Sophia Hewitt Ostinelli

Sophia Hewitt Ostinelli (1799-1845) was an American classical musician who was a child prodigy who later became the only woman ever employed as an organist and accompanist by the Handel and Haydn Society in Boston, Massachusetts. She also became the second musician ever to perform the music of Beethoven in Boston.
Formative years.
Sophia Henriette Hewitt was born in New York County, New York in what is now Manhattan on May 23, 1799, to James Hewitt (1770-1827), a native of England who became a respected composer, conductor and music publisher in the United States, and Eliza (King) Hewett (1779-1867), a Paris-educated author who was a daughter of a British Army officer. Sophia was baptized by the Rev. Benjamin Moore on June 14 1799, at New York City's Trinity Episcopal Church.
She studied music with her father from the time she was a very young child and performed a piano sonata before an audience at the City Hotel in New York on April 14, 1807, at the age of seven at a concert planned and promoted by her father. She performed again in New York in February and April 1808. She played a piano sonata by Ignaz Pleyel in Boston, Massachusetts on October 2, 1810.
Around 1812, Hewitt and her siblings relocated with their parents to Boston, where her father had accepted positions as the Federal Street Theatre's music manager and as organist for Trinity Church.
Following her 1814 performance of "The Storm", a piano concerto by Daniel Steibelt, the music publication "Repertory" noted: "It is far beyond our ability to do her ample justice ... the spontaneous bursts of applause which followed are the best tribute of praise. We never witnessed a performance on the Piano Forte which could compare with it."
After a brief sojourn in New York circa 1815 to 1817, during which she performed as a concert pianist for the Euterpian Society and vocalist for New York Oratorios and studied piano with a Mr. Morgan, the harp with a Mr. Ferrand and the organ with George K. Jackson while also providing music instruction for students at a boarding school operated by a Mrs. Brenton, she returned to Boston. On August 28, 1817, she played piano in concert as part of a trio and as a soloist, performing works by Pleyel and Henri Joseph Taskin. In addition, she sang at least one of her father's compositions, "Rest Thee, Babe". Later that year, she performed with the Handel and Haydn Society in New York City, and performed three more times in New York in 1818.
Professional musician.
Also in 1818, leaders of Boston's Handel and Haydn Society recruited Hewitt to be the society's organist and accompanist. Initially declining the position, she accepted two years later and held the post for a decade. Hewitt was "the only woman they ever employed in this capacity, before or since". She was paid between $50 and $62.50 per quarter during her tenure with the society. During this same time, Sophia Hewitt also took on the role of organist for Boston's Catholic Cathedral and Chauncy Place Church.
She also continued to perform in recitals and in concert in Boston, including with that city's Philharmonic Society throughout the late 1810s and early 1820s. On February 27, 1819, she became the second musician ever to perform the music of Beethoven in Boston when she played his Piano Sonata in A-flat, op. 26.