English-born, American composer, Clara Kathleen Barnett Rogers (1844 – 1931) was born into a musical family. She had a cellist grandfather (Robert Lindley), an opera-composing father who also taught music (John Barnett), and a “vocal” mother (Eliza). Clara’s music career really sprung into action in 1857 when she was admitted into the Leipzig Conservatoire. She studied the piano, harmony, part writing, violin, cello, and voice at Leipzig, and graduated at the age of 16 with an honours.

Choosing to go down the path of performing as an opera singer for the next 15 years, Rogers revisited her love of composing when she married the American lawyer, Henry Munroe Rogers. She met him, as well as many other influential artistic friends in Boston, including: Amy Beach, Margaret Ruthven Lang, George Chadwick, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Amy Lowell, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, in Boston. She held weekly musicales at home in which she promoted her friends work, for example Longfellow’s poem “Stay at home, my heart and rest” which he especially wrote for Rogers. During the 1880s, Rogers composed songs with the Arthur P. Schmidt publishing company, and later helped to found the Boston Manuscript Club in 1888. She joined the New York Manuscript Club in 1895, after being invited by Amy Beach.

In 1902, Rogers joined the New England Conservatoire where she taught vocal lessons and wrote about music, including Your Voice and You (1925). Here’s the Answer, sung by soprano Jenny Snyder:

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References:

Clara Kathleen Rogers – Wikipedia

Clara Kathleen Rogers Violin Sonata in d minor, Op.25 (editionsilvertrust.com)