Throwback Thursday: The Concert Pianist
By Chana Pollack December 19, 2013
Welcome to Throwback Thursday, a weekly photo feature in which we sift 116 years of Forward history to find snapshots of women’s lives.
Concert pianist Irene Jacobi (formerly Schwarcz) was a graduate of New York City’s Institute of Musical Art, now known as the Juilliard School. She met her husband Frederick Jacobi when he was an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera. A match made in music heaven, they married in 1917 and Irene frequently played Frederick’s music, which drew on influences as diverse as Native American folkloric recordings and Jewish traditional themes. Accompanied by orchestras or quartets, the pair performed his compositions at concerts of Jewish vocal and instrumental music in New York City at the Lexington Avenue YM-YWCA and Temple Emanu-El and at multiple venues in Europe as well.
She was also a recording artist with major labels including RCA. Frederick died in 1952. In 1972, Irene produced a Carnegie Hall concert of her husband’s music.
To read more about Irene Jacobi and to listen to a recording of her and her husband, check out the WNYC piece on their life.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we need 500 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Our Goal: 500 gifts during our Passover Pledge Drive!
