Carlo Ferdinando Lickl: The Life of a Nineteenth-Century Triestine Composer; a Case Study on Music History Construction in a Border Region of the Habsburg Empire

Abstract

Focusing on Carlo Ferdinando Lickl (1803–64), a Viennese-born composer who shaped the musical life of Trieste as a pianist, educator, and composer from the 1830s until his death, this article develops four distinct perspectives on his life, each developed on a different model of historical construction. Comparing two national perspectives, Italian and German, with two transnational perspectives, one applying the notion of cultural transfer and the other adopting the cosmopolitan view of nineteenth-century Triestine merchants, the article uses Lickl’s biography for a critical reflection on the construction of music history in a heterogeneous border region of the Habsburg Empire. It argues for the necessity of extending the focus of an Austrian music history beyond present-day national borders and at the same time questions the construction of national historiographies. back to index next article

Keywords

• 19th century
• border studies
• center and peripherie
• cultural transfer
• deutscher turnerverein
• habsburg monarchy
• hermann und thusnelde
• kotzebue, august von
• lickl, carlo ferdinando
• nationalism
• opera
• piano music
• schiller, friedrich
• trieste