Maria von Trapp - RIP

[Flosshilde]

The last of the Trapp Family Singers died yesterday aged 99. (in the film The sound of music she was renamed Louisa - prsumably to avoid confusiomn with the character played by Julie Andrews)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/23/maria-von-trapp-sound-of-music-dies

I'm surprised nobody has started a thread - are they considered too down-market?

[french frank]

I'm surprised nobody has started a thread - are they considered too down-market?

There was a thread earlier.


Ed: A different context http://www.for3.org/forums/showthrea...985#post379985

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Thanks, ff. I wrote the following:

Even today, a news item was posted: "Last of Trapp Family Singers dies" referring to the death of Maria von Trapp, who was portrayed as Louisa in the musical. It goes on to say her brother, Johannes, announced the news. Yet he too was one of the Von Trapp Singers. He was a child of the more famous Maria - not in the stage/film musical, but nevertheless one of the singing group in later years.

The news items that followed also failed to acknowledge the contribution of the children born after Captain von Trapp's second marriage. His marriage to the ex-nun took place as early as 1928 - a decade before its setting in the famous musical.

[marthe]

The last of the Trapp Family Singers died yesterday aged 99. (in the film The sound of music she was renamed Louisa - prsumably to avoid confusiomn with the character played by Julie Andrews)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/23/maria-von-trapp-sound-of-music-dies

I'm surprised nobody has started a thread - are they considered too down-market?

The children of Georg and Maria von Trapp are hardly down market. Johannnes von Trapp, and now his son Sam, have been running a Trapp family empire up in the green hills of Stowe, Vermont http://www.trappfamily.com/ His sister Eleanore lives in nearby Waitsfield, Vermont. The Warren-Waitsfield and Stowe, Vermont telephone directories are filled with listings of von Trapps and their various enterprises. There are, in addition to the proprieters of the famous lodge, plant nursery owners, brewers, cheesemakers, artists, musicians etc who are all descended from Georg and Maria von Trapp. When we go to Stowe, Vermont for a British car show, we often drink Trapp beer and eat Trapp cheese. A friend from Tiverton, Rhode Island, told me that his family doctor was one of the older sons (Rupert or Werner). My mother remembers, from her college days in the late 1940s, a visit from Maria, Baroness von Trapp. The first Baroness and mother of the children featured in The Sound of Music, was Agathe Whitehead von Trapp. She was the grandaughter of Robert Whitehead who developed the modern torpedo with the aid of the Austro-Hungarian navy in Fiume, Italy.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Marthe, you are a wonder. A fascinating post.

[Flosshilde]

Yes, Marthe - fascinating. They seem to have branched out into any enterprise under the sun!

(& I didn't really think they were down-market )

[marthe]

Of course not Flossehilde! My parents, who were big fans of the Trapp Family Singers, enjoyed playing recorder duets. My father played an alto recorder and my mother played soprano. Recordings made by the Trapp Family Singers were a source of inspiration as recorders were not widely known in the US back in the 1950s. My parents' recorders were lovely wooden ones made by Koch. At the time, children did not play recorder in school as they would a generation later.