In memory of Elizabeth Eaton

Dear family and friends of the musical school,

Unfortunately, right at the start of the year, we received the very sad news that our dear Elizabeth Eaton, who taught singing at the musical school from 2017 to 2019, has passed away.

Elizabeth Eaton, a qualified singer, had held engagements as a soloist (in opera, operetta, concerts and musicals) since 1982, including with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, the Bühnen der Stadt Köln, Theater Oberhausen and the WDR Radio Orchestra. She sang and performed, amongst many other roles, Susanna in *The Marriage of Figaro*, Julia in Gounod’s *Romeo and Juliet*, Gabriele in Offenbach’s *La Vie Parisienne*, Oskar in Verdi’s *Un ballo in maschera*, and Musetta in *La Bohème*.

Since 1995, Elizabeth Eaton has been an instructor in singing at various state-recognised institutions offering training for musical theatre performers: Stage School, Stella R-1 Academy, Joop van den Ende Academy, and the Hamburg School of Entertainment (all in Hamburg); as well as at the Institute of Music (University of Applied Sciences) and the German Musical Academy in Osnabrück.

We first met Elizabeth “Liz” in the late 1990s as a colleague in the production “Buddy – the Musical” in Hamburg, where she played, amongst other roles, “Maria Elena’s Aunt”. There, she struck us as a calm, consistently friendly, positive and highly professional colleague.

As is, unfortunately, not uncommon in show business, we lost touch somewhat after our time together in the “yellow sack”, until we met again whilst working for Stage School Hamburg, where she was head of the singing department.

Elizabeth Eaton at the musical school

After attending our performance of Ritter Rost and Disney’s Alice in Wonderland Jr in 2017, we were delighted when Liz offered to teach at our Ahrensburg Musical School. We were happy to accept this offer. Elizabeth taught with us until she returned to her home country, the USA, in 2019.

Unfortunately, Elizabeth’s health deteriorated rapidly after her return to the USA, and although she had been cautiously optimistic about the future as recently as the summer, her condition worsened again. Sadly, she was unable to recover from this setback and eventually passed away.

We cherish the many wonderful moments we were able to share with Liz and are grateful for the time we spent with her, as well as for the support she gave us through her creativity and her wealth of experience.

Hauke & Jacqui