Famous couples were and are popular objects in (scientific) biography, fiction and the tabloid press. The anecdotes and stories often entwine around the same couples: Robert and Clara Schumann or Alma and Gustav Mahler in particular became known as musical couples of the 19th century. Christine Fornoff-Petrowski shows in her study that marriages in the context of the bourgeois art and music culture of the 19th century were by no means isolated, but part of a practice that was widely lived and was controversially discussed. With the help of historical discourse analysis, the author traces the public debate - especially in the middle-class media - and reflects it using the example of individual, hitherto lesser-known musician couples such as Wilhelm Heinrich and Bertha Riehl or Hermine and Eugen d‘Albert. The uncovered thought patterns and narratives not only influenced the lives and actions of these couples, but also have persisted in telling stories about artist couples up to the present day.