Schmidl, Carlo

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Schmidl, Carlo

Schmidl, Carlo, Italian music publisher and lexicographer; b. Trieste, Oct. 7, 1859; d. there, Oct. 7, 1943. He was the son and pupil of the Hungarian composer Antonio (actually, Anton) Schmidl (1814–80). In 1872 he entered the employ of the music publisher Vicentini, and in 1889 he established his own business at Trieste; also directed the Leipzig branch of the Ricordi Co. (1901–06). He compiled and publ, an important biographical music dictionary, Dizionario universale dei musicisti (Milan, 1887–89; second ed., 1926–29; suppl., 1938; third ed., 1938), containing scrupulously accurate data on Italian musicians, exact dates of performance of major works, and other information testifying to independent research. Schmidl also wrote biographies of Schumann (1890) and G.S. Mayr (1901).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire