Marie Soldat-Roeger (born in

Graz Graz () is the capital of the Austrian Federal states of Austria, federal state of Styria and the List of cities and towns in Austria, second-largest city in Austria, after Vienna. On 1 January 2025, Graz had a population of 306,068 (343,461 inc ...

(

Styria Styria ( ; ; ; ) is an Austrian Federal states of Austria, state in the southeast of the country. With an area of approximately , Styria is Austria's second largest state, after Lower Austria. It is bordered to the south by Slovenia, and cloc ...

), March 25, 1863, died in Graz (Styria), September 30, 1955) was a

violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...

virtuoso A virtuoso (from Italian ''virtuoso'', or ; Late Latin ''virtuosus''; Latin ''virtus''; 'virtue', 'excellence' or 'skill') is an individual who possesses outstanding talent and technical ability in a particular art or field such as fine arts, ...

active in

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * String instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, ...

l and

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

in the

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A pupil of violin master

Joseph Joachim Joseph Joachim (28 June 1831 – 15 August 1907) was a Hungarian Violin, violinist, Conducting, conductor, composer and teacher who made an international career, based in Hanover and Berlin. A close collaborator of Johannes Brahms, he is widely ...

, she was born 'Marie Soldat', but in 1889 married a lawyer named Roeger. While studying with Joachim at the

Berlin Hochschule für Musik Berlin ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the highest population within its city limits of any city in the European Union. The city is also one of the states of ...

, she won the Mendelssohn Prize in 1880. Marie Soldat-Roeger became friends with Marie Baumayer, an Austrian pianist, Baumayer was friends with Clara Wittingstein (part of the important

Wittgenstein family The Wittgenstein family is a German-Austrian family that rose to prominence in 19th- and 20th-century Vienna, Austria. The family was originally Jewish and originated from the in Siegen-Wittgenstein, Germany. The Austrian branch of the Wittgen ...

) and

Johannes Brahms Johannes Brahms (; ; 7 May 1833 – 3 April 1897) was a German composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor of the mid-Romantic period (music), Romantic period. His music is noted for its rhythmic vitality and freer treatment of dissonance, oft ...

. The latter introduced her to

, who trained her in violin. For many years, she was the only woman to play Brahms's Violin Concerto. In the late 1880s and early 1890s, she formed an all-female string quartet, in which she played first violin. Agnes Tschetschulin played second violin, Gabriele Roy played viola and Lucy Hebert Campbell played cello. The group toured and was managed by the Herman Wolff Agency, which also managed the Berlin Philharmonic. The group was billed as the world's first all-female professional string quartet. In 1896, she founded the celebrated, all-female Soldat-Roeger Quartet, whose viola-player was Natalie Bauer-Lechner, Elsa Edle von Plank as second violinist (replacing Ella Finger-Bailetti in 1898), and

Leontine Gärtner Leontine may refer to: ;As a given name *Lona Cohen, Leontine "Lona" Cohen (1913–1992), American spy for the Soviet Union *Leontine Cooper (1837–1903), Australian trade unionist, suffragist and campaigner for women's rights *Leontine T. Kelly ( ...

as cellist (replacing Lucy Herbert Campbell in 1903). This quartet would perform at '' Soirées musicales'' presenting modern music.

References

Further reading