Jens Thiis

Jens Thiis (1809–1887) – Norwegian consul in Honfleur, businessman and music lover. Thomas Tellefsen met him thanks to Peter Hersleb Smith, whom he met by chance in Le Havre. Tellefsen’s acquaintance with Thiis, who received the young composer most kindly, recommending him to numerous acquaintances as a music teacher, enabled Tellefsen to study piano with Fryderyk Chopin. Thiis recommended Tellefsen in a letter to the poet Emile Barateau, who in turn, through several other individuals, finally reached Henri de Latouche, a personal acquaintance of George Sand. The writer, moved by the determination of the Norwegian pianist, who without a livelihood and with only a smattering of French persevered in his intentions, recommended him to Chopin.