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Up for sale "American Pianist" Marian MacDowell Hand Signed TLS Dated 1925.
ES-9605
Marian MacDowell (maiden
name Marian Griswold Nevins) (November 22, 1857 – August 23, 1956) was
an American pianist and philanthropist. In 1907, she and her husband Edward
MacDowell founded the MacDowell
Colony for artists in Peterborough, New Hampshire. Her
leadership of the artist retreat through two world wars, the Great
Depression and other challenges created one of the foremost cultural
institutions in the United States, which cultivated the work of generations of
musicians, writers, poets, sculptors, and visual artists. Marian
Griswold Nevins was born in New York City,
the third of five children born to David H. Nevins, a Wall Street banker, and
his wife, Cornelia L. Perkins. When she was eight, her mother died in
childbirth. Her aunt Caroline Perkins of South Carolina was a talented musician
who came to New York to teach piano. She recognized her niece's gifts and
encouraged them. As Marian grew older, she realized that she needed to study in
Europe, a basis for being taken seriously as a performer or artist at the time.
With a chaperone, she left for Frankfurt in 1880 intending to study with Clara
Schumann at the Hoch
Conservatory. Finding that Clara Schumann was away, Nevins asked for
advice in getting another teacher and was referred to Edward
MacDowell, a young American composer. After working together for
several years, they decided to marry on July 24, 1884. They had one child who
was stillborn. From the beginning Marian had great faith in her husband's
talent and wanted him to devote himself to composing.