German conductor and musicologist Peter Gülke was born in Weimar in 1934. He studied cello and musicology at the Franz Liszt University of Music in Weimar, and continued his education at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena. In 1958, he earned his doctorate at Leipzig University, and went on to pursue conducting jobs at theaters in the German Democratic Republic. Gülke became the conductor at the Semperoper Dresden in 1976, and he was named principal conductor in Weimar in 1981. In 1983, he moved to West Germany and conducted in Wuppertal, while teaching conducting in Darmstadt and Freiburg, as well as musicology in Basel. He has conducted many orchestras across Europe, Japan, and the United States, and appeared as guest conductor with such ensembles as the Philharmonic State Orchestra Hamburg, the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra, the Residentie Orkest den Hague, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the NHK Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, and Ensemble Recherche Freiburg. Gülke may be best known for his efforts to program unfinished works on concert programs, notably promoting the symphonic fragments of Franz Schubert. He has also sought to revive the music of neglected composers such as Franz Benda, Johann Friedrich Reichardt, and Carl Eberwein. As an author, Gülke has written on medieval music, as well as the music of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, and Bruckner, among many other composers. ~ Blair Sanderson, Rovi