Amy Beach - Music by Amy Beach: Variations on Balkan Themes; Bal Masque; Songs

Amy BEACH  (1867 – 1944) 

Music by Amy Beach:

Variations on Balkan Themes for Two Pianos, Op. 60c (1937)

Chanson d’amour, Op. 21 No. 1 (1893); 

Ectacy, Op. 19 No. 2 (1893)

A Mirage, Op. 100 No. 1 (1924) 

Stella Viatoris, Op. 100 No. 2 (1924)

Rendezvous, Op. 120 (1928)

Variations on Balkan Themes for Orchestra, Op. 60d (1906/2000)

Bal Masqué for Orchestra, Op. 22 (1894)

Kathryn Ananda Owens (piano I) Christopher Atzinger (piano II)

Alison Feldt (soprano) 

Hector Valdivia (violin) David Carter (cello)

Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra

Hector Valdivia

Track 1 recorded August 25, 2006 at Urness Recital Hall, Saint Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota.

Tracks 2-6 recorded June 11, 207 at Urness Recital Hall.

Tracks 7 & 8 recorded November 28, 2000, Olomouc, Czech Republic.

A case can be made that Amy Beach was America's greatest composer before Charles Ives developed his revolutionary and visionary style. Unlike him, she remained in a conventional European romantic idiom which, in this case, stands comparison with the works of Dvorák. Amy Marcy Cheney (1867 - 1944) married Dr. Henry Harris Aubrey Beach at the age of 18. She was already an acclaimed concert pianist and composer when the couple had agreed she would give only one or two recitals a year. This arrangement gave her the means and impetus to continue her prolific composing. Her rare concerts became eagerly anticipated, as she was sure to present her newest works. In 1904, audiences acclaimed this major new composition, which is excellent in every way. The inspiration for the work was a revolt by the Macedonians against their Turkish rulers, which resulted in cruel repression. She knew a missionary who had traveled to the Balkans and given her some folk songs. One of them was O Maiko Moyá, a Serbian song lamenting the burdens of the homeland. (Those parts of the Balkans that were not under Turkish Ottoman rule were dominated by Austria.) This song is the basis of the eight variations. However, Beach also used three other songs (Stara Planina and Nasadil ye Dadó—songs in a lighter mood—and another lament, Macedonia!), which appear for relief and contrast and also receive some variation treatment. All four songs have a tendency to affectingly switch from major to minor and are in modes that give a dark, Slavic feeling to Beach's variations. The form Beach gives her treatment of these themes is quite imaginative. The work proceeds conventionally (aside from the assertion of the three additional themes): O Maiko Moyá is given a melancholy initial statement and is treated to eight variations lasting just over a minute to just under four minutes, including the interjections of material from the other songs. The variations are: Più mosso, which continues the lamenting mood of the original statement; a dramatic Maestoso in polonaise rhythm; a scherzo, Allegro non troppo; and a lulling Andante alla Barcarola. From this point, Beach's music becomes more dramatic, the variations tending to be longer and admit more of the subsidiary material. The fifth is Largo con molta espressione; Poco più mosso, which sings sadly; sixth is Quasi Fantasia; Allegro all'Ongarese and uses three of the themes in a warm-blooded Hungarian fantasia style. Seventh is Vivace; Valse lento, as the title suggests, starts out rapidly then slows to a bitter waltz. The eighth is Con vigore; Lento calmato, a recitative. Then comes a substantial funeral march, clearly inspired by Liszt's funeral march for victims of the suppression of the 1848 Hungarian revolt. A cadenza, very much in Liszt's style, leads to a large-scale conclusion in which the two lamenting songs receive restatements in their original forms.