Observations

If Fanny Mendelssohn had not had a famous brother, Felix, her music may never have been heard outside her household.  Women could not have their work published in her day. Felix would, at her request and mostly with her permission, publish her compositions under his name.  Experts in musicology have since been able to identify her compositions apart from her brother’s. In addition to being a supremely gifted artist, she also invented what was then a new musical form – ‘songs without words’, often poetic and expressing deep human feelings. The illustration on this score was drawn by Fanny’s husband, Wilhelm Hensel, a successful artist. 

Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel - Biography