Gerhard Bronner

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Gerhard Bronner (b. 23 October 1922, Vienna - d. 19 January 2007, Vienna) was an Austrian composer, writer, musician and a cabaret artist, known for his contribution to Austrian culture in the post-WWII period.

Born to a Jewish family, he lost his job after the Germans invaded Austria. Bronner fled from occupied Austria to Czechoslovakia and later to Palestine, where he started his career. In 1948 he returned to Vienna and originally planned to stay only for a few weeks and then to move on to London. But he chose Vienna as his permanent residence after having been offered a chance to work there.

Bronner took over a dubious night-club called "Marietta-Bar" which he transformed into a small theater. There Bronner assembled a group of young artists which would later become renowned Austrian actors and cabaret artists. Among them was Helmut Qualtinger for whom Bronner wrote many songs. Bronner and Qualtinger also appeared together in the "Travnicek"-dialogs, with Qualtinger playing an ignorant but at the same time astute Viennese who cunningly answered Bronner's provoking questions.

Bronner died of a stroke in 2007, aged 84. Only two weeks before his death he had performed on stage for the last time. This show was recorded and broadcast on Austrian television one day after Bronner's death.

He was the father of magazine founder/newspaper editor Oscar Bronner. Throughout his life Bronner emphasized his Jewishness though he was not religious. He said he couldn't believe in God after the Holocaust.