Greater Astoria Historial Society 35-20 Broadway, 4th Floor | L.I.C., NY 11106 718.278.0700 | www.astorialic.org Gallery Hours: Mondays & Wednesdays 2-5 PM Saturdays 12-5 PM Exhibits ~ Lectures ~ Documentaries ~ Books Walking Tours ~ Historical Research Unique & Creative Content For more information visit us on the web at www.astorialic.org This image adapted from an invitation to the Long Island City Athletics 33rd Annual Masque Ball, 1909. 32 august 2014 i LIC COURIER i www.queenscourier.com legends The other day I received a phone call from someone interested in one of our books – a local real estate person. He mentioned that he had just closed a deal on a house depicted in one of its pages and wanted a picture of it. Upon inquiry I discovered he was interested in the Ferdinand Quentin Dulcken House. Although the name is meaningless in Astoria today, the writer regularly gets phone calls from Europe from those seeking information about the Dulcken family in America. They ask me, when they come to New York, if they can visit the house – expecting to find it as museum. They are appalled when they discover that it is a rooming house. When they hear that it soon might be demolished they are speechless. The Dulckens are the first family of music. Everyone who is either a musician, or a lover of music, owes them a debt as instrument makers, composers, artists, and teachers of music. The Steinways recognized this when they brought Ferdinand Dulcken to America. Like the Steinways, the Dulcken family roots are German. Patriarch, Johannes was one of the outstanding harpsichord craftsmen of all time. Expanding into other keyboard instruments, organs and pianos, his family had workshops in Amsterdam, Antwerp, and later Munich. During the time of a greatgrandson, Theobald, who lived in the mid-nineteenth century, the family made the critical move from workshop to concert stage. Theobald’s wife, Louise David, was the sister of Ferdinand David, one of the greatest violinists of all time. Louise, a child prodigy who spoke German, English, French and Italian was the first female pianist to perform with the London Philharmonic. Queen Victoria sought her as a teacher, and soon the wives of the crown heads of Europe were begging Louise, sister Therese, as well as nieces Sophie and Isabella, for keyboard lessons. They were the toast of the continent as composers, teachers and concert artists. Isabella helped popularize the concertina. Niece Sophie Drinker became a princess when she married Prince Radziwill in 1857. She is remembered today with the Sophie Drinker Institute in Germany, a research institute that specializes in musicological women’s and gender studies. Ferdinand Quentin Dulcken, born in 1837, was one of six children of Theobald and Louise. He studied music with his uncle, Ferdinand David and his uncle’s close friend, Felix Mendelssohn. He continued the family tradition as a performer, a composer, and as a teacher. He also managed a number of the greatest concert artists of his age. After Ferdinand moved to New York in 1876, he helped the Steinways make our city the world wide center of entertainment. In 1884, he married Mary Totten of Bowery Bay. Contemporary writers described their house as a museum filled with mementos from the family’s, as well as New York’s, early history. One witness recalled a framed note on the wall from author Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Ferdinand Quentin Dulckin, the father of music education in this country, and colleague of the Steinways, placed New York firmly as the world’s Capital of Culture. He died in 1901. Every person who has studied music, or is involved in some fashion with the cultural scene of New York owes their success, in some part, to this man and his family. The house deserves to be restored and to become a New York City Landmark. Many people who recently moved to Astoria are in the arts. Perhaps one of them would like to take up the challenge. Let us know if you are interested. The Dulckens LEGENDS OF LIC BY GREATER ASTORIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY LEGENDS OF LIC
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