Robert Fischhof

The Fischhof home in Vienna was a well-known center for celebrated musicians, composers and singers arriving from all over the world.

Fischhof had musical uncles: his father was the youngest brother of Joseph Fischhof, who became Professor of Piano at the Vienna Conservatoire in 1833; and his mother's brother was Maurice Strakosch, also an excellent pianist, who later became a vocal instructor and international impresario working with the soprano Adelina Patti.

Fischhof made his debut at age seventeen, and toured almost uninterruptedly for several years, playing concerts in Europe under the direction of celebrated musicians such as Abt, Dessof, Reinecke and Gade.

In 1884 Fischhof was appointed Professor for the class of finished pianists at the Vienna Conservatoire, a position he held until his death.

In 1916, Fischhof wrote Begegnungen auf meinem Lebensweg ("Encounters In My Life") about Brahms, Gustav Mahler, Pablo de Sarasate, Edvard Grieg, Charles Gounod, Camille Saint-Saëns, Leoncavallo, Alexander Dumas, Guy de Maupassant and Émile Zola and other people involved in public life, opera and the theater.