Farrenc, (Jeanne-) Louise (née Dumont)

Farrenc, (Jeanne-) Louise (née Dumont), French pianist and composer; b. Paris, May 31, 1804; d. there, Sept. 15, 1875. She studied music with Reicha. In 1821 she married (Jacques Hippolyte) Aristide Farrenc, but was not entirely eclipsed by his acknowledged eminence. Her 3 syms. had respectable performances: No. 1 in Brussels (Feb. 23, 1845), No. 2 in Paris (May 3, 1846), and No. 3 in Paris (April 22, 1849); the last received an accolade in the prestigious, and definitely male-oriented, Gazette Musicale, which conceded that “she revealed, alone among her sex in musical Europe, genuine learning, united with grace and taste,” She also wrote a piano concerto, 30 études in all major and minor keys for piano, 2 piano trios, cello sonata, 2 violin sonatas, 2 piano quintets, and a sextet and a nonet for winds and strings. One of her overtures (1840) was reviewed by Berlioz, who remarked that it was orchestrated “with a talent rare among women,” She was a brilliant pianist, and taught piano at the Paris Cons, from 1842 until 1872, the only woman ever to hold a permanent position as an instrumentalist there in the 19th century. Her daughter Victorine (b. Paris, Feb. 23, 1826; d. there, Jan. 3, 1859) was also a talented pianist whose promising career was cut short by an early death. After the death of her husband in 1865, Louise Farrenc assumed the editorship of his monumental collection Le Trésor des pianistes.

—-Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire