Elisabeth von Herzogenberg

Elisabeth von Herzogenberg née Elisabet von Stockhausen (born in Paris on 13 April 1847; died in Sanremo on 7 January 1892) was a German pianist, composer, singer and philanthropist.

Elisabeth and Heinrich von Herzogenberg

Composer Ethel Smyth was her lover

Biography

Her father had served as a Hanoverian ambassador and was a pianist linked to Frédéric Chopin and Charles-Valentin Alkan. Although a Protestant, she married the Catholic Heinrich von Herzogenberg.^[1] She is known in large part for her association with Johannes Brahms, with whom she studied and with whom she and her husband corresponded copiously.^[2] As an aristocratic musician, she largely did not perform or publish for the public,^[3] but did arrange children's folk songs.^[4] Her lover, the composer Ethel Smyth, devoted chapter XX of Impressions That Remained: Memoirs to her.^[5]

Edited works

• 24 Volkskinderlieder for voice and piano (1881)
• 8 Klavierstücke^[6]

References

1. Peter Clive (2 October 2006). Brahms and His World: A Biographical Dictionary. Scarecrow Press. pp. 216–218. ISBN 978-1-4617-2280-9.
2. The Online Books Page at UPenn
3. Ruth A. Solie (1995). Musicology and Difference: Gender and Sexuality in Music Scholarship. University of California Press. pp. 126–127. ISBN 978-0-520-20146-0.
4. Paul Berry (April 2014). Brahms Among Friends: Listening, Performance, and the Rhetoric of Allusion. OUP USA. pp. 3–6. ISBN 978-0-19-998264-6.
5. Ethel Smyth (16 April 2013). Impressions That Remained - Memoirs of Ethel Smyth. Read Books Limited. pp. XIII. ISBN 978-1-4465-4542-3.
6. "8 Klavierstücke (Herzogenberg, Elisabeth von) - IMSLP: Free Sheet Music PDF Download". imslp.org. Retrieved 14 December 2022.