Blahetka, Marie Leopoldine

1811-1887

Brilliant Austrian pianist and a good composer. She showed musical ability very early and as a child of five was placed under Czerny, on the advice of Beethoven, who had heard her play. Later she studied the piano with Kalkbrenner and Moscheles and composition with Sechter. After making a number of successful concert tours, she settled in Boulogne in 1840, where she devoted herself to teaching and composition. Her best works are an opera, Die Rauber und die Sanger, which was produced in Vienna in 1830, and a concert piece for piano and orchestra. She wrote beside these many concertos, sonatas, polonaises, and rondos, for the piano, and the piano and violin and also many songs.