Walter Kaufman was born April 1, 1907 in Karlsbad, Germany. He studied music and philosophy at the German University in Prague and the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin. After conducting several minor opera and symphony orchestras in Europe, he moved to Bombay, India in 1934, where he was the director of European music for All-India Radio. After serving in the Second World War, he was a guest conductor for the British Broadcasting Corporation from 1946 to 1947 as well as an assistant music director for J. Arthur Rank films. He moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1947, where he served as head of the piano department at the Maritime Conservatory of Music. In 1948, he moved to Winnipeg, Manitoba and became the first conductor of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. He also directed the Winnipeg Philharmonic Choir from 1949 to 1953 and reinstated the Winnipeg Male Voice Choir in 1950. He composed the music for the ballets Visages, Slavonic Dance and The Rose and the Ring, all premiered by the Winnipeg Ballet in 1949. He conducted the premiere of his opera Bashmachkin on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation radio in 1952. He moved to Bloomington, Indiana in 1957, where he taught musicology at the University of Indiana and continued to compose. Walter Kaufman passed away September 9, 1984 in Bloomington, Indiana.