR, ENGELBERT German composer, was born at Siegburg on Sept. 1, 1854, and studied music under F. Hiller at Cologne, and under F. Lachner and J. Rheinberger at Munich. In 1879 a Mendelssohn scholarship en abled him to go to Italy, where he met Wagner and was invited to assist in the production of Parsi f al at Bayreuth. After some years of travel he returned to Germany and settled at Frank furt, where he was professor of composition at the Hoch Con servatorium and musical critic of the Frankfurter Zeitung. He had already made his mark as a composer in Germany with his orchestral work, Humoreske (188o), and the choral composi tions Das Gluck von Edenhall (1 884) and Die W all f ahrt nach Kevlaar (1887), when he produced the charming children's opera, Hansel and Gretel (1893) , and became famous throughout Europe. In 1900 Humperdinck removed to Berlin, where he was head of a Meisterschule for composition. He died at New Strelitz on Sept. 27, 1921. Humperdinck's later works, like Hansel and Gretel, owed much to folk-tunes, and showed a sim ilar technical mastery, but none of them approached it in pop ular success, though Konigskinder was well received.
See 0. Besch, Engelbert Humperdinck (1915) .