Unsung heroines: contributions of selected early twentieth-century women to American piano pedagogy.

A woman at piano has traditionally symbolized the pleasures of genteel society. (1) For the past three centuries, women have enriched the quality of home life by playing beautiful music at the piano. However, while encouraged as amateurs, men traditionally did not pursue music professionally. Nevertheless, women throughout the twentieth century played a large and important role in furthering the art of piano teaching and piano performing in America. Unfortunately, their accomplishments are not recognized in current piano pedagogy textbooks or periodical literature. Perhaps as a result, many female independent teachers today do not fully appreciate the rich legacy of their past and the vital importance of their work to American musical life.

By the latter half of the nineteenth century, American women had moved "out of the fields and shops and onto the pedestal." (2) Expected to stay at home and be domestic, submissive and dependent, women also became status symbols for upwardly mobile husbands and fathers. An idle, well-dressed woman confirmed the financial success of her male provider. A lady was "allowed to work, provided that what she does is perfectly useless! She may embroider, but not make a dress.... She may make music, but not coffee!" (3) Playing the piano was considered the perfect hobby for a well-bred lady, and it became firmly associated with women. As a result, female pianists far outnumbered their male counterparts.

By the turn of the century, more and more American women had become employed professionally as musicians. Census data indicate that the percentage of women employed in music grew from 36 percent in 1870 to 66 percent in 1910. (4) However, stereotypes and prejudices against female musicians persisted. Amy Fay, the noted concert pianist, student of Liszt and author of the widely read Music Study in Germany, (5) gave the following account of employment conditions faced by female music teachers:

      A woman is at a disadvantage on account of her sex, and the reason of
   this is that, as a rule, boys and young men do not study music. Young girls
   find it more interesting to take of a man teacher.... This preference for
   men is so well known that it is almost impossible for a woman to get a good
   position in the private fashionable schools in the city.... If women teach
   in schools, it is usually as under-teachers, poorly paid. (6)

Another prejudice--that has not completely disappeared even today--was that women were most suited for elementary teaching of young children. A noted early twentieth-century female pianist and teacher observed that "[t]he professor will find his branch of the work is to impart artistic finish and interpretation. The well-trained woman teacher will be expected to lay the foundation." (7) Another well-known female piano teacher deplored the fact that parents chose female teachers for their children only until the children were "ready" to go to a male teacher. (8) Even in a 1929 special issue of The Etude magazine celebrating women's accomplishments in music, the editors included articles reinforcing stereotypical women's roles as mothers of great musicians, and as those who inspire men to compose musical masterworks. (9)

Despite the fact that "[i]n the musical centers of America the man teacher has decidedly the best of it," (10) women musicians persevered. Against the growing backdrop of the women's suffrage movement, women musicians made their mark on the music profession. Various articles, advertisements and announcements in The Etude magazine during the first two decades of the twentieth century confirm that American women were working in a surprisingly wide variety of piano-related occupations, including concert pianist; accompanist; pianist for the movies; piano teacher for universities, conservatories and public schools; music administrator; composer, author, manufacturer, and seller of piano music, books and records; workshop clinician and lecturer; concert manager; and piano tuner. (11)

Considering that women were not even granted the right to vote in America until 1920, their level of professional achievement was significant. Concert pianists Fannie Bloomfield Ziesler, Julie Rive-King and Teresa Carreno (12) had achieved worldwide fame and had far more popular appeal than their American male counterparts, John N. Pattison, Charles H. Jarvis, William Sherwood and A. Victor Benham. (13) Noted female educators such as Clara Baur, founder and director of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and Julia E. Crane, director of the Crane Normal Institute in Potsdam, New York, promoted their well-regarded schools. Frances E. Clarke, former president of the Music Section of the National Education Association, founder of the Music Supervisors National Conference and educational director for the new Victor Talking Machine Company, summarized the accomplishments of women, particularly in the public schools and in the music industry, in her 1918 article entitled "Music as a Vocation for Women." (14) Women such as Mrs. A. Fletcher-Copp and Mrs. A. M. Virgil authored music method books and offered workshops promoting them.

Despite their accomplishments in various musical fields, women were discouraged from entering some music occupations, such as performing for the movies. In addition, prejudice affected assessments of their capabilities. A female editor for The Etude noted that piano tuning requires a "quietness of nerve [which] is not the natural endowment of woman." (15) Nevertheless, advertisements for a piano tuning school pictured a woman tuning an upright piano. While women did good work in a variety of piano-related occupations, some of their most important contributions to music performance and pedagogy stemmed from their involvement in women's musical clubs. In 1918, the president of the National Federation of Music Clubs (NFMC), Mrs. A. J. Ochesner, estimated that about 1,425 musical clubs existed across America and included a combined membership of approximately 300,000 members. (16) Ochesner stated that "the sole object of our existence is to advance the cause of music in America." This was done through audience development; sponsorship of young performers; support of public school and community music programs; development of plans of study and examinations for music teachers; and support of American music, composers and teachers. Specifically, women's musical clubs can be credited with the following accomplishments:

* Increasing attendance at musical events all across the country. ("Let but one well-organized club persist in its work for a few years and the concert artist and the orchestra will find ample patronage in its vicinity.") (17)

* Promoting young artists. NFMC published a list of members who were willing to give recitals for a nominal fee. A young artist could build a reputation and gain valuable performing experience by performing for music clubs across the country.

* Encouraging the introduction of music into the public schools. Clubs offered financial help, encouraged the hiring of a music supervisor and supported the development of quality music curricula.

* Promoting musical activity in their communities. Music clubs established music schools within settlement houses, sponsored after-school musical activities and donated records and sheet music to public libraries. (18)

* Organizing a system of continued musical education. Music club libraries and courses of study encouraged the professional development of their members.

* Supporting American composers and American music. Music clubs published lists of American composers and compositions; they also sponsored competitions for American composers and performances of American music.

* Supporting American teachers and their students. NFMC sponsored an annual Young Artist Contest that was open only to contestants who were "entirely American trained." At a time when many Americans thought the best musical training was offered abroad, music clubs created this contest to demonstrate the high quality of American music instruction.

Over and above the accomplishments outlined thus far, women's most important contributions to twentieth-century musical life came from their teaching of music to young children from all classes of American society. In homes, independent music studios and public school classrooms, women bore the primary responsibility for spreading musical culture and functioned as the main conservators of music in America. As one author observed in 1918,

      America is musically great today, not because of the splendid efforts of
   a few earnest men of ability and fine training who have given their lives
   to the art, but rather because of the cooperation of a vast army of women
   who, through their high ideals and well-organized efforts, have brought
   music in far greater measure to every city, town and hamlet on the
   continent. (19)

Having acknowledged many important accomplishments of female musicians overall in the early twentieth century, the remainder of this article will spotlight the achievements of selected women who made significant contributions to piano teaching and performing throughout the century.

Julie Rive-King

Julie Rive-King (1854-1937) was one of the first American women to be considered a world-class concert pianist. She performed more than 4,000 concerts, 500 of them with an orchestra, and taught piano over a period of fifty years. (20) Rive-King received her first instruction from her mother; her other teachers included William Mason, Karl Reinecke and Franz Liszt.

Rive-King debuted with the New York Philharmonic Society in 1874 and then began a performing career under the management of Frank H. King, whom she later married. For the next ten years she toured extensively throughout the United States, playing from a solo repertoire that numbered over 300 works.

According to music critics, Rive-King's repertoire was surpassed only by that of Anton Rubinstein. She memorized all works that she studied. Concert reviews highlighted her extraordinary technique and musicianship. In an 1899 issue of The Etude magazine, John S. Van Cleve wrote that Rive-King was the greatest woman pianist of American birth, ranking her with Teresa Carreno and Fanny Bloomfield-Zeisler. (21)

Rive-King, who taught at the Bush Conservatory (later Chicago Conservatory) for twenty-eight years, was also an excellent teacher. Amy Fay, who studied with Liszt in Germany, advised young students that they no longer needed to go to Europe to study piano because of fine American piano teachers such as William Mason, William H. Sherwood and Rive-King. In addition to giving private piano lessons, Rive-King taught weekly two-hour interpretation classes, which were modeled after those of Liszt. In them, she required her pupils to play from memory and, afterwards, she gave her observations of their performances, using a second piano for demonstration. Her guidance was generally practical and straight-forward. She believed in using a good edition, following composers' markings carefully, playing a wide range of repertoire, including contemporary pieces, and studying the tonal color of orchestral instruments. (22)

Music critics and historians credit Rive-King for having raised the standard of piano playing in the United States. W. S. B. Matthews wrote that "[b]y her well-made and thoroughly educational program she became, in her way, as great an educator of the American public in piano playing as [Theodore] Thomas was in the line of orchestral work." (23)

Fanny Bloomfield-Zeisler

Fanny Bloomfield-Zeisler (1863-1927, nee Blumenfeld) (24) was another extraordinary American concert artist and piano teacher whose career spanned half a century. (25) A student of Theodor Leschetizky, she performed throughout the United States and Europe. Her performance style was described as fiery, intense and incisive.

Bloomfield-Zeisler's teaching career spanned thirty years. She joined the faculty of the School of Lyric and Dramatic Art in Chicago in 1884 and became the head of the piano department at Bush Temple of Music (later Bush Conservatory and Chicago Conservatory) in 1903. After 1912, she devoted herself primarily to teaching.

Bloomfield-Zeisler cautioned teachers to not follow one particular teaching method, but to bring out a student's individual style. In her own teaching, she focused on students' technical and musical problems one at a time, advised practicing slowly and advocated use of the metronome. Bloomfield-Zeisler urged students to evaluate whether a criticism or advice applied to them before using it constructively and advised young performers to never play a piece in public that was not thoroughly mastered. (26)

Olga Samaroff

The musical activities of Olga Samaroff (1880-1948, nee Lucy Jane Olga Agnes Hickenlooper) (27) encompassed concertizing, teaching piano and music appreciation, writing music criticism, recording music and lecturing. Today, she is probably best known as the piano teacher of outstanding musicians such as Rosalyn Tureck, Eugene List, Claudette Sorel, William Kapell, Maurice Hinson and Vincent Persichetti. (28)

Samaroff studied with her mother and grandmother (Lucy Grunwald, a concert pianist), as well as Elie Miriam Delaborde at the Paris Conservatory, Ernest Hutcheson at the Peabody Conservatory and Ernst Jedliczka (a former student of Tchaikovsky and Rubinstein) in Berlin. (29) She was the first female American to win a scholarship to the Paris Conservatory.

In her early 20s, Samaroff returned to the United States to establish a concert career. Since she had no concert sponsors or European credits, she took a great financial risk by hiring the New York Symphony Orchestra and renting Carnegie Hall for what became a successful American debut in 1905. Within a few years, she was being paid $500 to $600 per concert, the highest amount any woman pianist had earned, although still significantly less than what men were able to collect. Performance opportunities were abundant, including long concert tours in Europe and the United States. Except for the period between 1911 and 1914--the first three years of marriage to Leopold Stokowski--she continued to perform regularly until 1926, when she fell and injured her arm and shoulder. Around this time, she began teaching at the newly formed Juilliard Graduate School (1925-1937) and at the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music (1927-1937), where she headed the piano department. Teaching became such a passion for Samaroff that she never returned to the concert stage.

Samaroff developed her own flexible teaching style that successfully groomed talented pianists. She tried to foster her students' musical independence and their broader human development. Alex Weissenberg, who studied and worked under her at the Juilliard School of Music, said that she "was one of the few teachers I have met whose pupils all played differently. Individuality was something she respected. She had great insight into the personality of her students, and she let people develop their own way." (30)

Samaroff emphasized the importance of concentration during practice, (31) the observance of phrasing, pedaling and expression marks during early stages of learning (32) and the benefits of studying the score away from the piano. When teaching interpretation, she relied more on mental images and suggestion, rather than technical or mechanical details. Samaroff expected her students to perform frequently and worked hard to open performing opportunities for them.

Samaroff's educational influence extended beyond her piano teaching. In 1928 she helped found the Schubert Memorial Foundation, which gave the annual contest's winner the opportunity to play with the Philadelphia Orchestra. For two seasons, she wrote music reviews for the New York Evening Post (1926-1928). To foster music literacy for the general public, she developed Layman's Music Courses with lectures, slides, music selections and books; she gave these presentations, often assisted by her piano students, in New York's Town Hall from the 1930s until her death in 1948. She also trained and inspired many other teachers to become missionaries of music appreciation throughout the United States.

Angela Diller and Elizabeth Quaile

Angela Diller (1877-1968) and Elizabeth Quaile (1874-1951) were among the leading music educators who established pre-college piano programs in the first half of the twentieth century. (33) Diller headed the theory department (1899-1916), and Quaile headed the piano department (early 1900s-1916) of New York's Music School Settlement until they left with David Mannes to establish what is now the Mannes College of Music. In 1920, they founded the Diller-Quaile Music School, which provided music instruction to early elementary through pre-college levels. Their school's innovative curriculum consisted of private piano lessons combined with coordinated classes in musicianship and theory. The school continues today as a community music school, offering a wide range of early-childhood music classes, private voice and instrumental study, theory, chorus, chamber music, orchestra and adult courses. (34)

Diller and Quaile also collaborated to author the Diller-Quaile piano method series. Their First Solo Book, published in 1918, sold more than two million copies. The piano-teaching series was popular particularly in the 1930s and 1940s. Their forty books, thirteen of which are still in print, include The Diller-Quaile Solo and Duet Books, 25 First-Grade Pieces, Off We Go, Off We Go Again, First Pedal Studies, Tunes from Many Lands and When All the World Was Young. They also published the Bauer-Diller-Quaile Course (1931) with Harold Bauer, and published separately.

Their instruction and innovative piano-teaching series for young students provided a child-centered song approach, presenting music through singing, rhythmic activity and aural training. New musical elements were introduced first by hearing, then doing and, finally, by learning proper nomenclature. Their piano course included activities such as finding piano keys using a keyboard/staff chart, playing songs while singing, ear training and writing. As teachers, authors and composers, Diller and Quaile contributed significantly to the development of American music education in the first half of the twentieth century.

Edna Mae Burnam

Another notable female composer and method book author from the first half of the twentieth century is Edna Mae Burnam. Born in 1907, Burnam majored in piano at the University of Washington. She published nearly 300 original piano works, her first in 1935. The slogan, "Learn to play with Burnam ... all the way," appeared on many of her publications. In her series of six method books entitled Step by Step, Burnam outlined four goals for this series:

1. To present rudiments of music in logical order, step by step, with gradual and steady progress

2. To provide appealing melodious pieces for students to play and keep these pieces within the range of his or her ability so they may be played fluently and artistically

3. To present a challenge to the student that will increase pianistic facility

4. To strengthen the student's desire to continue to express and improve musically and encourage an even deeper love for music Burnam's best-known pedagogical work is probably her Dozen

A Day technique book series. These books contain short technical exercises, mostly in the key of C. (Although in the preface, the author recommends they be transposed into other keys.) According to Willis Music Company correspondence, by 1948, Book One of the Dozen A Day series was published in the United States, Great Britain, Africa, Australia, Hong Kong and Denmark. Although more than fifty years old, these books are still used in this country and abroad. Once voted one of the five favorite American composers by the National Guild of Piano Teachers, Burnam has enjoyed long-lasting popularity.

Early twentieth-century American authors such as Diller, Quaile, Burnam, Dorothy Gaynor Blake, Ada Richter and others certainly helped pave the way for the more recent women piano pedagogues and method book authors such as Jane Bastien and Clark, who we know so well today.

The early twentieth-century women profiled in this article made significant and lasting contributions to American piano performance and pedagogy. Their efforts not only eased the way for future generations of female musicians, but their achievements were instrumental in promoting musical activity throughout American society in the twentieth century.

CD of Female Composers Available

A group of McDaniel College students have recorded a CD of music by female composers.

The CD, titled Expositions I: Music of the Hildegard Publishing Company, includes vocal, piano and flute pieces that have been previously overlooked, says Robin Armstrong, of the McDaniel College Music Department.

The music on the CD will include work from the eighteenth century to the present, from composers such as Jane Savage, Clara Schumann, Mary Lou Williams, Florence Price and Tania Leon.

"We are providing this CD to studio teachers who are looking for new music to include in their teaching repertoire," says JoAnn McKinney, a senior music history major at McDaniel College. "We know that upon hearing these pieces, teachers will want to explore further the music that Hildegard publishes, and will find this untouched resource useful for students..

The CD, which will come with a catalogue of the scores recorded on the disc, will be available free of charge in January 2003 by contacting Armstrong, Music Department, McDaniel College, 2 College Hill, Westminster, MD 21157; [phone]; [e-mail].

NOTES

(1.) Burgan, Mary. "Heroines at the Piano: Women and Music in Nineteenth-Century Fiction," Victorian Studies, Great Britain, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Fall 1986), pp. 51-76.

(2.) Berg, Barbara. The Remembered Gate: Origins of American Feminism: The Women and the City, 1800-1860 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), p. x.

(3.) Ibid., p. 99.

(4.) Tick, Judith. "Passed Away is the Piano Girl: Changes in American Musical Life, 1870-1900," Women Making Music--The Western Art Tradition, 1150-1950, eds. Jane Bowers and Judith Tick (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1986), pp. 326-327.

(5.) Fay, Amy. Music Study in Germany (Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1880; reprint, New York: Dover Publications, 1965).

(6.) Fay. "The Woman Music Teacher in a Large City," The Etude, Vol. 20, No. 1 (January 1902), p. 14.

(7.) Brower, Harriette M. "Woman's Opportunity in Music: A Symposium to Which Some Well-Known `Etude' Writers, All of Whom are Practical and Experienced Teachers, Have Contributed," The Etude, Vol. 27, No. 7 (July 1909), p. 440.

(8.) Winn, Edith Lynwood. "The Woman Musician," The Etude, Vol. 18, No. 9 (Sept. 1900), p. 335.

(9.) Stoddard, Hope. "Mothers of Great Musicians," The Etude, Vol. 47, No. 11 (Nov. 1929), pp. 807-808 and Carl Engel. "What Great Music Owes to Woman, The Etude, Vol. 47, No. 11 (Nov. 1929), pp. 797-798.

(10.) Brower. "Woman's Opportunity in Music," p. 440.

(11.) Clarke, Frances E. "Music as a Vocation for Women," The Etude, Vol. 36, No. 11 (Nov. 1918), p. 696.

(12.) Teresa Carreno, though born in Venezuela, is listed among American pianists because of her long-time residence in the United States.

(13.) Loesser, Arthur. Men, Women, and Pianos: A Social History (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954), p. 539.

(14.) Clarke. "Music as a Vocation for Women," p. 696.

(15.) Smith, Fanny Morris. "Women as Tuners," The Etude, Vol. 18, No. 1 (January 1900), p. 26.

(16.) Ochesner, A. J. "The Story of America's Largest Musical Organization, The National Federation of Music Clubs," The Etude, Vol. 36, No. 11 (Nov. 1918), pp. 701-702.

(17.) Smith. "The Work Of Our Women's Musical Clubs," The Etude, Vol. 27, No. 7 (July 1909), p. 490.

(18.) Blair, Karen J. The Clubwoman as Feminist, 1868-1914 (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1980), pp. 132-136.

(19.) "Women's Hour of Glory in the Music World," The Etude, Vol. 36, No. 11 (Nov. 1918), p. 689.

(20.) Petteys, Leslie M. Julie Rive-King, American Pianist (D.M.A. dissertation, University of Missouri-Kansas City, 1988). "Piano Teachers and Concert Pianists," Dwight's Journal of Music, Vol. 37 (1877), pp. 84-85. H. Hunecker, "Julie Rive-King," Music, Vol. 18 (1897), pp. 223-225. "Julie Rive-King," The Musician, Vol. 16 (1911), p. 160.

(21.) Van Cleve, John S. "American Virtuoso," The Etude, Vol. 17, No. 5 (May 1899), p. 134.

(22.) Rive-King, Julie. "Thoughts on Music Teaching, Music Study and the Preparation for a Musical Career," Musician, Vol. 18 (Dec. 1913), p. 805. Grace Dickinson Patterson, "Mme. Julie Rive-King on Tempos, Interpretation, Editing," Musician, Vol. 19 (July 1914), p. 446, 494-495. Patterson, "Mme. Julie Rive-King on the Study of Brahms," Musician, Vol. 23 (July 1918), p. 460.

(23.) Matthews, W. S. B. "Editorial Bric-A-Brac," Music [Chicago], Vol. 17 (January 1900), p. 302.

(24.) The Blumenfeld family anglicized their German name to Bloomfield when they moved to the United States. Zeisler was added to Fanny's name in 1885 when she married Siegmund Zeisler, a lawyer from Chicago.

(25.) Bergenfeld, Nathan. "Piano Mastery: Profiles of Twentieth-Century Artist-Teachers," Piano Quarterly, No. 75 (1971), pp. 12-17.

(26.) Armstrong, William. "Mrs. Bloomfield-Zeisler on Study and Repertory," The Etude, Vol. 23, No. 2, (Feb. 1905). Fanny Bloomfield-Zeisler, "Appearing in Public," Great Pianists on Piano Playing, ed. James Francis Cooke (Bryn Mawr: T. Presser, 1917; reprint New York: Dover Publications, 1999), pp. 80-95. Bloomfield-Zeisler, "Women in Music," American Art Journal, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Oct. 17, 1891), pp. 1-3. Carl Engel, "What Great Music Owes to Women," The Etude, Vol. 47, No. 11 (Nov. 1929), pp. 805-806, 863. Bloomfield-Zeisler, "Expression in Piano Playing" [essay], MTNA National Convention (Indianapolis 1887).

(27.) Olga Samaroff was her stage name, and the name of her maternal great-grandmother, who was Russian. She also was known with the last name of Stokowski, the surname of her second husband, renowned conductor Leopold Stokowski, to whom she was married from 1911 to 1923.

(28.) Kline, Donna Staley. Olga Samaroff Stokowski: An American Virtuoso on the World Scene (College Station, Texas: Texas A & M University, 1996). Donna Pucciani, Olga Samaroff (1882-1948): American Musician and Educator (Ph.D. dissertation, New York University, 1979). Olga Samaroff wrote An American Musician's Story [autobiography] (New York: W. W. Norton, 1939); "Concentration in Music," Great Pianists on Piano Playing, ed. James Francis Cooke (Bryn Mawr: T. Presser, 1917; reprint New York: Dover Publications, 1999), pp. 334-347; and "Accuracy in Musical Performance," MTNA Convention (Boston 1948).

(29.) "Samaroff-Stokowski, Olga," Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, 4th ed. (New York: G. Schirmer, 1940), p. 950.

(30.) Dubal, David. The Art of the Piano (New York: Summit Books, 1989), pp. 227-228.

(31.) Samaroff-Stokowski, Olga. "Concentration in Music," Great Pianists on Piano Playing, ed. James Francis Cooke (Bryn Mawr: Theodore Presser, 1917; reprint New York: Dover Publications, 1999), p. 339.

(32.) Cooke, James Francis. "Appearing in Public," Great Pianists on Piano Playing (Bryn Mawr: T. Presser, 1917; reprint (New York: Dover Publications, 1999), p. 341.

(33.) Thompson, Oscar, ed. "Angela Diller," "Diller-Quaile School of Music" and "Elizabeth Quaile," Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Music and Musicians, pp. 458; 1,756.

(34.) For more information about the school, see www.diller-quaile.org.

Debra Brubaker Burns, a professor at Patten College in Oakland, California, earned a Ph.D. degree from the University of Minnesota and an M.A. degree at Ohio University. Her area of research interest is the history of piano methods published in the United States, and her expertise covers music education, piano pedagogy, piano performance and Web-based learning.

Anita Jackson, professor of music at Jackson State University in Mississippi, received M.M. and Ph.D. degrees from Northwestern University and a certificate from the Institute for Russian Musical Culture in St. Petersburg, Russia. Her research in the field of piano pedagogy and other music education articles have appeared in several publications, including The Journal of Research in Music Education.

Connie Arrau Sturm, NCTM, coordinates graduate and undergraduate programs in piano pedagogy at West Virginia University and has served as a past MTNA national student chapters chair. A prolific author and clinician, Sturm won the MTNA American Music Teacher Article of the Year Award in 1998.