Talk:Fanny Mendelssohn/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2

Requested move 17 May 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: no consensus to move (non-admin closure) Mdaniels5757 (talk) 04:14, 12 June 2020 (UTC)


Fanny Mendelssohn → Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel – Well, here goes. I believe that this title is more appropriate than the present one, and as there is no consensus for "Fanny Hensel" I would now support this option. I shan't go over the arguments again: they are all set out in extenso in the previous discussion. In closing that discussion , King of ♥ notes that there is no clear consensus either for the present name or for "Fanny Hensel" but that "Fanny Mendlessohn Hensel" (with or without hyphen) was put forward in various comments as an acceptable compromise. This would mean (and I agree here with Francis Schonken) that the first line would need to be something like " Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel (14 November 1805 – 14 May 1847), born Fanny Mendelssohn, baptized Fanny Cäcilie Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1816), and, after marriage (1829), Fanny Hensel, was a German composer and pianist from the Romantic era. She grew up..." I would specifically argue against the hyphen since "Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel" can be understood as a portmanteau of both of her surnames, whereas the form "Mendelssohn-Hensel" was never used by her or anybody else during or after her lifetime and it is unclear in what circumstances or for what reasons it was ever coined. Smerus (talk) 10:19, 17 May 2020 (UTC) —Relisting. King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 04:38, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

If none of these others are moved (which hasn't even been proposed yet – and seems like a terrible idea), it would not make a reasonable argument to move only Fanny's main article. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:58, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
It would not, of course, make sense to move any of the other "Fanny" headings until the present page is resolved. If this page is not changed, the other pages will remain; if it is then they will be moved, or (if necessary) I will propose to move them, as is logical. The status of these pages is subject to the decision on this page, and has no bearing on this discussion. As regards Rebecka - (which was raised in the previous discussion by User:Jerome Kohl) - it is doubtful to me whether she even deserves an article on her own - but anyone who wants to can make a move proposal if they want. Again, it is not material to the present discussion. At the risk of upsetting Francis, (which prospect always makes me quail), I will cite his comment above: "For clarity, my second choice, per Jmar67's suggestion, would be "Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel".--Smerus (talk) 12:32, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
? – no, this should have been a multiple-move proposal, i.e. move all, or move none, or move only those as decided in a proper multi-RM. Moving this one, without knowing where that leaves us for a series of other article titles, which are clearly connected, and would become quite unwieldy if not thinking this through from the start, only reinforces my now *very* strong oppose. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:43, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
For clarity, if I have to give my opinion on this proposal, irrespective of other stuff that may or may not exist, it is a *very strong oppose* – if the proposal had been part of a coherent scheme, my opposition may have been less strong, depending on how reasonable that scheme would have been. But as is (proposing to act first and think later), my opposition is very strong. For clarity, for reasons already given in the previous RM, and before: doesn't fit WP:CRITERIA as good as the current name: "Hensel" added to the current name would hardly help RECOGNISABILITY (first of the 5 CRITERIA); The proposed name does not seem more NATURAL (2nd of the CRITERIA); The proposed name is not more PRECISE (no ambiguity to resolve, 3rd of the CRITERIA); It is definitely less CONCISE (4th of the CRITERIA); And CONSISTENCY is completely thrown out (while the other pages that carry the composer's name aren't even considered in this RM – 5th of the CRITERIA). In sum, no improvement to any of the five CRITERIA, and two (Nos. 4 and 5) that are definitely worse. The 5th of the CRITERIA, consistency, may have been less bad if a coherent scheme had been proposed. --Francis Schonken (talk) 13:34, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment: Ideally, WP:UCN should be the guiding policy for settling this issue. Google suggests "Fanny Mendelssohn" is considerably more common than the longer form of her name, but this does not tell us much about the quality or character of the sources. I understand Francis Schonken's argument about the names of other similar pages, but it ends up boiling down to a WP:OSE argument. Each of these page names has to be assessed on its own and on the strength and quantity of available sources. Toccata quarta (talk) 12:55, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
  • 'Oppose - I am in favor of using names that the subject used during their lifetime. For most of her life Fanny was married hence her name was Fanny Hensel. The only reason that she's identified with Mendelssohn is to raise her popularity. As others say above, she never used the name Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel so I strongly oppose moving the page to that name. - kosboot (talk) 00:52, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Legacy section

I have added some referenced examples of CDs released on mainstream labels, which received mainstream reviews, in the late 1980s and early ‘90s. These entries speak to, and date, the legacy and “revival” of interest in FM’s music. 09:33, 26 July 2020 (UTC)Design (talk) 10:04, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

If you want to create an article on the lines of List of Recordings of Music by Fanny Mendelssohn, you are welcome to do so. Amazon lists twenty or more of them. The fact that there are 20+ recordings is probably as much as needs to be said here (if indeed anything needs to be said at all). This article is about FM, not a partial listing of, comparative review of, or recommendations of, recordings of her music, all of which are WP:UNDUE to the topic.--Smerus (talk) 13:55, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Some thoughts:

  • Re. "twenty or more" – if it were around 20, a "Discography" section of about this size would be possible (which would be feasible as far as I'm concerned), but I'm afraid there are many more: Fanny Mendelssohn at Muziekweb website lists nearly 300 recorded works (and more than twice as many actual recordings, while on average these works were recorded more than once). This indeed rather calls for a separate article, either a "Discography" type of page as suggested by Smerus, or a "Repertoire pieces" article or list like this one.
  • Amazon is not the best of sources for such endeavour: the Muziekweb link given in the previous point would be much better (and that's of course also not the only possible source for a discography).
  • Whether or not a separate discography page is initiated, what is said and referenced about recordings in this biographical article is still somewhat substandard (e.g. a bare link used as reference; the recordings mentioned also seem far from a representative overview), and seems like Design was giving a stab at addressing these issues. So I'd rather support them in their efforts, than thwart & blunt revert.

--Francis Schonken (talk) 15:08, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

  • Perhaps then, Francis, you can give some examples or guidelines as to which recordings should be selected and how? - which comments about the recordings from journalists' reviews should be included or deprecated? - on what grounds any recordings should not be included? Other articles about composers on WP which included detailed discussions of recordings? As on your estimate there are over 300 recordings involved, this section could rather dwarf the rest of the article.
  • I see that Design's interests are largely in the field of popular music (as they say themselves on their talkpage), where recording details, reviews, and comments are perhpas more integral to to the topic. They may find it helpful/interesting to look at other articles that come under WP:CLASSICAL to gather the WP practices in that area. --Smerus (talk) 17:59, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

I accept the point about "undue weight". I am trying to expand on the "Legacy" section in the article to provide dates, and verified examples of when her music began to be more widely known and played and recorded. The conductor Elke Mascha Blankeburg, who recorded the Gartenlieder in the late 1980s, appears to be a scholar who has researched FM manuscripts and prepared editions for modern performance. I haven't been successful so far in finding more citable refs about this. The fact that recordings were made in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and received positive reviews in mainstream classical music publications (Gramophone magazine, Penguin Guide, and others) are concrete examples of the "revival". Perhaps these details are better placed in footnotes? The "revival" of FMs music is relevant to this article and I think deserves details, much like Felix Mendelssohn's and Nadia Boulanger's revival of Bach's music. Cheers. Design (talk) 00:17, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Maybe the Legacy section needs a bit of a re-write for historical context? The sub-sections on Music, Writings, and Biographical/Musicological studies each separately refer to the 1980s period of revived study/interest/publication. I think this could expressed better to reflect that the "revival" included all these areas, which (probably) informed each other. Design (talk) 00:46, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
I would say that "Reception History" from the 1980s onwards is relevant, particularly in light of the varied responses to FMs music in her lifetime. It is also part of a wider interest in "discovering" female composers and reception history in general, is it not? Design (talk) 00:54, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Some suggestions:

  • You wrote

    ... Elke Mascha Blankenburgde:Elke Mascha Blankenburg ...

    when first talking about that person. A less conspicuous way to do that would be:

    ... Elke Mascha Blankenburg [de] ...

    That is, using the {{ill}} template.
  • I'd rename the section from "Legacy" to "Reception" (see also e.g. Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography, Wikipedia:WikiProject Classical music/Guidelines for general suggestions about structure etc. of the article).
  • An example of a GA level article integrating an overview of recording history into the general reception narrative can be found here (that is however an article about a composition rather than about a composer, as is the case here).
  • When given the choice between mentioning a recording that left no trace in the press (Gramophone etc) and one that was favourably received, I'd rather mention the latter of course. But that doesn't mean all accolades received by the recording need to be in this article: the article is about Fanny Mendelssohn, not about 20th/21st-century artists and how well they did.

--Francis Schonken (talk) 03:50, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

  • [reply to 2nd bullet] Such a renaming would make little sense if the legacy section includes subsections on the "Museum" "Writings" and "Biographical and musicological studies". Renaming the "Music" subsection to "Reception" would be more appropriate. - Aza24 (talk) 04:54, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
  • late comment (had no time yet to read above): In opera, we have some articles with a section "Recordings" (Maria Stuarda, just seen), and other with a separate article (L'Orfeo discography]. In Hensl's case, with a limited worls list and limited recordings, I believe we could have a section ("Reception"? "Recordings") in her article which readers not accustomed to seeing something like that in a biography could just skip. Such a section should not try to be exhaustive, but mention notable (reviewed, by notable performers) recordings, and possibly better in prose, with evaluation and comments, than as a table. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:31, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
  • The balance now seems much better to me, thanks.--Smerus (talk) 07:51, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Details of Legacy section

  • "From the 1980s onwards there has been renewed interest in Fanny Mendelssohn and her works, as described below." - Let's drop "Fanny" and "as described below", please, and I guess most of the works recorded will be labelled Fanny Hensel's works by those who recorded them. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:44, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Easter Sonata premiere 2012

Is this reference sufficient to show that the Easter Sonata was premiered under Fanny’s name in 2012? [1]

There are also Youtube interviews from Duke University here: [2] [3] Design (talk) 01:05, 4 September 2020 (UTC)

Prima facie, yes. Secondary sources would be stronger. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:52, 4 September 2020 (UTC)

Fanny Zippora Mendelssohn

The Mendelssohn museum website says her birth name was Fanny Zippora Mendelssohn. Here’s the link [4] Design (talk) 02:01, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

  • Zippora was I think her Hebrew name. But there is no evidence that it was ever used by her or the family. I am seeking citation which is a bit stronger than a passing mention on a website.--Smerus (talk) 07:42, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

ref converting

Oops, in converting the refs as Smerus and Michael Bednarek and I discussed I seem to have run over some of your edits Smerus. Feel free to restore them and let me know whenever you're done today so I can finish the refs. Best - Aza24 (talk) 21:36, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

Ok I take the above back, I believe I've restored any ones I messed up; in terms of refs, Hawkins 2017 doesn't seem to connect to anything in the biblio, do we know what publication this one is referring to? Aza24 (talk) 21:41, 10 January 2021 (UTC)
And one last query on the references: some of the 1884 have II (presumably meaning from the second volume) and some don't (presumably from the first volume?). Also not sure what the "v." in ref 39 is. Aza24 (talk) 22:24, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@Aza24:; Hi, I've corrected/adjusted the Hensel 1884 refs, I and II refer to volumes. Hawkins was " "A Mendelssohn masterpiece was really his sister’s. After 188 years, it premiered under her name.". Washington Post, By Derek Hawkins March 9, 2017." but as this citation can't be read except by subscription, and the text is supported by the other reference, I have deleted what was note 52. Many thanks for undertaking this task.--Smerus (talk) 10:42, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

GA assessement/infobox

I am forwarding this article for GA review (here) and in the process I have thought it appropriate to remove the infobox. The infobox was added without discussion by an editor during 2020. Subsequent discussion ended in a draw, awaiting comment from that editor who never responded. Since then I have extensively expanded/rewritten the article and it has had a peer review. I believe now (as then) that it is better without the infobox. Let's see what the GA reviewer says. Thanks--Smerus (talk) 22:18, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

I was too late for the peer review, and will not be the GA reviewer (I don't feel able to judge English prose), but think that the infobox clarified the many names much better than prose could. I also fondly remember the encouragement by RexxS for the work of a new editor. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:42, 20 January 2021 (UTC)
Alas the new editor (who was carrying out his work as part of a university project) has not returned to this or any other article yet.--Smerus (talk) 22:47, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

GA Review

GA toolbox
Reviewing
This review is transcluded from Talk:Fanny Mendelssohn/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Tim riley (talk · contribs) 08:45, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Comments after first read-through. Try as I may, I can find little to quibble about, but these are my meagre gleanings:

  • Lead
  • "Fanny Hensel published a collection of songs as her Opus 1. The next year, she died of a stroke." A particularly perverse reader, e.g. me, might detect some causal connection between these two sentences. Perhaps safer to say "In 1847 she died of a stroke"?
  • Early life and education
  • Links – I think both or neither of Jewish and Christian should be linked. Neither, probably, I'd say.
  • False titles – these are a particular bête noire of mine, and you must ignore me if you take a different view of the question. In my view, in "the son of philosopher Moses Mendelssohn), and Lea, née Salomon, a granddaughter of the entrepreneur Daniel Itzig" the first half would be much improved by giving "philosopher" a definite article to match that of "entrepreneur". Likewise "Musicologist Stephen Rodger", in the Style and form section.
  • Felix and Fanny
  • –ise -v- ize –"organised by her father" but "never materialized" later in the section.
  • Marriage and later life
  • In the fourth paragraph, the three citations at the end of the first sentence might perhaps be put in numerical order.
  • Ref 41 – the current MoS diktak is that page ranges must have the full page numbers at each end: pp. 95–6 should be pp, 95–96.
  • Compositions
  • "illustrated by her husband Wilhelm" – could do with a comma before Wilhelm – not that there is any real ambiguity but it's the grammatical distinction between restrictive and non-restrictive: without a comma Wilhelm is one of her several husbands, and with, he is the only one. (The same is true of "their father Abraham" in the first para of Early life and education, but it doesn't seem to stick out so much there, possibly because the notion of two or more fathers doesn't occur to one.)
  • Writings
  • The three citations would be better in numerical order.

Over to you. I shan't bother to put the review on formal hold for such trivial quibbles. I rather think this article ought to be at FAC rather than GAN, but I'll duly apply the GA criteria when concluding my review. I'm enjoying this, and have learned a lot. Tim riley talk 08:45, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Many thanks for this, Tim riley. I've made all the revisions you suggest, with the exception of the comma after Wilhelm, (where I have just removed "Wilhelm" instead as it was anyway superfluous). A number of the issues you raised (s/z, false titles) were leftovers from the American college rewrite of the article which I mention in my note below.--Smerus (talk) 14:04, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Comment by Francis

At Wikipedia:Peer review/Fanny Mendelssohn/archive1#Legacy/reception I posted some suggestions regarding the treatment of legacy and reception topics in the article. Despite an initial promise by Smerus it seems like not much has changed to the article in this department since October last year (when the promise was made). Anyhow, even if some changes were made in the mean while the result today seems imho that my original suggestions have not yet been satisfactorily addressed. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:17, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

  • I undertook to review the content and structure and did so. The article as it stands is the consequence of my thoughts at the time. That involved the deletion of some unsourced and unverifiable opinions (e.g. that recordings got universal good reviews) which had crept in when the article was revised as a project by some US university students. The issues you mention may not I'm afraid have been addressed to your satisfaction, but they were to mine. It's now of course up to the assessor to consider whether this is a factor in their GA assessment. --Smerus (talk) 13:39, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
    • I don't propose to enquire into the content of the peer review. What I am required to do here is to scrutinise the present article and assess it against the GAN criteria, which I hope to do by the end of this weekend. Tim riley talk 16:24, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Overall summary

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

  1. Is it reasonably well written?
    A. Prose quality:
    B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:
  2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?
    A. References to sources:
    Well referenced.
    B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:
    Well referenced.
    C. No original research:
  3. Is it broad in its coverage?
    A. Major aspects:
    B. Focused:
  4. Is it neutral?
    Fair representation without bias:
  5. Is it stable?
    No edit wars, etc:
  6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?
    A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:
    Well illustrated.
    B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:
    Well illustrated.
  7. Overall:
    Pass or Fail:

Clearly meets every GA criterion in my opinion, and I am pleased to be able to promote it. Tim riley talk 08:08, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Infobox

Why is there no Infobox? 70.161.8.90 (talk) 12:35, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Look above. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:52, 14 November 2021 (UTC)
There should be an infobox. They are very useful and informative.70.161.8.90 (talk) 14:40, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 1 January 2020 and 31 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ben Novotny.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 21:10, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Infobox, again

I’ve looked through past discussion and the topic has come up at least 3 times with no consensus. Can we finally just add one or does this need an rfc? Dronebogus (talk) 03:42, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

It needs a discussion, as I thought had been made clear elsewhere. - SchroCat (talk) 05:29, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
Yes. Thank you for raising this. Can you provide links to the previous discussions and to the various aspects of WP:RFCBEFORE that have been accomplished especially if there has been consensus not to have an RFC in this particulat case? It would also help to give your thoughts as to what the infobox would contain and how it would affect the rest of the article. Thincat (talk) 09:09, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
An infobox was added in April 2020 by an editor who had made major improvements. It was discussed, but then remained. The following year, Smerus improved the article further towards GA and removed the infobox, with this announcement. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:00, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
Oh, as an afterthought. Nothing on Wikipedia is final. Not even article deletion. Further discussions and decisions are always entertained if they are not disruptive. Thincat (talk) 09:14, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
I don't feel strongly either way, but the only information in the 2020 infobox that wasn't already in the lede was the name of her son. If we added an infobox now, what more would we put in it?Jbening (talk) 16:34, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
It adds age at death as well, don’t forget that. That’s why I, and probably quite a few others, want I-boxes so badly— they save people from doing tedious mental arithmetic. Dronebogus (talk) 18:45, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
Ah well, I've added it to the lead to assist those who can't or don't want to do the maths. - SchroCat (talk) 18:50, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
I think that edit actually proves why infoboxes have utility, because I had to skim the entire lead for the information instead of glancing over to the right. It’s inefficient anti-standardization that slows readers down (which I’m aware some users actually want, because “slow encyclopedism” is a thing now, even though we’re literally “the fast encyclopedia”) Dronebogus (talk) 18:59, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
Given there are only a very small number of factoids in an IB, it's always going to be the case that people have to search a lead or an article to find a specific piece of information they are after. I would posit that wanting to know the age at death is probably not the key piece of information most people would want to know when visiting a page. Then again, the place of birth and death is even less likely, but there we go. - SchroCat (talk) 19:07, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
You are missing the point; not everyone wants to skim the lead. People absorb information differently. Dronebogus (talk) 19:13, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
No, I haven't missed the point at all. There are limited factoids in a box, and they are not what many (probably most) people are looking for. In a average-sized biography, the IB probably contains about 1 per cent of the information of the biography, and these are the least important ones. - SchroCat (talk) 19:19, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
But if it helps some people it doesn’t matter. It costs next to nothing to maintain (prove that i-boxes are vandalized more frequently, because in anecdotal experience they aren’t) and provides something to readers- rather than blocking it, which only deprives. Dronebogus (talk) 19:22, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
The problem is that they often mislead by oversimplification and by omission: that doesn't help anyone - it does the exact opposite. I would rather not deprive readers of accurate and correct information and instead give them something that leaves then with the wrong impression, but I guess people's mileage may differ. - SchroCat (talk) 19:30, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
How is saying “died: 1863 (age 49)” “misleading”? Dronebogus (talk) 19:36, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
I haven't said it is: nice straw man argument. But how does it help explain or inform readers information of use? - SchroCat (talk) 19:39, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
I don’t understand what your asking Dronebogus (talk) 19:45, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
Her age at death (41) is at the end of para 2 of the lead. I always defer to the main editors of the article, rather than drive-bys like User:Dronebogus & myself, so I'm against. Johnbod (talk) 02:53, 17 July 2023 (UTC)
It’s only there because I asked. Plus what part of “defer[ing]… to the main editors of the article, rather than drive-bys” is not WP:OWN? Dronebogus (talk) 21:39, 17 July 2023 (UTC)
All of it: "No one, no matter what, has the right to act as though they are the owner of a particular article (or any part of it)...." I've never edited the article that I can recall (nor read most of it), and I'm certainly not claiming to own it - I've really no idea how it is on my watchlist. But then, neither do you. It is right to give more weight to the views of those who have actually created the article than drive-bys like us. Johnbod (talk) 00:27, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
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