Harmonies and Heritage

We cordially invite you to the lecture from the cycle Dialogo della musica, which will be given by  Birgit Lodes (Vienna) on the topic of Harmonies and Heritage: Exploring the Musical Legacy of Charlotte Princess Kinsky.

The lecture will take place on Tuesday, September 17, 2024 at 5 pm in the Musicological library IAH, Puškinovo nám. 9, Prague 6.

Charlotte Princess Kinsky, wife and widow of Beethoven’s patron Ferdinand Prince Kinsky, was a dedicatee of song collections by composers like Václav Jan Tomášek, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Franz Schubert. Raised in the music-loving von Kerpen family in Koblenz, she emigrated to Prague in 1792. In 1801, she married Ferdinand, bringing a deep love for music and a beautiful voice. My lecture explores her musical life in Prague, focusing on compositions performed at her wedding, on the pieces in her private music collection, and on drawings of the Kinsky home by her mother.

Birgit Lodes studied in Munich, at UCLA, and at Harvard University. She has been Full Professor at the University of Vienna since 2005, and a corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences since 2008. Since 2020, she has been general editor of the Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Österreich. Her research focuses on Beethoven, Schubert, and on music around 1500. Together with Reinhard Strohm, she edits and curates the multimedia research platform “Musical Life of the Late Middle Ages in the Austrian Region” http://www.musical-life.net). Her latest book is Beethoven-Geflechte. A Beethoven Tapestry. Networks and Cultures of Memory, 2024, co-edited with Melanie Unseld.