Berger, Francesco
Berger, Francesco
Berger, Francesco, English pianist and composer; b. London, June 10, 1834; d. there, April 25, 1933. He studied harmony with Luigi Ricci in Trieste, piano with Karl Lickl in Vienna; later studied with Hauptmann and Plaidy at Leipzig. Returning to London, he was a prof. of piano at the Royal Academy of Music and at the Guildhall School of Music. He made frequent concert tours through Great Britain and Ireland, and was for some years director and, from 1884 to 1911, honorary secretary of the Phil. Soc. He composed an opera, II Lazzarone, a Mass, overtures and incidental music to Wilkie Collins’s The Frozen Deep and The Lighthouse, many songs, and piano pieces. He publ. First Steps at the Pianoforte, Reminiscences, Impressions and Anecdotes, Musical Expressions, Phrases and Sentences, and a Musical Vocabulary in 4 Languages (1922). In 1931 he publ. his memoirs, entitled (with reference to his age) 97.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire