Richard Stoehr was born in Vienna. Innitialy he studied medicine and became medical doctor (1898). He also studied music composition at the Konservatorium of Vienna. After graduating, he became a teacher at the Konservatorium of Vienna, from 1904 to 1908. Stoehr was a member of the instructing personal at the Wiener Musikakademie for forty years (1908-1938).
After the Anschluss he immigrated to the USA, where he instructed music at the Curtis Institute, Philadelphia. During his years as a teacher, more than ten thousand students were taught by him, including Leonard Bernstein, Marcel Rubin, Fritz Spielmann, and Erich Zeisl. Richard Stoehr had a long life and died in Montpellier, France, at the age of 93.