Mária Eckhardt (*1943) is an Erkel, Szabolcsi and Széchenyi Prize-winning music historian and conductor. Her work in scholarship and organizing research is of outstanding importance in the history of Liszt scholarship both in Hungary and internationally. Her main areas of research are: the life and oeuvre of Franz Liszt; Liszt’s contemporaries and pupils; Hungarian music in the 19th century; and the history of musical institutions.
After her years on the scholarly staff of the Music Collection of the National Széchényi Library (1966–1973) and in the Institute of Musicology in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1973–1986), she was the director of the Liszt Ferenc Memorial Museum and Research Centre until 2009, and then became its scholarly director until her retirement in 2013. She is currently co-president of the Hungarian Liszt Ferenc Society, the editor-in-chief of its bulletin, and an honorary member of the German, British, and American Liszt societies. She has published six books, and many studies and catalogues, in Hungarian, English, German, and French. She has delivered papers and lectures in almost all the countries of Europe (and regularly in Weimar), the USA, and Canada, and has organized guest exhibitions in Poland, Portugal, and Germany. She is also active as a music editor and preparing critical editions. Alongside her scholarly work, in 1970 she founded and led the Choir of the National Széchényi Library. Prizes she has been awarded include: the American Liszt Society Award of Excellence (1985), the Erkel Ferenc Prize (1986), the
Ipolyi Arnold Prize (1999), the Szabolcsi Bence Prize (2004), Grand Prix of the National Association of Hungarian Artists (2004), and the Széchenyi Prize (2018).