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Leopoldine Blahetka
16.3.1809 - 17.1.1885
Born near Vienna in Guntramsdorf, Leopoldine Blahetka attracted attention at the age of six for her pianistic talent and was described as a “child prodigy” in numerous press releases. On Beethoven’s advice Joseph Czerny was hired to teach her, followed by Friedrich Kalkbrenner and Ignaz Moscheles, among others.
As part of her busy concert schedule, she performed a number of her own compositions, which received consistently positive reviews. Her list of works comprises sixty-four opus numbers, most of which were published by a number of renowned publishers during her lifetime. Leopoldine Blahetka lived with her family in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France, probably as early as 1830, where she devoted herself to promoting young talents until her death.
Stefan Mendl’s thoughts on the work
Leopoldine Blahetka, who was born near Vienna in Guntramsdorf in 1809 and died in Boulogne-sur-Mer in France in 1885, was considered a child prodigy and was already performing as a virtuoso in 1818 at the age of nine. At one concert, she played variations on a theme from “Castor and Pollux” for piano and orchestra by Johann Nepomuk Hummel. Her performance aroused great enthusiasm from experts, the press and the public. The young Blahetka received lessons from the famous virtuosos Friedrich Kalkbrenner and Ignaz Moscheles and theory lessons from the legendary Simon Sechter, who later became Bruckner’s teacher.
Her “Variations brillantes” op.4 for piano and orchestra or string quartet are entirely in the tradition of Hummel. A typical feature of the virtuoso literature of this period was the ritornello-like interlude of an ensemble or orchestra. It was to be played after the theme and each individual variation, if only to give the audience the opportunity to immediately cheer each of the variations, which are usually full of breakneck difficulties.
In her work, Blahetka not only writes extremely entertaining and technically demanding variations for the piano (runs in thirds, octave passages, daring leaps) on a Ländler theme, she also has the accompanying ensemble play a short “polonaise” as an interlude and creates harmonically exciting contrasts to the virtuoso fireworks with a slow minor introduction and a charming quiet minor variation. No wonder even Paganini and Schumann paid tribute to Leopoldine Blahetka’s talent.