LEIB GOLDKORN, 103, WEST SIDE CHARACTER

By Susan Dominus—October 24, 2005

MR. LEIB GOLDKORN, a familiar figure on the Upper West Side, died some two weeks ago, though his body was discovered only last Friday in his apartment on West 80th Street. The apparent cause was suicide, since he was found with his head thrust inside his kitchen oven.

Mr. Goldkorn was born in 1901 in the Austro-Hungarian town of Iglau, now Jihlava in the Czech Republic. His father, Gaston Goldkorn, was a well-known grower of hops. Mr. Goldkorn’s nature was musical. To all who would listen he claimed to be a graduate of the esteemed Akademie für Musik, Philosophie, und darstellende Kunst and a former student of Julius J. Epstein, the instructor of Mahler and friend of Brahms.

Mr. Goldkorn was a bit of a jack-of-all-trades on the orchestral scene, playing glockenspiel at the Vienna State Opera; the piano at the Steinway Restaurant, now defunct, on Rivington Street; and flute during a brief stint with the NBC Symphony Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini. He often boasted that his artistry could be heard during that orchestra’s recording of Wolf-Ferrari’s Il Segreto di Susanna, though no copies of that disc have been found. He was best known perhaps for two things: his street concerts on musical glasses—old-timers fondly recall his rendition of “The Bells of St. Mary’s”—and the highly fanciful accounts of his life in two autobiographical though little-read novels, Goldkorn Tales and Ice Fire Water: A Leib Goldkorn Cocktail.

Mr. Goldkorn came to America in 1938, narrowly escaping the fate of his family, all of whom died in Auschwitz. It seemed he worked for a time in Hollywood as a composer for films. He enjoyed regaling passersby with tales of his intrigues with some of the most glamorous stars of that era, including Sonja Henie, Carmen Miranda and Esther Williams. “Who?” said Ms. Williams, when contacted by a reporter at her home in Beverly Hills. With his passing we can close the book on a colorful part of a musical Vienna that no longer exists, and on a familiar figure on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, which is also changing into something new.

Mr. Goldkorn leaves no relations. He was married to the former Clara Litwack and had a daughter, Martha, who is thought to have died in childbirth. A private service will be held at the cemetery of Hachilah Hill.