Felix Fox (born May 25, 1876, Breslau,

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

– d. March 24, 1947, Boston, Massachusetts) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

-born concert

pianist A pianist ( , ) is an individual musician who plays the piano. Since most forms of Western music can make use of the piano, pianists have a wide repertoire and a wide variety of styles to choose from, among them traditional classical music, ja ...

and educator. Fox studied piano with

Carl Reinecke Carl Heinrich Carsten Reinecke (23 June 182410 March 1910) was a German composer, conductor, and pianist in the mid-Romantic era. Biography Reinecke was born in what is today the Hamburg district of Altona; technically he was born a Dane, as ...

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

, and Hungarian-French pianist Isidor Philipp in Paris, and studied music theory with

Salomon Jadassohn Salomon Jadassohn (13 August 1831 – 1 February 1902) was a German pianist, composer and a renowned teacher of piano and composition at the Leipzig Conservatory. Life Jadassohn was born to a Jewish family living in Breslau, the capital of the ...

. Fox graduated from the Royal Conservatory of Music in Leipzig where he made his debut in 1896. He made his

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

debut in 1897, his

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

debut in 1898, and his

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

debut in 1907. Fox performed concerts with the

New York Symphony Orchestra The New York Symphony Orchestra was founded as the New York Symphony Society in New York City by Leopold Damrosch in 1878. For many years it was a rival to the older Philharmonic Symphony Society of New York. It was supported by Andrew Carnegie, ...

, the

Philadelphia Orchestra The Philadelphia Orchestra is an American symphony orchestra, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. One of the " Big Five" American orchestras, the orchestra is based at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, where it performs its subscription ...

, the Dannreuther String Quartet, as soloist with the

Griller Quartet The Griller String Quartet was a British musical ensemble particularly active from 1931 to c.1961 or 1963, when it was disbanded. The quartet was in residence at the University of California at Berkeley from 1949 to 1961. It performed a wide repert ...

, violinist Albert Spalding, the Boston Festival Orchestra, the Boston Pops Orchestra, and the

Boston Symphony Orchestra The Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is an American orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the second-oldest of the five major American symphony orchestras commonly referred to as the " Big Five". Founded by Henry Lee Higginson in 1881, ...

. Fox moved to Boston, Massachusetts in 1897, and in 1898 co-founded the Fox-Buonamici School of Pianoforte Playing with pianist Carlo Buonamici at 403 Marlborough Street in Boston's Back Bay. After Buonamici's death, in 1920, the school became the Felix Fox School of Pianoforte Playing. The school was closed in 1935. Among Fox's students were the composer Miriam Gideon and pianist and educator

Harrison Potter Harrison Potter (May 9, 1891, North Adams, Massachusetts – October 3, 1984, Holyoke, Massachusetts) was an American concert pianist, accompanist, choral conductor, and educator. Potter studied piano with Felix Fox, and, in Paris, Isidor Phil ...

. Potter went on to teach at the Fox-Buonamici School. Fox also taught piano at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts in the 1920s. Fox composed a number of songs and works for solo piano and also made transcriptions of works by composer and pianist

Edward MacDowell Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the late Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites ''Woodland Sketches'', ''Sea Pieces'' and ''Ne ...

. In 1917, Fox published "The Boston Music Company Digest Of Piano Pieces: For The Left Hand Alone," reprinted by

Kessinger Publishing Kessinger Publishing LLC is an American print-on-demand Print on demand (POD) is a printing technology and business process in which book copies (or other documents, packaging or materials) are not printed until the company receives an orde ...

, LLC, in 2010. In 1932, Fox began work on the operetta, ''The King Fishers'' in collaboration with noted Broadway tenor and lyricist George Mitchell. ''The King Fishers'' was copyrighted in 1933 and received its premiere by Boston's Repertory Theatre in 1934. In 1935, Fox was named a Chevalier in the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon, ...

for his service to French Music. Fox married Mary Vincent Pratt in 1910; they had two children.International Who's Who in Music and Musical Gazetteer: "A contemporary biographical dictionary and a record of the world's musical activity," by César Saerchinger, page 200, Current Literature Publishing Company, 1918

References

External links

* https://archive.today/20130112033913/http://www.box.net/shared/xoamu98toh Etude, Opus 24, No.1, by Moritz Moszkowski, played by Felix Fox on the Ampico Reproducing System, circa 1920, Roll #101003L {{DEFAULTSORT:Fox, Felix 1876 births 1947 deaths German music educators German pianists Pupils of Isidor Philipp Emigrants from the German Empire to the United States