Arthur Kay (musician)

Arthur Kay, né Kautzenbach (16 January 1882 in Grottkau/Grodków (Silesia), Germany; † 19 December, 1969 in Los Angeles (CA), United States) was a German-American conductor, composer, arranger, and cellist. Educated in Silesia and Berlin, he emigrated to the United States in 1907, where, after a few seasons as cellist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra, he embarked on a career as conductor, composer, and arranger in operetta, silent film, and talkies, first primarily on the East Coast and from 1918 on the West Coast. Biography Family and education Arthur Kautzenbach came from a Catholic family in Silesia in which there had already been musicians in earlier generations. He was the first of eight children of the cartwright and musician Ferdinand Kautzenbach (1856–1942) and his wife Bertha Kautzenbach, née Großmann (1861–1923). Kautzenbach’s main instrument was the cello, but he learned other instruments during his training in his father’s apprentice orchestras in Grottkau, Frankenstein, and Reichenbach im Eulengebirge. His sisters learned piano, his brothers string instruments. His sister Maria Kautzenbach, married Folgmann (1884–1915), and his