Liza Lehmann, the daughter of artistic and musical parents, made her debut as a soprano at the Monday Popular Concerts in 1885, at the age of twenty-three. It was a huge success and she rapidly became one of the most sought-after singers in England. Joachim and Clara Schumann had been her friends, and the latter, in her eighties, had accompanied her in Robert's ‘Nussbaum’ and ‘Frühlingsnacht’. In 1894, on her marriage to Herbert Bedford, she retired from the concert stage and took to composing. A whole series of most successful cycles appeared, all written with great expertise and charm. The first cycle was In a Persian Garden (1894) to Fitzgerald's The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, and from 1909 she toured England and America, accompanying a quartet of the best singers of the day, with enormous success. Just before her death in 1918 she finished a characteristic and charming biography, full of memories of the period. Here is one from the Art Nouveau days: ‘I suppose I was intended to be flattered when a young lady of our acquaintance one day rushed up to me after a performance [of In a Persian Garden], saying, “Oh thank you! Thank you! Do let me thank you! The local colour is too wonderful. I have so enjoyed it – I simply felt as if I was at Liberty’s!”’