IDENTITY STATEMENT
Reference code(s): GB 1249 MS 6922
Held at: Royal College of Music
Title: JOACHIM, Joseph (1831-1907)
Date(s): 1895-1903
Level of description: Collection (fonds)
Extent: 1 file
Name of creator(s): Joachim | Joseph | 1831-1907 | violinist
CONTEXT
Administrative/Biographical history:
Joseph Joachim (1831-1907) was an Austro-Hungarian violinist, composer, conductor and teacher. After education in Pest and Vienna, he studied under Mendelssohn in Leipzig and was an ardent advocate of Mendelssohn's works throughout his life. He later studied under Liszt in Weimar, but came to reject composition in the 1860s and concentrate on performance and instruction. He established a school of instrumental music in the Konigliche Hochschule fur Musik in Berlin, as well as giving concerts internationally over the next forty years. He was particularly renowned for his individual performances of the violin works of J S Bach and Beethoven, as well as the regular concerts given with colleagues from the Hochschule, who formed the Joachim Quartet which Joachim had established in 1869. For further details on Joachim and the Joachim Quartet see Grove Dictionary of Music. Anne Isabella Ritchie was born in 1837, and was the eldest daughter of the author William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863). She was married in 1877 to the civil servant Sir Richmond Thackeray Willoughby Ritchie (1854-1912), and was a novelist, biographer and renowned society hostess. She died in 1919. For further details on the Ritchies see the Dictionary of National Biography.
CONTENT
Scope and content/abstract:
Three letters of thanks and greetings from Joseph Joachim to Anne Isabella Ritchie (1895, 1902 and undated); programme for concert of the Joachim Quartet, St James's Hall, London, 1 May 1903.
ACCESS AND USE
Language/scripts of material: English.
System of arrangement:
Conditions governing access:
Usual conditions of the Library of the Royal College of Music apply. See the RCM website or contact the RCM Library for details.
Conditions governing reproduction:
Photocopying is permitted at the discretion of the Archivist for research purposes only.
Physical characteristics:
Finding aids:
The collection is catalogued in the 'Provisional catalogue of letters in the RCM library' by J Kersey, 1997, vol 1.
ARCHIVAL INFORMATION
Appraisal, destruction and scheduling information:
Accruals:
Archival history:
Immediate source of acquisition:
Given to the RCM by Mrs Belinda Norman-Butler (a descendant of the Ritchies), 1985.
ALLIED MATERIALS
Existence and location of originals:
Existence and location of copies:
Related material:
RCM Library holds correspondence to Fanny Davies, 1886-1906 (MS 7505).
British Library, Music Collections, holds family correspondence of Joachim, 1839-1881 (Ref: Add MS 42718) and letters to Sir George Grove, 1890-1899 (3095).
Publication note:
DESCRIPTION NOTES
Note:
Archivist's note: Compiled by Robert Baxter as part of the RSLP AIM25 Project. Sources: Articles on Joachim and the Joachim Quartet, Grove Dictionary of Music; articles on the Ritchies, Dictionary of National Biography; National Register of Archives.
Date(s) of descriptions: Nov 2001