Sophie Weisse

Sophie Weisse (1852–1945) was a Scottish music teacher and founder of Northlands, an all-girls school in Surrey, England. She was the teacher and life-long friend of the music scholar and composer Donald Tovey.

Biography Weisse was born in Edinburgh in 1852 to immigrant parents. Her father, Traugott Heinrich Weisse, was a refugee of the German Revolution of 1848. Although blind, he worked as a German language teacher and wrote a book on German grammar, which ran into multiple editions. His wife, Sophie Marquidorff, was a Lithuanian pianist who performed regularly in chamber-music concerts in Edinburgh. Like their father, Heinrich also worked as a teacher. In adulthood he used the name Henry Whitehouse. A sister Mary was born a year after Henry, and then a brother Victor was born in 1860. The family home was a cultural centre for Edinburgh people with interests in literature and philosophy. Weisse claimed it was her father's influence that encouraged Stevenson to take up writing. She spent time with Leopold von Ranke in the final weeks of his life, and published an account of their time, Leopold von Ranke, reminiscences of Berlin 1884-1886.

Weisse never married and had no children of her own. For a few years following Tovey's divorce from his first wife, she and her former student, Clara Wallace, had joint guardianship of his young son, John Wellcome.

Weisse died in January 1945 at Guildford, Surrey.

Teaching career On the suggestion of friends, Weisse went to Eton in early 1880 with the intention of settling and establishing a school for the children of the college masters.

Tovey featured as the pianist in the Northland's concerts, providing a platform for his launch as a concert pianist.

Weisse and Tovey maintained a relationship throughout their lives, although it was strained at times. Weisse disapproved of choices Tovey made in his personal life and expressed frustration with a stall in his career between 1902 and 1914. However, upon Tovey's acceptance of the role of Reid Professor of Music at the University, Weisse followed Tovey to Edinburgh.

Whilst Tovey held of the post of Reid Professor, he bestowed on Weisse an honorary degree of Doctor of Music in 1936, in recognition of her services to music.

Much of her correspondence, both professional and personal, is held in the University Archives. It includes correspondence between Weisse and Tovey, Louis Fleury, Hubert Parry, Joseph and Ellen Joachim, and J.A. Fuller-Maitland.