Boston-born composer, administrator, teacher and pianist; student of Moscheles and Liszt; set up a music school; a teacher of
George Whitefield Chadwick; may be most famous or infamous now, to the extent he is remembered, for a series of spiritualist/psychically-inclined books and novels. An early (1860s, which in fact does, it seems, count as early) advocate of Schumann's piano music in the USA (Marston, Nicholas (1992). "Schumann: Fantasie, Op.17".) Participated in what may have been the first Boston performance of Saint-Saëns' B
♭ piano quartet, in February 1882 (see
Program Notes. (Etc.))
Despite the similarity of names, not to be confused with music professor and composer Karl W. Petersilie (of Edgeworth Seminary- in the 1840s, in any event, clearly too early!) a few of whose songs were published in "Graham's American Monthly Magazine" at that time.
