Did you know?

Did you know that in the final decade of the 19th century, when national divisions in Trieste extended even into the musical sphere, the Viennese pianist Lucilla Tolomei Podgornik (1854–1937) boldly collaborated with the leading German, Italian, and Slovene institutions? After marrying the journalist Fran Podgornik (1846–1904), she moved to Gorizia, where she integrated into the Slovene cultural environment through teaching, performing, and writing articles on Slavic music, while at the same time maintaining fruitful connections with German and Italian musical circles.

After moving to Trieste in 1890, she formed a close artistic partnership with the violinist Julius Heller (1839–1901). Together they organized a series of “historical concerts” in which they presented the development of the violin sonata from the Baroque era to the late Romantic period, without paying heed to the national origin of the selected composers.

You can read more about the multifaceted work of Lucilla Tolomei Podgornik, her influence on musical life in Trieste and in Slovene culture more broadly, and the reasons why this gifted musician was pushed into a century of oblivion in the article by Sara Zupančič (https://doi.org/10.3986/dmd21.1.05).