British. Pianist. Born, London, 2 Feb. 1888, Died London, 11 January, 1971. Ida and Tobias Scharrer’s third child. She first studied with her mother, Ida. At the age of twelve she won a scholarship to study with Tobias Matthay at the Royal Academy of Music in London. At her first Royal Academy student concert in 1901, Scharrer played Chopin s Rondo in E flat Op. 16 & “with wonderful finish and very remarkable technical skill.” Her Debut was 1904. According to Naxos music, Myra Hess was not a cousin, but she was someone with whom Irene played duos often, and with whom she gave her last public concert in 1958. Early in her career Scharrer toured widely, performing in Germany, France, Holland, Belgium, Scandinavia and the United States. After she married S. Gurney Lubbock in 1915, her family took precedence over her career and she cut her concert schedule. She largely played Romanic repertoire, and was known for her Chopin selections. “Her technical facility was shown to great effect in Chopin s études which she performed a great deal.” Scharrer made her first recordings in 1909 for the Gramophone Company. Around 1929 Scharrer switched to Columbia, re-recording a fair amount of the repertoire she had recorded for HMV, making her last discs in the mid-1930s. Most of the Columbias are extremely impressive and in far better sound than the early HMV discs. Albums featuring this artist are available. WOMEN AT THE PIANO – AN ANTHOLOGY OF HISTORIC PERFORMANCES, Vol. 2 (1926-1950) 8.111121 University of Maryland Archive has some online clips of her performing: