Otto Glastra Van Loon

Personal

Vocation

Dutch musicologist, writer, composer and conductor. Little information can be found Glastra of Van Loon in the standard online resources. Actually, Koppejan tells most of this secretive person, who like him had interest in astrology. He is most known for his thorough books on music history, like the six or in other editions ten Volume encyclopaedic work "mozaiek van de muziekgeschiedenis" and his history of 80 years of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw orchestra ("Onder de stenen lier"). He was a musicologist and choir director. He often directed Bach's Matheus Passion. One of his favourite opera singers was the Jewish tenor and tailor Michel Gobets (1 May 1905, Amsterdam - 20 April 1945, Dachau). After WW2, he was accused of collaborating with the Germans, presumably because he had become a member of the Dutch Kulturkammer. Without the censorship of the by the Nazi's governed Kulturkammer, artists could not earn their money (publish, perform) in any legal way. Even not by singing the in the Netherlands very celebrated Matheus Passion. He was tried for it on 3 October 1945 and was sentenced with a Berufverbot for one year by the "Eereraad voor de Muziek" at Den Haag. On 2 January 1947 he got compensation for the wrong accusation of working together with the Nazi's in higher appeal by the "Centrale Ereraad voor de Kunst" (Central court of honor for the Arts). In 1955 he was involved in the erection of the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra (NKO), Choirs in Rotterdam and elsewhere, composed music and was one of the first conductors of the Dutch Opera (1946, since 1964 known as the Dutch National Opera). He died in 1986.