Finck, Henry T(heophilus)

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Finck, Henry T(heophilus)

Finck, Henry T(heophilus), prominent American music critic and editor; b. Bethel, Mo., Sept. 22, 1854;d. Rumford Falls, Maine, Oct. 1, 1926. He was brought up in Ore., then entered Harvard Univ., where he studied with J.K. Paine. After graduation in 1876 he went to Germany. He studied comparative psychology in Berlin and Vienna, and publ. a book, Romantic Love and Personal Beauty (1887), propounding a theory that romantic love was unknown to the ancient nations. He was music critic of the N.Y. Evening Post and the Nation from 1881 to 1924, and occasionally wrote for other journals. Finck was a brilliant journalist. In his books on music he stressed the personal and psychological elements. He married the pianist Abbie Cushman in 1890; a fine literary stylist, she succeeded in copying her husband’s style and even wrote music reviews for him.

Writings

Chopin, and Other Musical Essays (1889); Wagner and His Works (2 vols., 1893; reprinted 1968); with others, Anton Seidl: A Memorial by His Friends (1899); Songs and Song Writers (1900); Edvard Grieg (1906); Grieg and His Music (1909); Success in Music and How It Is Won (1909); Massenet and His Operas (1910); Richard Strauss (1917); Musical Progress (1923).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire