Mártha Eggerth

Highlights in 2006/2007 have included two concerts with interviews at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; sold out shows at the Café Sabarsky in Neue Galerie entertaining audiences with her great pre-war Viennese/Berlin cabaret style of wit, artistry and song; a concert and discussion held as part of New York University's Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes; an appearance at the Austrian Cultural Forum as part of their Mostly Operetta series; operetta master classes at the Manhattan School of Music; as well as an appearance at the Jewish Association for Services for the Aged (JASA).

Still living at her home in Rye, New York, USA. She has released a new album of earlier recordings, "Marta Eggerth: My Life My Song" (Patria Productions), produced by her son, Marjan Kiepura. [August 2005]

In 2003, Patria Music released a retrospective double CD of her songs entitled My Life My Song.

In 2001, Eggerth returned to London for "An Interview-in-Concert" at an absolutely sold-out Wigmore Hall, accompanied by conductor-pianist Alexander Frey and hosted by British author and critic, Brendon Carroll. She also sang at the annual Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation concerts at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall to much fanfare.

In 1999, at the age of 87, she sang on the stage of the Vienna State Opera in a special televised matinée concert hosted by opera impresario and historian Marcel Prawy, to mark that opera house's first production of Lehár's The Merry Widow. She sang a medley from the operetta in four languages and received a spontaneous standing ovation. She repeated this medley in 2000, at a gala to mark the 200th anniversary of Vienna's Theater an der Wien.

Although it was not love at first sight, Jan and Martha gradually fell in love, married two years later, had two sons and were separated only by death with the demise of Jan in 1966.

Mother of Jan Tadeusz Sharbek (born 1944), singer, and Marjan Wictor (born 1950), producer and pianist.

During the shooting for "Mein Herz ruft nach dir" in 1934 she met singer and actor Jan Kiepura. They got married two years later, acted together in other movies and belonged to the most dazzling pairs in Germany.

From the day she was born Martha lived in a world of music. For sure her father was a banker but he was also an amateur pianist. As for her mother, she was a housewife but also a very talented opera singer who had given up her career for the joys of matrimony and motherhood. It does not come as a surprise, under such circumstances, that the little girl's singing capacities were soon discovered. At eight she was already on a scene singing an aria from "The Barber of Seville". A critic attended the show and was impressed by her performance. He introduced her to the director of the Magyar Theater, where she landed her first contract. As of the age of 10 she was hailed as Hungary's "national idol". And it was not long before her triumph became international. An operetta, "Pogasza", was written specially for the crystal-clear-voiced little singer. Among others, she played the role of the doll in "Tales of Hoffmann" and starred in "Das Veilchen vom Montmartre" by Kalman. With the advent of sound films, she found herself very much in demand in the 1930s, bringing her beautiful voice and looks to yet more delighted viewers. It is on the set of "Mein Herz ruft nach dir" that she met Jan Kiepura, another successful opera and operetta singer.