Mitja Nikisch was the son of the celebrated orchestral conductorArthur Nikisch and, like his father, became a fine interpreter of classical works. Nonetheless, while respected in that literature — he made his debut as piano soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra on April 22, 1918; performed with luminaries such as Wilhelm Furtwängler and Sir Henry J. Wood — he was most celebrated as leader of a popular jazz band in Berlin during the Weimar Republic era. The band played in fashionable clubs and included some of the most admired popular performers in Germany of the day; prominent guitarist Otto Sachsenhauer described it as "the best dance band ever heard in Berlin”. Mitja himself returned to playing the piano, hoping to pick up where he had left off with his career as a concert performer. He was on summer holiday in northern Italy when he was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer. He had recently fallen in love with a woman from Moscow, Alexandra Mironova. She was twelve years his junior and was a well-known soubrette in Berlin's Schillertheater under the pseudonym Barbara Diu. Mitja called her Barbara as he did not like her Russian name. The two were planning to get married when his diagnosis of cancer came. Knowing he did not have long left to live, he feverishly began to compose a piano concerto. He dedicated several hours a day to his magnum opus as his illness released enormous amounts of energy. On Wednesday, August 5, 1936, Nikisch finished the concerto and died at age 37. Barbara was in London on business when her fiancé passed away. The handwritten score she found upon her return to Venice was a recollection of an all-too-brief life, and Nikisch dedicated it to his wife. He had been married to and divorced from stage and film actressNora Gregor.
Recordings
As a classical performer, Mitja Nikisch left some reproducing piano rolls and one commercial recording, a 1934 account of Mozart's Piano Concerto no. 20 in D Minor, K. 466, with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Rudolf Schulz-Dornburg. The Tahra label reissued it in 2007 as part of a set of 4 compact discs. Recordings by the Mitja Nikisch Tanz Orchester included one in 1931 of the Nacio Herb Brown-Arthur Freed tune for the MGM film Lord Byron of Broadway, Should I , in German as Ich kann, ich will with vocalist Paul Dorn.
