Kleiber was born as Karl Ludwig Kleiber in Berlin, the son of the Austrian conductor Erich Kleiber and Ruth Goodrich, an American.[1]. In 1935, the Kleiber family emigrated to Buenos Aires, after Erich Kleiber had resigned his post at the Berlin Opera in protest over the Nazi Party's policies. Karl's name became Carlos. As a youth, he had an English governess, grew up in English boarding schools in Argentina and later studied in New York and Zurich. He also composed, sang, and played piano and timpani. While his father noticed his son's musical talents, Erich Kleiber nevertheless dissuaded Carlos from pursuing a musical career: "What a pity the boy is musically talented", wrote his father to a friend.