Elisabeth Röckel (15 March 1793 – 3 March 1883) was a German

soprano A soprano () is a type of classical female singing voice and has the highest vocal range of all voice types. The soprano's vocal range (using scientific pitch notation) is from approximately middle C (C4) = 261 Hz to "high A" (A5) = 880&n ...

opera singer and the wife of the composer

Johann Nepomuk Hummel Johann Nepomuk Hummel (14 November 177817 October 1837) was an Austrian composer and virtuoso pianist. His music reflects the Transition from Classical to Romantic music, transition from the Classical period (music), Classical to the Romantic ...

Life

Röckel was born in Neunburg vorm Wald, Bavaria, and baptised Maria Eva. She was a sister of the opera singer Joseph August Röckel (1783–1870) who played Florestan in the second version of Beethoven’s opera '' Fidelio'', which premiered in the Theater an der Wien in 1806. In the same year she came to Vienna, too, where she lived in a flat in the theater, together with her brother. In a register of the residents of the theater she is named "Elis Rökel". According to this register in another flat of the theater lived the famous singer Anna Milder-Hauptmann with her family, who played the title role of ''Fidelio''. She became a close friend of Elisabeth. Many sources show that Elisabeth often met Beethoven who fell in love with the beautiful young girl and wanted to marry her. However, in April 1810 Elisabeth Röckel got an engagement at the theater in

Bamberg Bamberg (, , ; East Franconian: ''Bambärch'') is a town in Upper Franconia, Germany, on the river Regnitz close to its confluence with the river Main. The town dates back to the 9th century, when its name was derived from the nearby ' castle. C ...

where she made her stage debut as Donna Anna in Mozart's ''

Don Giovanni ''Don Giovanni'' (; K. 527; Vienna (1788) title: , literally ''The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni'') is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. Its subject is a centuries-old Spanis ...

'' and became a friend of the writer

E. T. A. Hoffmann Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann (born Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann; 24 January 1776 – 25 June 1822) was a German Romantic author of fantasy and Gothic horror, a jurist, composer, music critic and artist. Penrith Goff, "E.T.A. Hoffmann" in E ...

. The German musicologist Klaus Martin Kopitz has suggested that Beethoven wrote his famous Bagatelle No. 25 for piano, commonly known as " Für Elise", in the days of Elisabeth Röckel's departure from Vienna. It had the inscription "" or Elise on 27 April (1810) as memento by L. v. Bthvn Indeed, Anna Milder-Hauptmann named her "Elise" in a letter to her. During the days before Beethoven's death, she and her husband Hummel visited Beethoven several times, and cut and saved a lock of his hair. This was later discovered in 1934 in Florence by Wilhelm Hummel, a descendant of Johann Nepomuk Hummel. The lock of hair is now in the Beethoven Center of the San Jose State University.William Meredith, "New Acquisitions (Summer 2012): The Yvonne Hummel Collection", ''The Beethoven Journal'', vol. 27, no. 2 (Winter 2012), pp. 74–80 From 1819 until her death at age 89, Röckel lived in Weimar.

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Life

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Further reading