Robert Emil Lienau (28 December 1838 – 22 July 1920) was a prolific German music publisher. Lienau was born in

Neustadt in Holstein Neustadt in Holstein (; Holsatian: ''Niestadt in Holsteen'') is a town in the district of Ostholstein, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, on the Bay of Lübeck 30 km northeast of Lübeck, and 50 km southeast of Kiel. History In World War I ...

and entered the publishing firm of

Adolf Martin Schlesinger Adolf Martin Schlesinger (4 October 1769 – 11 October 1838) was a German music publisher whose firm became one of the most influential in Berlin in the early nineteenth century. Career Schlesinger was Jewish, and was born Aaron Moses Schlesing ...

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

in 1863. In the following year he acquired the firm, initially merely adding his own name to Schlesinger's. The firm Robert Lienau issued the works of leading composers such as

Anton Bruckner Josef Anton Bruckner (; 4 September 182411 October 1896) was an Austrian composer, organist, and music theorist best known for his symphonies, masses, Te Deum and motets. The first are considered emblematic of the final stage of Austro-Germ ...

Jean Sibelius Jean Sibelius ( ; ; born Johan Julius Christian Sibelius; 8 December 186520 September 1957) was a Finnish composer of the late Romantic and 20th-century classical music, early-modern periods. He is widely regarded as his country's greatest com ...

Leopold Godowsky Leopold Mordkhelovich Godowsky Sr. (13 February 1870 – 21 November 1938) was a Lithuanian-born American virtuoso pianist, composer and teacher. He was one of the most highly regarded performers of his time, known for his theories concernin ...

and

Alban Berg Alban Maria Johannes Berg ( , ; 9 February 1885 – 24 December 1935) was an Austrian composer of the Second Viennese School. His compositional style combined Romantic lyricism with the twelve-tone technique. Although he left a relatively sma ...

. In 1875 he also acquired the Vienna-based publishing company Haslinger, originally founded by

Tobias Haslinger Tobias Haslinger (1 March 1787 - 18 June 1842) was an Austrian composer and music publisher. He published works by composers including, among others, Beethoven, Bendel, Mozart, Schubert Franz Peter Schubert (; 31 January 179719 November 1 ...

, which also brought many works by

Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...

Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...

Spohr Louis Spohr (, 5 April 178422 October 1859), baptized Ludewig Spohr, later often in the modern German form of the name Ludwig, was a German composer, violinist and conducting, conductor. Highly regarded during his lifetime, Spohr composed ten Sy ...

, Hummel, and Johann Strauss senior and

junior Junior or Juniors may refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * ''Junior'' (Junior Mance album), 1959 * ''Junior'' (Röyksopp album), 2009 * ''Junior'' (Kaki King album), 2010 * ''Junior'' (LaFontaines album), 2019 Films * ''Junior'' (1994 ...

into the business. Robert Lienau withdrew from the management of the company in 1898 (he died in 1920 in Neustadt in Holstein) and inherited it to his son Robert Heinrich Lienau (1866–1949), whose

lobbying In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agency, regulatory agencie ...

on the issue of musical

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

influenced the new copyright laws of the

German Reich German ''Reich'' (lit. German Realm, German Empire, from german: Deutsches Reich, ) was the constitutional name for the German nation state that existed from 1871 to 1945. The ''Reich'' became understood as deriving its authority and sovereignty ...

of 1901. From 1910 the company was managed by Robert Heinrich and his brother Friedrich Wilhelm Lienau (1876–1973), but they separated in 1938, with the younger brother taking over responsibility for the Haslinger business in Vienna and the elder remaining in Berlin. Following the death of Hugo Bock in 1932, Lienau also took over

Bote & Bock Bote & Bock is a German publishing house founded in Berlin in 1838 by Eduard Bote and Gustav Bock (1813-1863). The first Gustav Bock was a musically gifted publisher with an eye for opera. Eduard Bote withdrew from the business in 1847, after the ...

in 1935.Michael Kennedy, Joyce Bourne: "Bote & Bock", in: ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music'', p. 90 (2004). Following Robert Heinrich Lienau's death in 1949 the company was managed by his children. It was sold in 1990 to the publisher

Zimmermann Zimmermann is a German occupational surname for a carpenter. The modern German terms for the occupation of carpenter are Zimmerer, Tischler, or Schreiner, but Zimmermann is still used. ''Zimmer'' in German means room or archaically a chamber wi ...

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

References

External links

Robert Lienau
website (in German) {{DEFAULTSORT:Lienau, Robert 1838 births 1920 deaths German publishers (people) Sheet music publishers (people)