1853 in music

Events

• March 5 – The American-German piano company Steinway & Sons is founded by Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg.
• October – Louis Niedermeyer reorganizes and re-opens the school known as the École Choron, which becomes the École Niedermeyer.
• October 1 – The piano manufacturer C. Bechstein Pianofortefabrik is founded by Carl Bechstein in Berlin.
• October 22 – The overture to Tannhäuser is performed in Boston Music Hall by the Germania Musical Society conducted by Carl Bergmann. It is the first American performance.
• November 1 – Richard Wagner begins composing the music for The Ring of the Nibelung.
• Louis Moreau Gottschalk returns the United States after eleven years in Europe.
• Brahms meets Joseph Joachim and Robert and Clara Schumann.
• Julius Blüthner founds Blüthner in Leipzig, Germany.

  Published popular music

• Danmarks gamle Folkeviser collected by Svend Grundtvig
• "Farewell My Lilly Dear" by Stephen Foster
• "My Cottage Home" w.m. Alice Hawthorne
• "My Old Kentucky Home" by Stephen Foster
• "P'tit quinquin" by Alexandre Desrousseaux
• "The Yellow Rose of Texas"

  Classical music

• Franz Berwald
• *Piano Trio No. 4 in C major
• *Piano Quintet No. 1 in C minor
• Johannes Brahms – Piano Sonata No. 1, Piano Sonata No. 3
• Ida Henriette da Fonseca
• *Der Abschied
• *Byrons Statue
• *Die Erwartung
• *Granen ved Lougen
• *Regnbuen
• *Wechsellied zum Tanze
• *Zum neuen Jahr
• William Henry Fry – Santa Claus, Christmas Symphony
• Louis Moreau Gottschalk – The Banjo, Op. 15
• Charles Gounod – Méditation sur le Premier Prélude de Piano de S. Bach, later known as Ave Maria
• Franz Liszt
• *Piano Sonata in B minor
• *Hungarian Rhapsodies 1–15
• Camille Saint-Saëns
• *Piano Quartet in E major
• *Symphony No. 1 in E♭ major
• Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms and Albert Dietrich – F-A-E Sonata''
• Henryk Wieniawski – Violin Concerto No. 1

  Opera

• Victor Massé – Les noces de Jeannette
• Karel Miry – Anne Mie
• Giuseppe Verdi
• *Il trovatore
• *La traviata

  Births

• May 17 – Carolina Östberg, opera singer
• July 24 – Alessandro Parisotti, composer and music editor
• November 23 – Giuseppina Bozzachi, ballerina
• December 22 – Teresa Carreño, pianist, singer, conductor and composer
• December 30 – André Messager, composer
• date unknown
• *Alfonso Rendano, pianist
• *Maria Westberg, ballerina

  Deaths

• January 16 – Matteo Carcassi, guitarist and composer
• March 15 – Giovanni Ricordi, violinist
• October 3 – George Onslow, composer
• October 29 – Pierre-Joseph-Guillaume Zimmermann, pianist, composer and music teacher
• October 30 – Pietro Raimondi, composer
• December 5
• *Johann Peter Heuschkel, oboist, organist and composer
• *Jeanette Wässelius, operatic soprano
• date unknown – James Hill, folk musician