Dublin-born composer silenced by the Nazis returns to Vienna's Musikverein

Mary Dickenson-Auner's string quartets, unpublished for eighty years, open a four-concert cycle with baritone Thomas Hampson

VIENNA, Sept. 1, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- She was born in Dublin, trained at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and built her career in Vienna. In 1938 Mary Dickenson-Auner (1880-1965) was banned from performing and teaching in the city she had made her home – because she held a British passport. Almost all her string quartets survive only in manuscript. For the first time, they are being made playable again.

From 25 November 2026, the Auner Quartett performs her Fourth String Quartet at the Vienna Musikverein, opening a cycle of four concerts titled "Jenseits vom tanzenden Wien" (Beyond Dancing Vienna). Daniel Auner, the quartet's first violinist and a relative of the composer, plays her own violin.

Her grandfather Hercules MacDonnell co-founded the Royal Irish Academy of Music. She studied under Émile Sauret in London and Otakar Ševčík in Prague, made her debut with the Czech Philharmonic in 1905, and in 1922 gave the Austrian premiere of Bartók's First Violin Sonata. Her early works appeared under a male pseudonym, Frank Donnell. Deprived of every public role in 1938, she began composing in earnest at almost sixty; the suppressed notes, she wrote, broke forth "like a tidal wave."

The cycle places her among contemporaries who shared her fate. Alexander Zemlinsky – teacher and brother-in-law of Arnold Schönberg – fled in 1938 and died in American exile in 1942. Egon Wellesz escaped to Oxford. Fritz Kreisler wrote his quartet "A Confession to Vienna" in New York exile. Baritone Thomas Hampson sings songs by these displaced composers on 17 March 2027.

"What a bold, exciting project," says Peter Marboe, former Vienna City Councillor for Culture and chairman of the Alexander Zemlinsky Fund, which supports the cycle.

Founded in 2013, the Auner Quartett won the Eugène Ysaÿe Competition in Liège in 2018 and was Austria's NASOM cultural ambassador in 2020/21.

Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/3008705/Auner_Quartett.jpg

Concert Dates

25 Nov 2026 – Mary Dickenson-Auner: String Quartet No. 4; works by F. Schubert, J. Brahms, A. Zemlinsky. Reading by Irene Suchy.
17 Feb 2027 – A. Webern, J. Strauss, A. Zemlinsky, A. Berg. Reading by Wolfgang Böck: A. Schnitzler.
17 Mar 2027 – Thomas Hampson, baritone: songs by A. Zemlinsky and contemporaries; H. Wolf, A. Schönberg.
22 May 2027 – F. Kreisler: "A Confession to Vienna"; E. Wellesz, A. Zemlinsky, J. Strauss.

Full programmes and tickets: https://aunerquartett.at/kammermusikzyklus
Presskit: https://aunerquartett.at/presseinformationen

Enquiries & Contact
Kammermusikforum Wien:
Daniel Auner, M.A. 
+43 677 63513039
presse@danielauner.com