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Miklós Vig | |
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![]() Miklós Vig | |
Background information | |
Birth name | Miklós Voglhut |
Also known as | Miklós Vig |
Born | 11 July 1898 Budapest, Hungary |
Origin | Hungary |
Died | 19 December 1944 Budapest, Hungary | (aged 46)
Miklós Vig (11 July 1898 – 19 December 1944) was a Hungarian cabaret [1] and jazz [2] [3] singer, actor, comedian [4] and theater secretary [1] in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. Born in Budapest on 11 July 1898, he was murdered there on 19 December 1944 by members of the Arrow Cross. [5]
Vig was born Miklós Voglhut [6] in 1898 to Vilmos Vogelhut (1867-1942) and Roza Vogelhut (1870-1942) in a Hungarian Jewish family in Budapest, Hungary. [7] [1] Although he went to acting school, he had better success as a cabaret singer. In 1924 as his career was picking up he changed his surname to Vig, [6] because Voglhut was a Jewish-sounding name and antisemitism was growing at the time. Vig means cheerful or merry in Hungarian. [6]
Other musicians from the Vig family include Vig's brother, saxophone and clarinet player György Vig, [3] and his nephew, jazz musician Tommy Vig. [8] Another nephew, John Vig, is a physicist and was president of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in 2009.
The fact that Vig was married to a Catholic woman, Kató Szőke, and the fact that he changed his name, did not save him from the Holocaust. On 19 December 1944 he was among a group of Jews who were bound, lined up along the banks of the Danube and machine-gunned into the river by Hungarian Nazis, members of the Arrow Cross Party.[ citation needed] The Shoes on the Danube Promenade commemorates those who were murdered in this fashion.
Vig had his first major successes as a soloist, and later performed frequently in other cabarets including the Budapest Operetta Theatre and Budapest Orfeum. Although he made many recordings, he became most famous as a singer of popular music on the radio. [1] A 1935 article in Színházi Élet described Vig as a singer of popular sentimental songs. [9]
According to Gramofon (the Hungarian Jazz and Classical music magazine), Vig was considered part of the first generation of recorded Hungarian musicians. [10] When Deutsche Gramophone found themselves falling behind the competition, they signed Vig, who became their first dance-music star. [10]
As a comedian, he performed in the early 1920s at various cabarets including the Rakéta Kabaré, occasionally with female partner Annus Nagy. [4]