Three Bio-Bibliographical Studies: Coninx, Rucquoy, Rie: Forgotten Masters of the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

1.  Coninx (Louis-Joseph), ca. 1803-1876, flutist/composer, active Paris. L. Coninx, as he was customarily known, is among the most obscure of the flutists active in Paris during the golden age of the flute in the first half of the nineteenth century. The only time at which his full name is given was in the various news items reporting his death, at the age of seventy-three, in 1876, at which time he is invariably named as Louis Joseph Coninx. He produced 64 numbered opuses, as well as additional works without opus number. Few of these are remembered today. 
2. Rucquoy (Frédéric-Auguste), 1829-1910, flutist/composer, born in Lierre, professionally active as professor of flute at the Conservatory of Strasbourg. Among the hundreds of works for flute and piano included at the International Music Score Library Project is the Echoes of Alsace, there attributed to Frédéric Rucquoy (1852-ca. 1915). In fact, the work is the only surviving piece by the elder Rucquoy, more distinguished than his son, and with a more notable career. Both are pictured in the 1906 anthology of photographs of notable flutist, the Portraits und Biographien hervorragender Flöten-Virtuosen, -Dilettanten und -Komponisten issued in Berlin by Adolf Goldberg. 
3.   Rie, Bernard, 1838-1910, pianist/composer, born Prague, active Paris. Among the many musical emigrés to be trained in Prague in the nineteenth century was Bernhard Rie. He was one of ten children to be born to David Israel Rie (himself born Dec. 3, 1805) and his wife Lotti (Charlotte, Carolina) Sobotka, b. 1806. Bernhard was the next to youngest of the surviving children. He produced almost fifty numbered opuses during a successful career as composer and virtuoso, and was one of a number of Jewish piano virtuosos born and trained in Prague in the early nineteenth century, along with Moscheles and Tedesco.