born on May 31, 1804 in Paris, France
died on September 15, 1875 in Paris, France
French composer, pianist, and musicologist
150th anniversary of her death on September 15, 2025
Biography
In 2004, the 200th birthday of the important French composer Louise Farrenc was celebrated internationally with many events, similar to the celebrations of her compatriot and contemporary (to within a few months) George Sand (1804-1876). This would have been practically unthinkable ten years earlier when it seemed that almost no one knew of Louise Farrenc. It was the result of the relentless work of the new women's movement to educate and raise awareness of women’s contributions that she had finally been recognized. Although there were not quite as many celebrations as there had been for Hector Berlioz's 200th birthday a year earlier, it was still significant. The Women's Music Forum Switzerland (www.fmf.ch) proudly announced: “The complete edition of Louise Farrenc's works is now available.”
Life and work:
“She is a tall woman with cerebral features, almost masculine in appearance, with silver hair, graying less from age than from the fever of her thoughts, with a broad and high forehead that reveals a talent for combining ideas, with a steady and slightly inquiring gaze…” – this is how a contemporary critic described the composer. Another described her as having “a distinguished but strict and cool appearance… reserved, pale, and ascetic.”
Raised in a liberal environment, Louise Dumont enjoyed a rich cultural education as a child. At the age of fifteen, she began studying composition with Anton Reicha at the Paris Conservatory. At seventeen, she married the flutist Aristide Farrenc, who later published her first piano works as a music publisher and helped organize her concerts. In 1826, her only child, Victorine, was born (who, like her mother, became a composer and pianist; she died of tuberculosis in 1859 at the age of 32). In 1834, Farrenc wrote her first orchestral works. In 1842, she was appointed professor of piano at the Paris Conservatory, where she was the only woman in such a position and taught young girls and women until her retirement. She was honored in 1861 and 1869, twice receiving the coveted Prix Chartier of the Académie des Beaux-Arts for her orchestral works.
However, Louise Farrenc did not see herself solely as a composer and pianist: throughout her life, she also worked in the field of musicology. Together with her husband, she published a 23-volume collection of sheet music for keyboard instruments from 1500 to 1850: Le Trésor des Pianistes, a careful compilation of the best works from the 16th to the 19th century, with historical, biographical, and interpretative information accompanying each piece. This important collection still exists today. When her husband died, she edited it alone for nine years.
After her death, she was forgotten until the new women's movement rediscovered her. A multi-volume edition of Louise Farrenc's works is currently being published at the University of Oldenburg as part of a large-scale research project led by Prof. Freia Hoffmann. Based on this preliminary work, her first and third symphonies have already been recorded on CD by the NDR Radio Philharmonic Orchestra Hannover. Her works are thematically detailed, formally convincing, and full of melodic ideas. Farrenc drew on the tradition of Viennese Classicism, which she purposefully developed further with colorful instrumentation and a harmonious, romantic style. Her chamber music, including a nonet and a sextet, is also a treat for the ears.
(Text from 2000, updated 2004 for FemBio by Luise F. Pusch. Translated with DeepL.com; edited by Ramona Fararo, 2025. Please consult the German version for additional information, pictures, sources, videos, and bibliography.)
Quotes
In France, Madame Farrenc is honored and admired by those who know her, but the masses have never cheered her name, for as a woman she is consequently too weak to make her way through the streets crowded with the ‘strong’. She constantly encounters only hostility and stubborn jealousy… We are astonished that neither the Conservatory nor the ‘Societé des jeunes artistes’... have considered taking up Madame Farrenc's great orchestral works… This is a criminal omission, against which enlightened critics must protest, and we will repeat this protest every time we see Madame Farrenc forced to organize concerts herself… (La France Musicale, 1857)
This First Symphony is an extremely remarkable work, and it is only right and proper to draw public attention to its author, whose merits seem to me to be neither sufficiently known nor sufficiently promoted. (François-Joseph Fetis, 1845)
The fact that there are fewer female composers than male composers ... is certainly not due to women being denied access. ... It is usually overlooked that genetically determined gender differences are not limited to the physical realm. (Letter to the editor by Prof. Dr. Waltger Rummel, FAZ, September 15, 1998)
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