Nannette Streicher, geb. Stein (1769-1833) - Fotografie eines Aquarells von Ludwig Krones

The pianist and piano-maker Anna Maria (Nannette) Streicher, née Stein, belonged together with her husband to Ludwig van Beethoven's closest friends in Vienna. She was the daughter of the famous Augsburgian piano-maker Johann Andreas Stein. In 1794, she married Johann Andreas Streicher and moved to Vienna with him, where they ran their own piano factory henceforth. Beethoven already got to know Nannette and Andreas Streicher when he was young. He probably contacted them again soon after the couple had moved to Vienna. Beethoven's friendship with Andreas and Nannette Streicher lasted for decades. In the years of 1817 and 1818, after having been granted sole guardianship of his nephew Karl, Beethoven very often asked for Nannette's advice on all matters concerning the household. More than sixty letters and various notes in the composer's conversation books proove the intimacy of the friendship between Beethoven and the Streicher family.

Beethoven very much appreciated the pianos of Streicher's factory. For some time he preferred them to all other musical instruments, because - as he himself stated more than once - they corresponded to a high degree with his play and sound ideal. In appreciation of Streicher's work, Beethoven helped his friend several times sell the musical instruments.

Nannette and Andreas Streicher had not only been piano-makers. But the concerts they first hosted in their apartment - and from 1812 on in a piano room, which accommodated an audience of 300 people - also made an important contribution to the Viennese musical life. Andreas Streicher was known of his good connections, his competence and his solicitousness. Very often, he was the contact person for Beethoven's friends and aquaintances, when they could not or did not want to get in touch with Beethoven in person.(S.B.)