Amy Beach

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Carolyn Marie Treybig
1999
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Amy Beach: An Investigation and Analysis
of the Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80.
Approved by
Supervisory Committee:
Carroll Gonzo, Co-Supervisof
‘"lacqii&Iine Hofto, Coûpervisor

MAJ___________
Roger Graybill
rL unO J
Richar
Georgia Peep
of the Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80.
by
Carolyn Marie Treybig, B.M., B.M.E., M.M., M.M.
Treatise
Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of
The University of Texas at Austin
in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Doctor of Musical Arts
The University of Texas at Austin

May 1999
UMI N u m b e r : 9947467
UMI Microform 9947467

Copyright 1999, by UMI Company. All rights reserved.
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Dedication
To my husband, Joel.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Dr. Carroll Gonzo and Dr. Roger Graybill for their
help and guidance in writing this treatise. I would also like to thank the rest of
my committee for their valuable input. Special thanks to Steven Hendrickson and
David Hainsworth for their technological expertise. I would also like to thank
Hildegard Publishing for granting me copyright permission for including musical
excerpts in the treatise and Jeanell Wise Brown for giving me permission to
reprint the photographs of Amy Beach and her family.
of the Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op. 80.
Publication No.______________
Carolyn Marie Treybig, D.M.A.

The University of Texas at Austin, 1999
Co-Supervisors: Carroll Gonzo and Jacqueline Hofto
The intent of this treatise is to 1) provide a biography of the composer,
Amy Beach; 2) provide a history and compositional style analysis of her chamber
works; 3) present a complete analysis of the Theme and Variations fo r Flute and
String Quartet, Op.80; and 4) address the place of the Variations, Op.80 among
the other chamber works of Amy Beach based upon the sim ilarities of
compositional techniques and style found in this work and others. The purpose of
this study is to reintroduce a substantial piece into the chamber music repertoire
for flute as well as present a scholarly study on the compositional style o f the
work together with a discussion about its position in the chamber music output of
one of America's earliest notable composers.
vi
Amy Beach wrote the majority o f her chamber music for strings
and piano. Only three works contain the flute and of those compositions, only
one is o f significant structure. The Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String
Quartet, Op.80 represents several achievements for Amy Beach. Opus 80 is a
sophisticated structured set of variations in which Beach manipulates thematic

material from either the first or second parts of the main theme or from the whole
theme, with thematic quotations sometimes limited to as few as five notes. The
work contains many characteristics of Beach's style: ambiguous cadences,

extensive chrom aticism , enharmonic m odulations, contrapuntal w riting,
development of counter-melodies, rich overlapping texture, and cyclic writing.
Among her other chamber works, Op.80 retains a high position. It is only
one of two sets of formal variations, the other being the Variations on Balkan
Themes, Op.60. In Op.80, Beach based her variations on her own composition
rather than folk material. In length and structure, Op.80 ranks with Beach's other
works for string and piano: the Sonata in A moll, Op.34; the Quintet in F-Sharp
Minor, Op.67; and the Trio, Op. 150. In terms o f orchestration, Op.80 is perhaps
held in higher esteem because of its equal five-voice texture with minimal
sections of solo with accompaniment writing.
vii
Table of Contents
List of Figures...............................................................................................................xi
List of Examples......................................................................................................... xii
Chapter One 1
Introduction....................................................................................................................1
A Biographical Sketch of Amy Beach.........................................................................3
Ch a pt e r T w o 26
A Study of the Compositional Style of Amy Beach:............................................... 26
In Selected Chamber W orks.......................................................................................26
Ch apter Three 46
An Analysis of the Theme.......................................................................................... 46
Form .............................................................................................................................47
Harmony...................................................................................................................... 50
M elody.........................................................................................................................51
Rhythm.........................................................................................................................54
Orchestration...............................................................................................................56
Ch apter Four 60
An Analysis of Variation I ......................................................................................... 60
Form ............................................................................................................................. 60
Harmony...................................................................................................................... 61
M elody.........................................................................................................................62
viii
Rhythm......................................................................................................................... 65
Orchestration............................................................................................................... 66
C h a p t e r F iv e 70
An Analysis of Variation II........................................................................................ 70
Form ............................................................................................................................. 70
Harmony.......................................................................................................................70
M elody.........................................................................................................................71
Rhythm ......................................................................................................................... 75
Orchestration............................................................................................................... 79
C h a p t e r S ix 81
An Analysis of Variation HI....................................................................................... 81
Form ..............................................................................................................................81
Harmony.......................................................................................................................81
M elody......................................................................................................................... 83
Rhythm......................................................................................................................... 86
Orchestration............................................................................................................... 88
Ch a pter Seven 93
An Analysis of Variation IV....................................................................................... 93
Form ............................................................................................................................. 93
Harmony.......................................................................................................................93
M elody.........................................................................................................................95
Rhythm .........................................................................................................................97
ix
Orchestration................................................................................................................99
C h a p t e r E ig h t 103
An Analysis of Variation V ....................................................................................... 103
Form ............................................................................................................................. 103
Harmony...................................................................................................................... 103
M elody.........................................................................................................................105
Rhythm .........................................................................................................................113
Orchestration.............................................................................................................. 116
C h a p t e r N in e 120
An Analysis of Variation V I...................................................................................... 120
Form ............................................................................................................................. 120
Harmony...................................................................................................................... 120
M elody.........................................................................................................................126
Rhythm .........................................................................................................................130
Orchestration.............................................................................................................. 134
C h apter T en 140
Summary and Conclusions........................................................................................ 140
B ib lio g r a p h y 144
V ita 148
List of Figures
FIGURE I : CHARLES ABBOTT CHENEY 4
FIGURE 2: C LAR A IMOGENE MARCY CHENEY 5
FIGURE 3: A M Y MARCY CHENEY, C. 1870 6
FIGURE 4: A M Y CHENEY, C. 1880 9
FIGURE 5: DR. H.H.A. BEACH II
FIGURE 6: DR. A N D MRS. H.H.A. BEACH, C. 1890 12
FIGURE 7: M RS. H.H.A. BEACH. C. 1900 17
FIGURE 8: A M Y BEACH, C. 1937 23
xi
List of Examples
EXAMPLE 1: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM. 13-17. 48
EXAMPLE 2: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM. 13-18. 48
EXAMPLE 3: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM.30-34. 49
EXAMPLE 4: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM.31-36.. 49
EXAMPLE 5: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM. 1-4. 51
EXAMPLE 6: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.5-8. 52
EXAMPLE 7: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.9-18. 52
EXAMPLE 8: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM. 19-26. 53
EXAMPLE 9: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM .27-30.. 54
EXAMPLE 10:: THEME (VIOLIN I) M M .31-36.. 54
EXAMPLE 11:: VARIATION I (FLUTE) MM. 1-4. 60
EXAMPLE 12:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.5-8. 62
EXAMPLE 13:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM. 13-20. 63
EXAMPLE 14:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.21-28. 64
EXAMPLE 15: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.37-40. 66
EXAMPLE 16: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.33-40. 68
EXAMPLE 17: VARIATION n (SCORE) MM. 1-6. 72
EXAMPLE 18: VARIATION 0 (SCORE) MM.22-27. 73
EXAMPLE 19: VARIATION n (SCORE) MM.36-41. 73
EXAMPLE 20: VARIATION 0 (SCORE) MM.52-55. 74
xii
E X A M P L E 2 1 : V A R I A T I O N II (S C O R E ) M M .7 2 - 7 7 . 75
EXAMPLE 22: VARIATION II (SCORE) MM. 1-6. 76
EXAMPLE 23: VARIATION H (SCORE) MM. 15 - 19. 76
EXAMPLE 24: VARIATION H (SCORE) M M .44-50. 77
EXAMPLE 27: VARIATION m (SCORE) M M .32-34. 82
EXAMPLE 28: VARIATION m (SCORE) M M .3-5. 83
EXAMPLE 29: VARIATION IH (SCORE) M M .7-9. 84
EXAMPLE 30: VARIATION m (SCORE) MM. 10-12. 84
EXAMPLE 31: VARIATION IE (FLUTE) MM. 19-26. 85
EXAMPLE 33: VARIATION IH (SCORE) MM. 1-4. 87
EXAMPLE 35: VARIATION HI (SCORE) MM. 19-26. 90
EXAMPLE 36: VARIATION HI (SCORE) M M .27-31. 91
EXAMPLE 37: VARIATION IV (SCORE) MM. 101-115. 94
EXAMPLE 38: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) MM. 13-29. 95
EXAMPLE 39: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) M M .30-44. 95
EXAMPLE 43: VARIATION IV (SCORE) M M .34-44. 98
xiii
E X A M P L E 4 4 : V A R I A T I O N IV (S C O R E ) M M . 1 0 5 - 1 1 5 . 99
EXAMPLE 46: VARIATION IV (SCORE) M M .93-99. 101
EXAMPLE 47: VARIATION V (CELLO) MM. 1-13. 106
EXAMPLE 48: VARIATION V (VIOLIN O) M M .5-13. 107
EXAMPLE 49: VARIATION V (SCORE) MM. 14-25. 108
EXAMPLE 50: VARIATION V (SCORE) M M .29-38. 109
EXAMPLE 52: VARIATION V (SCORE) M M .58-70. I ll
EXAMPLE 53: VAR. V, MID. SECTION (FLUTE) MM. 13-21. 112
EXAMPLE 54: VAR. V , LAST SECTION (SCORE) MM. 1-8. 113
EXAMPLE 55: VARIATION V (CELLO) MM. 1-13. 114
EXAMPLE 61: VARIATION VI (SCORE) M M .26-32. 121
EXAMPLE 65: VARIATION VI (SCORE) MM. 101-106. 125
x iv
E X A M P L E 6 7 : V A R I A T I O N V I (S C O R E ) M M . 1-6 . 126
EXAMPLE 69: VARIATION VI (SCORE) MM.53-57. 128
EXAMPLE 72: VARIATION VI (FLUTE) MM.95-99. 130
EXAMPLE 73: VARIATION VI (CELLO) MM. 1-6. 131
XV
CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
Amy Beach (1867-1944) has been the object of renewed interest in
music circles today. Her compositional output includes a large number of
works in the following genres: vocal, keyboard, choral, opera, chamber, and
orchestra. Amy Beach made her debut in music as a pianist in 1883 to
favorable reviews. She studied piano with her mother, Clara Cheney, Ernst
Perabo, and Carl Baermann, and harmony and counterpoint with Junius
Hill. However, Amy Beach was entirely self-taught in composition.
Furthermore, she did not enter a college music program or study in Europe
as many American composers did at that time. Her success as a musical
artist during this time is significant on two levels. First, her works are of
considerable quality and were performed during her lifetime, enabling her
to develop a national and international reputation as a significant American
composer. Second, as a woman, during that time in American culture, she
was faced with limitations based on gender which her musical talents
helped her overcome.
The majority of her chamber works include piano and strings, while
only three include the flute: Pastorale for woodwind quintet; Water
Sprites, Op.90 for flute, cello, and piano (incomplete); and the Theme and
Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80. The Theme and
Variations was published in 1920 by G. Schirmer and dedicated to the
Chamber Music Society of San Francisco. Hildegard Publishing purchased
the rights to the music and republished it in 1996. Copyright permission
has been granted by G. Schirmer and Hildegard Publishing.
The intent of this treatise is to 1) provide a biography of the
composer, Amy Beach; 2) provide a history and compositional style analysis
of her chamber works; 3) present a complete analysis of the Theme and
Variations; and 4) address the place of the Theme and Variations among
the other chamber works o f Amy Beach based upon the similarities of
compositional techniques and style found in this work and others. The
purpose of this study is to reintroduce a substantial piece into the chamber
music repertoire for flute as well as present a scholarly study on the
compositional style of the work together with a discussion about its position
in the chamber music ouput of one of America's earliest notable composers.
A Biographical Sketch of Amy Beach
Amy March Cheney was bom to Clara Imogene (Marcy) and Charles
Abbott Cheney on November 5, 1867 in Henniker, New Hampshire.1 Her family
history contained colonial ancestors and politically influential people.
From the same ancestry came William Lamed

Marcy, who was successively governor of New York,
United States senator, Secretary of War, and
Secretary of State; Randolph Barnes Marcy, the
explorer of the Red River; Charlotte Cushman, the
eminent tragedienne; and Major-General Dearborn of
Revolutionary fame.2
Charles Cheney was a graduate of Bates College and worked as a paper
manufacturer and importer.
1 Gail Smith, comp, and ed.. The Life and Music of Amy Beach: “The First Women
Composer o f America." (Pacific, Missouri: Creative Keyboard Publications, 1992), p.5-6.
2 Louis Charles Elson, The History of American Music (New York: Macmillan, 1904),
p.294.
FIGURE 1: CHARLES ABBOTT CHENEY
The Marcy family had a musical history. Amy’s grandmother was an
exceptionally high soprano, while her aunt was a respected and sought after
contralto. Her grandfather was a clarinetist and her mother, Clara, was a vocalist,
pianist, and tutor who performed occassionally.
FIGURE 2: CLARA IMOGENE MARCY CHENEY
Amy’s stunning musical abilities were apparent from age one. Mrs. Cheney
stated: “When she was just one year old, she had memorized and could sing forty
different songs. She was gifted with perfect pitch and an accurate memory.”3 By
seventeen months, she knew the alphabet. Shortly thereafter, Mrs. Cheney relayed
3 Smith, p.6.
to her aunt: "‘Before two years of age she would, when being rocked to sleep in my
arms, improvise a perfectly correct alto to any soprano air I might sing.”4 At three
years of age, Amy taught herself to read and at four, composed her first two pieces
entitled “Mamma’s Waltz” and “Snowflake Waltz.”5
FIGURE 3: AMY MARCY CHENEY, C. 1870
4 Smith, p.6.
5 Lindsey E. Merrill, “Mrs. H.H.A. Beach: Her Life and Music.” (Ph.D. dissertation.
University of Rochester, 1963), p.2.
As is often the case for people with perfect pitch, Amy possessed a distinct
scheme o f musical color in her mind. The following is a list of keys with an
associated color.
B lue...A flat W hite...C

Green... A Red...G
Pink... E flat Yellow...E
Violet...D flat Black.. .F sharp or G
sharp minor.6
With her natural abilities and still without instruction, Amy could, at the age of
five, sight-read at the piano and sight-sing simultaneously. At six years, she could
play by ear anything that she heard so far as the size of her hands would permit.
Consequently, her mother started tutoring her three times a week.7
Within a brief period, Amy developed a completed repertoire that included
Heller and Czemy etudes, several Beethoven sonatas and Chopin Waltzes, and the
“Harmonious Blacksmith” Variations of Handel. She included the H andel, a
Chopin waltz, and the Beethoven Sonata, Op.49 as well as one of her own waltzes,
in her first public concert at the Unitarian Church in Chelsea, Massachusetts. She
was only seven.8 At ten years, Amy assisted Professor Edward R. Sill, an
ornithologist, in recording songs of the California larks. Amy’s absolute pitch
6 Smith, p.7.
7 Smith, p.8.
8 Smith, p.8.
made it possible for her to transcribe the calls of numerous birds and consequently
incorporate them into her own compositions.
The Cheney family moved to Boston and Amy began her general education
at Mr. W.L. Whittemore’s private school. She also pursued piano study with Ernst
Perabo, a well-known concert pianist. It was said that he had over one thousand
students during his residency in Boston. His teachers included Moscheles, Richter,
Hauptmann, and Reinecke. Her next piano teachers included Carl Baermann, a
student of Franz Liszt, and Junius W. Hill, who also studied with Moscheles,
Reinecke, and Hauptmann in addition to Plaidy and Richter. During the winter o f
1881 and 1882, Amy received her only formal training in music theory from Hill.9
As a young student, Amy could practice finger technique while simultaneously
studying a text. She considered the technique practice to involve only physical
coordination which left her mind available for mental work.10
9 Smith, p.9.
10 Myma G. Eden, Energy and Individuality in the Art of Anna Huntington, Sculptor and
Amy Beach, Composer, Composers of North America, No.2 (Metuchen, New Jersey: The
Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1987), p.38.
FIGURE 4: AMY CHENEY, C. 1880
Amy’s official debut as a concert pianist in Boston came on October 24,
1883 at the age o f sixteen. Her performance with orchestra was conducted by
Adolf Neuendorff at the Old Boston Hall. The program contained the Moscheles G
minor Concerto, Op.60 and Chopin’s Rondo in E-flat as a solo.11 Her first
published work appeared in 1885, a song entitled “With Violets.” According to
Adrienne Fried Block, it was the only work published under her maiden name.12
11 Adrienne Fried Block, introduction to Amy Beach: Quintet for Piano and Strings in F
Sharp Minor, Op.67, Women Composers Series (New York: Da Capo Press, 1979), p.vi.
12 Ibid.
During 1884 and 1885, Amy gave twelve solo recitals that were of considerable
length and contained standard solo pieces as well as chamber works. In addition to
solo recitals, she appeared as piano solist regularly. “From 1885 to 1917 she
appeared eleven times as soloist with the Boston Symphony, playing works by
Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin, Saint-Saens, and herself.” 13
When she was seventeen, Amy visited the eminent physician Dr. H.H.A.
Beach for treatment of a sore finger. Dr. Henry Harris Aubrey Beach was educated
at Harvard, served in hospitals during the Civil War, and was later appointed to the
Massachusetts General Hospital where he eventually became consulting surgeon.
He also became a faculty member at Harvard. Besides practicing medicine, Dr.
Beach, during the early portion of his career, served as assistant editor of the
Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. Dr. Beach also had several written works
on medicine and surgery published.14 In addition to being an exemplary physician,
Dr. Beach was a well-read student of the fine arts. He was a capable pianist, an
amateur poet, and a collector and admirer of fine literature.
13 Merrill, p.4-5.
14 Eden, p.43.
10
FIGURE 5: DR. H.H.A. BEACH
Amy Cheney and Dr. Beach were married on December 2, 1885 in Trinity Church
in Boston. 15 She was eighteen and he was forty-two. The Beachs made their
permanent residence at 28 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston.16 After their
wedding, Amy bore her husband’s full name, Mrs. Henry Harris Aubrey Beach,
and wore her hair up for the rest of her lifetime.
15 Smith, p.l 1.
16 Jeanell Wise Brown, Amy Beach and her Chamber Music Biography, Documents, and
Style, Composers of North America No. 16 (Metuchen, New Jersey: The Scarecrow Press, Inc.,
1994), p.29.
11
FIGURE 6: DR. AND MRS. H.H.A. BEACH, C. 1890
Dr. Beach was a staunch believer in his wife’s abilities and wisely
encouraged her to continue her independent study of composition, theory, and
orchestration to develop her individuality and originality. Her aptitude for
languages enabled her to translate French and German treatises on harmony,
12
counterpoint, and instrumentation. Her personal music library was an impressive
collection of such treatises and scores of Bach and Beethoven. Her admirable
discipline in her independent study is reflected in the following quote: “As an
exercise in the study of fugue she was accustomed to committing Bach fugues to
memory, and then writing out their voices on separate staves.”17
Dr. and Mrs. Beach were known to practice her art songs and four-hand
piano works together. Amy even composed music to five poems by Dr. Beach.
Their musical rapport was fostered through their mutual understanding of Dr.
Beach’s position and appreciation of Amy’s abilities. During their marriage the
profits earned from her musical career were given to charities. Her husband’s
wealth and status did not stop her from performing but from earning an
unnecessary income. The couple extended their generosity to fellow artists as well.
The Beachs were known to hold “drawing room” musicales every Wednesday
evening at their Boston residence. The weekly musical events were instrumental
in launching and/or furthering the careers of talented young artists.
While composing independently in 1891, Amy Beach began serving on the
awards committee for piano at the New England Conservatory with Arthur Foote
and Edward MacDowell, other prominent Bostonian composers. Shortly thereafter,
Mrs. Beach had her first major composition premiered. Although published in
1890, the Mass in E-Flat for solo quartet, chorus and orchestra was premiered on
17 Elson, p.297.
13
February 7, 1892 with Carl Zerrahn conducting. The following quote from the
New York Sun Review on February 18, 1892 testified to the work’s success.
Boston, February 7. —The Handel and Haydn Society

to-night gave the initial presentation of a Mass in E-
flat, composed by Mrs. H.H.A. Beach of this city.
Mrs. Beach is the first woman in America to
compose a work of so much power and beauty.
Music Hall was packed, and the piece scored a grand
success.18
The Mass contains movements of brilliantly contrasting character, key, style, and
orchestration. It was the first work of a woman composer performed by the
Handel and Haydn Society.
Following the success of the mass, Mrs. Beach was offered several
commissions. The first commission was to write a “Festival Jubilate,” Op. 17 for
chorus and orchestra for the dedication of the Women’s Building at the World’s
Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.19 Theodore Thomas conducted this
concert of works by women composers that included Ingeborg Bronsart of
Germany and Frances Ellicott of England as well as Mrs. Beach. For Op. 17, Mrs.
Beach used themes reminiscent of Gregorian writing and more modem harmony
and orchestration in an effort to compose a piece sharing elements of the nineteenth
18 Percy, Goetschius, Mrs. H.H.A. Beach: An Analytical Sketch (Boston, Massachusetts:

Arthur P. Schmidt, 1906), p.61.
19 Smith, p.13.
14
and twentieth centuries. Other successful women composers of Beach’s era include
Fannie Charles Dillon, Eleanor Everest Freer, Margaret Ruthven Lang, Mary Carr
Moore, and Clara Kathleen Rogers.20
Mrs. Carl Alves, a soloist from the premiere of the Mass in E-flat,
commissioned the opera aria “Eilende Wolken,” Op. 18 from Mrs. Beach.21
“Eilende Wolken” was based on Schiller’s “Maria Stuart.” Mrs. Alves performed
the work with Walter Damrosch and the New York Symphony Orchestra, thus
making it the first work of a woman composer to be performed by the Symphony
Society of New York.
Beach’s next work was a full-scale symphony for orchestra. She entitled
the work “Gaelic Symphony,” Op.32. The premier was yet again of historical
importance.
It took place on October 30, 1896, with Emil Paur

conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Scored
for full orchestra, it was the first symphony ever
produced by an American woman, and the first such
work ever performed by an American orchestra.22
The first movement entitled Allegro con fuoco is in e minor and is characterized by
the Gaelic folk tune interwoven with the theme. Alla Siciliana, the second
movement in F major, alternates a melody with a scherzo. The third movement,
20 Block, p.v.
21 Block, p.vii.
15
Lento con molto expressione, is in e minor and consists of three themes resembling
folks songs and possessing the closing minor cadences found in Gaelic music. The
fourth movement, also in e minor, is entitled Allegro molto and also develops a
folk-song theme. Very popular in its time, the Gaelic Symphony was performed by
the Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Kansas City, Manhattan (New York), Philadelphia,
San Francisco, and St. Louis Symphonies.23
In 1898, Mrs. Beach was commissioned to compose “Song of Welcome”
for the opening of the Trans-Mississippi Exposition in Omaha. Two years later, on
April 7, 1900, she premiered her Piano Concerto in C-sharp minor, Op.45 with the
Boston Symphony.24The work was dedicated to Mme. Teresa Carreno and
contained four movements: opening movement, scherzo, largo, and finale. This
work signified a marked continuation in Beach’s individuality and finesse for
writing for piano and full orchestra.
22 Christine Ammer, Unsung: A History o f Women in American Music (Westport,

Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1981), p.79.
23 Block, p.viii.
24 Smith, p. 14.
16
FIGURE 7: MRS. H.H.A. BEACH, C. 1900
Amy Beach’s affinity for piano writing was developed further in the Quintet
for Piano and Strings. “The Quintet for Piano and Strings, Op.67, had its first
performance on February' 20, 1908 by the Hoffman Quartet with Beach at the
piano, in Potter Hall, Boston.”25 The work was published in 1909 and was
considered the end of her early style primarily because of its harmonic language.
25 Block, p.vii.
17
Sadly, just shy of their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, Dr. Beach died on
June 28, 1910.26 It had been a happy marriage despite the age difference and the
fact they had no children. At the age of 74, Amy Beach shared some memories of
her husband.
Dr. Beach was ‘old-fashioned’ and believed that the

husband should support his wife. But he did not want
me to drop my music, in fact, urged me to keep on,
with the stipulation that any fees I received should go
to charity. So hospitals, charities, institutions and
similar organizations all were the recipients. I was
happy and Dr. Beach was content.27
However, the Beachs’ summer home in Cape Cod was paid for completely by the
royalties from the song, “Ecstasy,” Op. 19.
Tragically, less than a year after her husband’s death, Amy’s mother, Clara
Cheney, died on February 18, 1911.28 After the deaths of her husband and mother,
Amy Beach left for Europe on September 5, 1911. She spent her first year resting
and traveling, trying to recuperate from her double personal loss. The next three
years comprised her European debut and she enjoyed a wonderful reception for her
performances and compositions in several cities: “ ...she played her works in
Berlin, Leipzig, and Hamburg, attracting considerable attention as the first of her
26 Smith, p. 14.
27 Brown, p.32.
28 Brown, p.45.
18
sex and national origin to be able to compose music of a European quality of
excellence.”29
Critics expressed the highest praise for Beach’s works.
The most respected of German critics, Ferdinand

Pfohl, wrote in 1914 that Beach “has musical gifts o f
the highest kind, a musical nature touched with
genius,” and he also noted the virtuosity of her
pianism .... Another Berlin critic stated flatly that
Beach was “the leading American composer.”30
Her first trip to Europe lasted nearly four years; she returned to the United States
shortly before the outbreak of World War I.
Due to her publicized European success, Beach’s homecoming and ensuing
popularity was overwhelming. For the years after her return, her manager, M.H.
Hanson, had her booked concertizing as solo recitalist, chamber music pianist, and
as solo pianist with major American orchestras. Mrs. Beach spent her winters
touring and her summers practicing and composing. She spent fifteen summers at
the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire.
The colony is the 420-acre former estate of Edward

MacDowell. There private studios are scattered
29 Theodore Baker, Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, S'*1ed., revised by

Nicholas Slonimsky (New York: Schirmer Books, 1992), p. 128.
30 Block, p.vii.
19
among the secluded woods that afford complete
peace and privacy. Amy Beach always stayed in the
W atson Studio when she was there.31
Amy Beach so enjoyed her time at the MacDowell Colony, that in her will, she left
her royalties to the Colony.
The balance o f performing and composing invigorated Amy Beach. She
explained the duality of her career in the following statement.
I have literally lived the life of two people, one a

pianist, and the other a writer. Anything more unlike
than the state of mind demanded by these two
professions I could not imagine! When I do one kind
o f work, I shut the other up in a closed room and lock
the door, unless I happen to be composing for the
piano, in which case there is a connecting link. One
great advantage, however, in this kind of life is that
one never grows stale, but there is always a continual
interest and freshness from the change back and
forth.32
Composition continued with the “Panama Hymn” in 1915 for the San Francisco
Panama-Pacific Exposition. The occasion continued with “Mrs. H.H.A. Beach
Day” held on June 26, 1915.33
In addition to composing and performing, Mrs. Beach found extra time to
foster the music education of children through music clubs. Many of her piano
31 Smith, p.I5.
32 David Ewen, “Mrs. H.H.A. Beach,” American Composers: A Biographical Dictionary
(New York: Putnam, 1982), p.46.
33 Brown, p.67.
20
pieces are instructional in nature and proved to be popular in their time.
“Children’s Album” and “Children’s Carnival” are two representatives of Mrs.
Beach’s imaginative writing for children: both works are original and technically
accessible. She also contributed to the Etude Music Magazine,34 Amy Beach also
possessed a keen sense of political involvement. During World War I, she had her
publisher, A.P. Schmidt, sell some of her original manuscripts to raise money for
the American Red Cross.
During one of her sojourns at the MacDowell Colony, Mrs. Beach
collaborated with the Kneisel Quartet and consequently decided to compose more
chamber music. G. Schirmer published her new compositions, chamber and others,
between 1914 and 1918. In a letter to her old and dear friend Schmidt, Beach told
him of her plans to close her Boston home, which she did on April 26, 1918.
During that year, Amy Beach turned 51 and began suffering from symptoms that
suggest heart failure and recurring colds. She required more frequent and extensive
rests from her career. Closing her Boston residence was one step towards
curtailing travel. The death of her long-time publisher and close friend, Arthur P.
Schmidt, occurred in the late spring of 1921. Their catalogued correspondence,
comprising hundreds o f letters, has been preserved at the Library of Congress.35
The 1920’s were a busy time for Mrs. Beach because of her professional
duties to numerous organizations. In 1924, Amy Beach served as the first president
34 Merrill, p.14.
21
of the Society of American Women Composers founded that same year. Sadly, the
Depression ended the society’s activities in 1929. However, the group’s efforts
witnessed the founding of thirty women’s orchestras, the majority of which had
female conductors. Other professional obligations included several national
organizations: “She was a member of the National League of American Pen
Women and the American Society of Composers and Publishers. She served as
leader of several organizations, including the Music Teachers National Association
and the Music Educators National Conference.”36
Mrs. Beach took her second trip to Europe from November of 1926 to July
of 1927. The trip was expressly for leisure and recuperation from professional life.
Afterwards in 1928, she resumed her summer sojourns to the MacDowell Colony.
“Both she and Mrs. Edward MacDowell were granted the Honorary Master of Arts
Degree by the University of New Hampshire.”37 Not long afterwards, Mrs.
Beach’s fluctuating health took a more permanent turn in 1930 and marked her
curtailment in concertizing. In 1930, she also made her final residence at the
American Women’s Association on W. 58th St. in Manhattan. In 1933, the
Chicago International Exposition honored Mrs. Beach with a medal for her work in
music.
35 Brown, p.41 and 79.

36 Smith, p.4.
37 Brown, p.85.
22
FIGURE 8: AMY BEACH, C.1937
Amy Beach’s last chamber work, the Piano Trio, Op. 150 was composed at
the MacDowell Colony in just three days in the summer of 1938. Between 1938
and 1939, Beach communicated extensively with B.C. Tuthill, the historian who
compitled the first biographical accounts of her life and works.38 In 1940, Mrs.
Beach was the guest of honor at a dinner in New York’s Town Hall Club, attended
38 Brown, p. 103.
23
by over 200 musicians, composers, and friends.39 In addition to the honors
received, Mrs. Beach had another milestone that year. “As of 1940, only 3 of her
150 opus numbers remained unpublished, and this in itself is a remarkable record
for any American composer.”40 The following publishers were responsible for the
publishing of Amy Beach’s works: Arthur Schmidt Co., C.C. Birchard and Co.,
and Oliver Ditson Co. After her departure from Boston, she employed G.
Schirmer, H.W. Gray & Co., and the Composer’s Press 41
Mrs. Beach’ wide-spread success in composition and performing fostered
many acquaintances. “She maintained long-term relationships with conductors
Theodore Thomas, Carl Zerrahn, Emil Paur, and Victor Harris, with singers Emma
Eames, Marcella Craft, Mrs. Carl Alves, and Ruth Schaffner, as well as with
pianists Fannie Bloomfield-Zeisler, Teresa Carreno, and Marian MacDowell, and
violinist Maud Powell.”42 Her many professional relationships led to
commemorative concerts. “In 1942, to celebrate Beach’s 75Ih birthday, Elena de
Sayn, a violinist and critic from Washington, D.C. organized two retrospective
concerts of her music.”43 Beach’s association with the League of American Pen
39 Diane Peacock Jezic, Women Composers: The Lost Tradition Found (New York: The
Feminist Press at the City University of New York), p. 149.
40 Ibid.
41 Ibid., p. 150.
42 Block, p.viii.
43 Adrienne Fried Block, “Amy Marcy (Cheney) Beach,” vol. I of The New Grove
Dictionary o f American Music, ed. H. Wiley Hitchcock and Stanley Sadie (New York: Grove’s
Dictionaries of Music, Inc., 1986), p .164.
24
Women led to her introduction to the Library of Congress and the subsequent
donations of her manuscripts preserved there today.
Finally, at the age of 77, Mrs. Beach died of heart disease at 5:00 pm on
December 27, 1944 in New York City after being ill for six weeks.44
44 Smith, p. 18.
25
CHAPTER TWO
A Study of the Compositional Style of Amy Beach:
In Selected Chamber Works
Categorizing Amy Beach with respect to American music is problematic.
She is often associated with the tum-of-the-century “Boston” or “New England”
school, whose founder was composer and teacher John Knowles Paine. Leading
composers of this group included George Chadwick, Arthur Foote, Horatio Parker,
and perhaps Edward MacDowell. With the exception of Foote, all the “New-
Englanders” studied in Europe. Amy Beach neither studied with the “New
England” composers nor in Europe. Her independent study resulted in her work
showing the chromatic influence of Wagner and Brahms rather than the influence
of her contemporaries.
In her thesis on the chamber works of Mrs. Beach, Felicia Ann Piscitelli
described the background of the “Boston classicists.”
In general, the music of the “Boston classicists,” in

terms of its position in American musical history,
reflects the relatively youthful culture of the United
States in the nineteenth century, when European
fashions and styles were imitated. Their conservative
and derivative style is a reason why these composers
are of a secondary stature despite their unmistakable
talent. Due to their training, however, their
26
craftsmanship was sound, and they composed music
that is worthy of study.45
B.C. Tuthill, famous historian and Beach biographer, praised the “New-
Englanders” for their accessible music.
All of the New England group have written with

ample technique in form, harmony, and counterpoint,
and with an intelligence and emotional intellectuality
that is not abstruse. Their music may be enjoyed if
not fully apprehended at a first hearing, a strong point
in its favor for public performance.46
H. Wiley Hitchcock further distinguished the group: “ none of them was
a “classicist” except in the sense that Brahms was a classicist: they belonged to
that wing of Romanticism that maintained a belief in the viability of the abstract
instrumental forms.”47 The Boston composers including Amy Beach composed
symphonies, sonatas, chamber music, fugues, and contrapuntal choruses.
Although Amy Beach was associated with the Boston school through the
similarities of genre and style, Carol Neuls-Bates describes the gender standards in
music criticism by which Mrs. Beach was judged.
45 Felicia Ann Piscitelli, “The Chamber Works of Mrs. H.H.A. Beach (1867-1944).”
(M.M. thesis. The University of New Mexico, 1983), p.3.
46 Burnet Corwin Tuthill, “Mrs. H.H.A. Beach,” Musical Quarterly 26, no. 3 (July 1940):
298.
47 H. Wiley Hitchcock, Music in the United States: A Historical Introduction, Prentice
Hall History of Music Series (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1969), p. 139.
27
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As a corollary to the “woman composer question,”
critics of the late nineteenth century developed a
system of sexual aesthetics that analyzed music in
terms of feminine and masculine traits. Feminine
music, which women were expected to cultivate
exclusively, was by definition graceful and delicate,
full of melody, and restricted to the smaller forms of
songs and piano music. Masculine music, by
contrast, was powerful in effect and intellectually
rigorous in harmony, counterpoint, and other
structural logic. Symphonies, operas, and similarly
large-scaled works lay in the realm of masculine
music, and as women in increasing numbers came to
write in large forms they were decried as venturing
beyond their proper sphere.48
Philip Hale, in his review of Amy Beach’s Gaelic Symphony, viewed her
heavy orchestration as a chance to be virile. Another critic claimed she was weak
in contrapuntal writing and that the symphony was too long and drawn out.49 In
Famous American Composers, Rupert Hughes stated: “It is the transparency of
her studiousness, and the conspicuous labor in polishing o ff effects and mining
opportunity to the core, that chiefly mars the work of Mrs. Beach, in my opinion.”50
During her time, Amy Beach had few harsh critics and many vocal
supporters, such as Percy Goetschius.
48 Carol Neuls-Bates, ed.. Women in Music: An Anthology o f Source Readings from the
Middle Ages to the Present (New York: Harper & Row, 1982), p.223.
49 Ibid., p.224-5.
50 Rupert Hughes, Famous American Composers (Boston, Massachusetts: L.C. Page and
Co., Pub., 1900), p.430.
28
From this point of view it is easy to define concisely
the salient characteristics of Mrs. Beach’s style:
strong, passionate conception and powerful
emotional impulse, tempered and controlled by
never-failing command of the means of expression;
hand in hand with an exquisite sense of melodic and
rhythmic beauty; and serious, scholarly, technical
treatment which is as effective as it is always
refined.51
Beach’s success during her lifetime was unusual due to the gender bias
associated with composition. Women were not expected to compose in the
larger forms. Beach did so successfully, even more successfully than her
“European-trained” contemporaries since she was self-taught. As composers,
however, they were in agreement that they were not trying to develop an
American musical idiom.
Amy Beach was known throughout her career as a fine writer of songs. She
composed more than 120 art songs, comprising the largest portion of her output, set
to prose o f Henley, Bums, Shelley, Hemingway, and Browning. The songs are
characterized by their wonderful lyric quality, artful and idiomatic melodies,
energetic and capable accompaniments, and distinctive expression. Beach also
composed duets, part-songs for male, female, and mixed voices in addition to large
choral pieces.
51 Goetschius, p. 16.
29
Amy Beach’s thematic structure is a strong and consistent feature of her
style. “Beach’s themes are commonly constructed with three or four phrases, each
four or eight measures long, with a repetition of the first phrase in a different
register.”52 Beach had earlier been noted to write more lyrical, conjunct melodies
in the instrumental idiom than vocal. However, her early period or style of
composition was believed to be ended before her first trip to Europe. “After 1915,
even the instrumental melodies become increasingly more disjunct, chromatic, and
harmonically ambiguous.”53 Furthermore, her melodic writing is characterized by
overlapping phrases, use of folk tunes, and beautiful counter-melodies developed
by motivic manipulation and thematic expansion.
Other defining stylistic features include rhythm. “Her rhythmic
characteristics include cross-rhythms, uneven groupings of notes, syncopation,
repeated rhythmic motives, and the triplet figure.”54 Beach’s contrapuntal writing
is nearly limited to her instrumental music. Counterpoint sometimes serves as a
contrasting secondary texture in her instrumental works. Structurally, Beach’s
piano pieces and songs are most often in ternary form. She employs the sonata-
allegro form in her multi-movement instrumental works.
Beach’s harmonic writing is characterized by seventh, ninth, augmented,
altered, and Neapolitan chords. She also made use of modal harmony, whole-tone
52 Brown, p. 163.
53 Brown, p. 141.
54 Brown, p. 150.
30
harmony, and enharmonic modulations. Furthermore, Beach incorporates
extensive chromaticism, rapidly changing tonal centers, distant harmonies, and
references to secondary keys. Jezic reiterates:
And yet her musical style is eclectic, reflecting

aspects of Brahms, Wagner, MacDowell, and perhaps
even Debussy. Typical of the late Romantic period,
her larger works exhibit lush chromaticism, many
altered chords, broadly spun-out melodies, involved
development of themes, and complex harmonies.55
The influence of Berlioz’s treatise on harmony is seen in Beach’s use of
third relationships, diminished chords as transitions, and avoided cadences. To
Liszt, perhaps Beach’s greatest influence, can be attributed her development of
formal structure and thematic development. Beach’s trademarks, perhaps also
influenced by Liszt, include preference for trills, tremolos, chromatic scales and /or
passages, and extensive use of octaves.56 In her piano piece, “Fireflies.” Beach
makes excessive use of double thirds, a challenging piano technique attributed to
her early study of Moscheles. The piano pieces, “A Hermit Thrush at Eve: and “A
Hermit Thrush at Mom,” were composed at the MacDowell Colony. Apparently, a
55 Jezic, p. 152.
56 Brown, p. 131.
31
thrush visited Mrs. Beach’s studio and she transcribed the bird call to the correct
key and employed them an octave lower in her pieces.
Through her independent study of composition, Amy Beach determined her
own set of guidelines. In 1915 Beach gave an interview to the Los Angeles
Examiner in which she cited “ten commandments” for young composers:
1. Perfect the technique of composition, beginning

with the simplest rudiments.
2. Begin with small things-ideas that can be

expressed in small forms.
3. Develop all the possibilities of a small form.
4. Learn to employ as much variety in form as

possible. Avoid becoming stereotyped in
expressing melodic, harmonic, or rhythmic ideas.
5. Analyze the old masters, especially their examples

in the same form (as, for a fugue, Bach's Well-
Tempered Clavier).
6. Study the string quartets of Haydn, Mozart, and

the early Beethoven; analyze and learn them by
heart.
7. Listen to good string quartets at their rehearsals

and concerts; take along a score and follow it.
8. Hear good choral music.
9. Learn the master works of the symphony as played

by fine orchestras; be thorough in studying
symphonic works.
32
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10. Remember that technique is only a means to an
end. You first must have something to say. “If
you feel deeply and know how to express what
you feel, you make others feel.”57
In addition, Amy Beach encouraged young composers to study piano, harmony,
counterpoint, and orchestration as well as training their ears and cultivating their
musical tastes. In piano study especially, Beach emphasized the masterworks of
Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms.
Highly respected and regarded as a deeply spiritual and moral person, Mrs.
Beach confided some personal views on being an artist.
To me, the greatest function of all creative art is to

try to bring even a little of the eternal into the
temporal life. So long as we write exactly what we
ourselves feel and believe, so honest is our works and
so high its quality.58
In another article, Mrs. Beach elaborated on the same sentiments.
The one idea that I would earnestly beg all young

people to accept as the guiding principle of their
musical life is this: Music is to be shared with others.
We never know how beautiful a composition really
is, what possibilities for emotional or dramatic
57 Ammer, p.83.
58 Mrs. H. H. A. Beach, “The Mission of the Present-day Composer,” The Triangle o f Mu
Phi Epsilon 36, no. 2 (February 1942): 72.
33
expression it may contain, until we play it to
someone else.59
In her chamber music, Amy Beach wrote primarily for strings and piano.
The seven chamber works that include piano encompass the following: Romance,
Op.23 for violin and piano; Sonata in A moll, Op.34 for violin and piano; Three
Pieces fo r Violin and Piano, Op.40; Invocation fo r the Violin, Op.55 with piano;
Quintet in F Sharp Minor, Op.67; Suite fo r Two Pianos, Op. 104; and Trio, Op. 150
for violin , cello, and piano.60 Only three chamber works exclude the piano:
Quartet fo r Strings, Op.89; Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet,
Op.80; and the Pastorale for woodwind quintet.61 And of the remaining five
manuscript chamber works, all include the piano: Pastorale, Op. 90, N o.l for violin
and piano; Water Sprites, Op. 90 for flute, cello, and piano; Lento espressivo,
Op. 125 for violin and piano; Barcarolle for violin and piano; and Dreaming, a
transcription for cello and piano from Dreaming, Op. 15 for piano.62
Of these works, certain ones are deserving of study for their sound
composition and significant representation of Amy Beach’s style. The Sonata for
violin and piano, Op.34 is one such work. The themes of the Sonata reflect those
of Brahms in style and melodic shape. The manipulation of these thematic ideas
59 Mrs. H.H.A. Beach, “Work Out Your Own Salvation,” Etude 36, no. 1 (January 1918):
11.
60 Brown, p.viii-ix.
61 Brown,p.x.
62 Brown, p.x.
34
results in an artistic product characterized by distinct structure, rich harmonies, and
expert contrapuntal writing.
In the first movement, the principle theme and counter theme are disguised
in a subtle combination in the Animato section that occurs prior to a modulation to
the dominant and presentation of the lyrical second theme which is developed in
the Neapolitan of E major. This movement is not in a clear sonata form. The
second movement is a scherzo beginning in G Major with a contrasting slower
middle section in G minor, thus creating a ternary form. This movement contains a
short rhythmic motive tossed between the piano and violin. The third movement is
an exceptionally beautiful Largo that begins in E minor with an eight-bar piano
introduction. The melody is constructed of dotted rhythms and tied notes and the
movement concludes in E major. The fourth movement begins in A minor with the
main theme stated in the violin and the syncopated second theme in the relative
major stated in the piano. The thematic and motivic development resembles that of
the first movement. The fourth movement is in an expanded sonata form and
contains contrapuntal sections. Joseph Silverstein, violin, and Gilbert Kalish,
piano, recorded the Sonata for the Anthology o f American Music in 1976.63
Another major work that is mistakenly left off her chamber music list is the
Variations on Balkan Themes, Op.60. Beach premiered the Variations for solo
piano on February 8, 1905. She published a revision of the work in 1936. An
35
arrangement of the Variations for orchestra was written in 1906 followed much
later by an arrangement for two pianos in 1937, with a revision in 1942.64 This
work is only one of two pieces in the theme and variations format by Beach, the
other being the Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80. Both
works use minor mode themes containing the augmented second and employ
imitative contrapuntal writing.
The Reverend William S. Sleeper had been a missionary in the Balkans and
had provided Amy Beach with the folk songs she utilized in her Balkan Variations.
Of the melodies, one is from Macedonia, two are probably from other areas of
Yugoslavia, and the main theme is a Serbo-Croation song, most possibly from
modem Yugoslavia. The title of the main theme in the minor mode is “O Maiko
Moya.” Its translation in the score is “O my poor country.” Topich translated it as
“O my mother.”65 Piscitelli describes the construction of the main theme.
The main theme is a regular eight-bar period with

antecedent and consequent phrases. It is in C-sharp
minor and contains a prominent augmented
second.... Another period beginning in the relative
major and returning to the tonic completes the
theme.66
63 Jane Weiner Le Page, Women Composers, Conductors, and Musicians o f the Twentieth
Century: Selected Biographies (Metuchen, New Jersey: Scarecrow Press, 1980), p.46.
64 Adrienne Fried Block, Jacket notes to Amy Beach, Arthur Foote Music fo r Piano,
Virginia Eskin, piano (Northeastern Records, NR 223-CD, 1987), p.2.
65 Piscitelli, p.29.
36
In the first variation, the tune is presented in canon and then immediately
goes into the second variation which is characterized by dotted-rhythms and
octaves. The third variation possesses a lighter quality established by the perpetual
sixteenth-note motion in the high register. The fourth variation begins in
compound duple meter with a modulation beginning in the previous variation from
C-sharp minor to B-flat minor. This variation is in ternary form with the middle
section in D minor. The fifth variation is in G-flat major and is characterized by a
dotted-quarter note followed by three eighth notes, trills, and chromaticism. The
sixth variation uses a new tune “Stara Planina” or “Hymn to the Mountains.”67
This tune is in F-sharp minor and prominently features the augmented second. The
main theme returns in the seventh variation. The eighth variation introduces a new
tune, “Nasadil e Dado” or “Grandpa has planted a little garden,” beginning in F-
sharp major and modulation A major.68 The eighth variation brings back the rapid
sixteenth-note figure of the third variation. In the ninth variation, the fragmented
main theme returns, again in C-sharp m inor with a chromatic counter-melody. The
dotted rhythm of the fifth variation resurfaces in the tenth variation, which is a
waltz. The eleventh variation is a lento in G-flat minor. Fragments of the main
theme and the Macedonian melody are interspersed in the twelfth variation entitled
“Marche Funebre” which closes the work in E-flat major.
37
Block further categorizes the organization of the composition with
variations nine and ten combined as well as variations eleven and twelve. The
tunes used in each variation are indicated by their number:
Theme: Adagio malincolico, No. 1

Variation I: Piu mosso, No. 1
Variation II: Maestoso, No. 1
Variation IE: Allegro ma non troppo, No. 1
Variation IV: Andante alia Barcarola, No. 1
Variation V: Largo con molto expressione, No. 1
Variation VI: Quasi fantasia, No.2
Variation VII: Allegro all’Orgarese, No.i
Variation VTH: A tempo, No.3
Variation IX: Vivace, Valse lento, No.l
Variation XI: Marcia fiinebre; Molto lento;
Nos. 1 and 4.69
The Piano Quintet in F sharp minor, Op.67 was published in 1909 and
premiered in February of that year with Beach at the piano.70 Piscitelli explains the
significance o f this work.
In this Quintet, Mrs. Beach makes use of the cyclic

principle by interpolating the slow introduction to the
first movement into the third movement toward the
end, and by making this introduction thematically
related to both movements.71
69 Block, Amy Beach, Arthur Foote, p.4.

70 Brown, p. 197.
38
R ep ro d u ced with p erm ission of th e copyright ow ner. Further reproduction prohibited w ithout p erm ission .
The harmonic and melodic content found in the Adagio introduction sets the tone
and thematic development used in the ensuing Allegro. Beach uses parallel chords
frequently to segue into new thematic material. Piscitelli describes the lyrical
second theme of the first movement: “This new theme is developed extensively
throughout the movement. Its first three notes are an inversion of the opening of
the first theme; therefore the two main themes are related.”72 The movement is an
expanded sonata form in which the first theme is presented in augmentation in the
recapitulation. The movement concludes with another Adagio section exhibiting
thematic fragments and parallel chords.
The second movement, entitled Adagio expressivo, begins with the theme
in the strings in D-flat for eight bars. The key shifts enharmonically to C-sharp
minor in the piano with an inversion of the first two measures of the theme.
Piscitelli states that this movement is a symmetrical rondo form, whereas Brown
argues for its ternary structure based upon the middle section containing a lengthy
rhapsodic solo for piano followed by the return of the principle melody. This
movement is characterized by its manipulation of themes, tempo changes, and
chromaticism.
The third and final movement, Allegro agitato, is in compound duple meter
and begins in F-sharp minor. The theme is four measures in length and contains an
39
octave leap and an augmented second. The theme is treated in imitation,
fragmentation, and augmentation. Cyclic use is apparent when the slow
introduction from movement one reappears. A closing Presto utilizes thematic
material from the first and last movements and ends the piece in the tonic major.
The Trio, Op. 150 for violin, cello, and piano was published in 1939. The
work, like the Piano Quintet, has a three-movement format, virtuoso piano parts,
and a slow movement coupled with a scherzo. Although the work was criticized
for its old-fashioned romanticism, it reflects the more modem Beach with its
thematic material being more motivic than lyric, extensive use of imitation, and
unresolved dissonances.
In the first movement, Allegro, a three-note motive is manipulated while the
violin has ascending and descending chromatic material. Harmonically, there are
suggestions of Hungarian minor but the harmony is ambiguous, and while the
presentation of thematic material may outline a sonata form, the tonal plan does
not. The movement ends in A major.
The second movement, Lento espressivo, is in compound duple time
beginning with a three-bar melody in the strings. The movement is arguably either
in ternary form with a coda or A B A’ B \ The ambiguity is based upon the tonal
flexibility, with the movement beginning in F-sharp minor and then to G-sharp
minor in contrasting sections. The contrasting section, Presto, contains a theme
40
from a set of piano pieces, Eskimos, Op. 64. The Presto is highly imitative and is
reminiscent of the Quintet, Op.67 for its treatment o f the string and piano writing.
The third movement, Allegro con brio, is in cut-time and ternary form. It is
characterized by its syncopated melody and the octave eighth-note ostinato found
in the piano. The contrasting meno mosso is in D-flat major and has a dotted-
rhythm melody. The movement ends in a Maestoso with thematic fragments o f the
preceding sections. The movement and work come to a definite close in A major.
Amy Beach composed three chamber works for flute and other instruments.
Aside from Arthur Foote, she was the only one of the New England composers to
write for the flute, music for strings being the primary focus of chamber music. O f
the three works for flute, the Water Sprites is incomplete; the Pastorale is
insignificant structurally; and the Variations, Op.80 is substantial.
The Pastorale for woodwind quintet was published by The Composers
Press, Inc. in 1942.73 The one-movement work for winds is in a slow compound
duple. The ternary structure has key areas of G major, e minor, and G major. Its
texture is relatively transparent due to the thin voicing of phrases. The phrases
frequently overlap, however, and the thematic ideas are exchanged in points of
imitation. The melody is characterized by the repetition of the dotted quarter note,
dotted eighth-sixteenth-eighth note rhythm.
73 Brown, p.313.
41
The Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80 was
completed on July 20, 1916 in San Francisco.74 The work was commissioned by
flutist Elias Hecht and dedicated to the Chamber Music Society of San Francisco.75
Elias Hecht premiered the work on September 28, 1916.76 The piece was published
in 1920 by G. Schirmer.77 Hildegard Publishing purchased the rights in 1996.
The work was immensely popular during Amy Beach’s lifetime and
enjoyed many publicized performances. In 1930, Opus 80 was performed on the
radio: “On December 26 her Flute Variations, Op.80, was broadcast nationally
from Cleveland, but she found out about it too late to listen.”78 On January 14,
1932, the Variations, Op.80 was performed at a private music studio on West 40th
St. in New York City.79 The piece was again performed at St. John’s School in
March of 1934. In 1935, the Variations was performed in New Jersey and on
October 28th of the same year, the Beatrice Oliver ensemble performed the work in
New York.80
A few years later, Mrs. Beach heard a performance: “Of Carlton Sprague
Smith’s playing of the Flute Variations in 1938 she said “beautiful,” adding that
74 Adrienne Fried Block, introduction to Amy Beach: Theme and Variations for Flute and
String Quartet, Op.BO (Bryn Mawr, PA: Hildegard Publishing Company, 1996).
75 Brown, p.286.
76 Block, Theme and Variations.
77 Brown, p.286.
78 Walter S. Jenkins, The Remarkable Mrs. Beach, American Composer, ed. John H. Baron
(Michigan: Harmonie Park Press, 1994), p. 102.
79 Ibid., p. l l l .
80 Ibid., p. 121-2.
42
there was “much enthusiasm” from the audience.”81 The work was performed by
William Rose, principle flutist in the Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestra, and the
Guild String Quartet in Grand Rapids, Michigan in January of 1941. The piece was
also included on the concerts in honor of Amy Beach.
In Washington, D.C., in 1942, the Phillips Memorial

Gallery recognized the composer’s 75th birthday
anniversary with two concerts of her music on
November 27 and 28.... Kenton F. Terry,
accompanied by the Sayn String Quartet, played the
Variations for Flute and String Quartet, op.80, in the
Washington premiere of the work.82
On May 9, 1944, John Wummer, principle flutist of the New York
Philharmonic, performed the VariationsP Two days later, on May 11, 1944, Mr.
Wittgenstein, flutist, performed the work with the Oxford String Quartet on the
American Music Week program broadcast on WQXR.84
Critics praised the work for the high quality of its writing. Tuthill, historian
and Beach biographer, suggested that her balance of instruments was excellent,
something she did not achieve when composing chamber music with piano. Merrill
adds to the point: “The handling of the flute in relation to the strings is admirable.
81 Ibid., p.139.
82 Ibid., p. 158.
83 Ibid., p. 157.
84 Ibid.
43
The work has a sense of direction and above all a sense of formal coherence.”85
Merrill elaborates further: ‘T he string writing is the best of all of her chamber
works.... Although there is a trace of Wagnerian writing, the statement that Mrs.
Beach wrote most sincerely when not utilizing the piano certainly holds true
here.”86
Tuthill expounds further on his view of the Theme and Variations, Op.80.
The color effects produced by the combination of the

flute with the strings have seldom if ever been so
well exploited in so original a treatment. Too often
composers treat the part for the wind instrument as
though it were intended for a soloist but here, while it
may have the lead because of its coloratura-soprano
position in the gamut, it is nevertheless merely an
important member of the ensemble. While the
violincello is often scored in its high register, the
feeling is never created that the texture is
unsupported; there is no underlying void such as
gives so many works for flute with strings an air of
insipidity. For pure beauty and sincerity there are
few passages in American music that can surpass the
slow fifth variation in F-sharp major. A debt is owed
to the flutist, the late Elias Hecht of the Chamber
Music Society of San Francisco, who persuaded Mrs.
Beach to write the composition for him.87
In his review of a 1980 recording of the Variations, Op.80, Thomas W arner
commended the work.
85 Merrill, p.32.
86 Merrill, p.33.
44
Beach displays in her twenty-minute set of six
variations on an initial theme an unabashed
romanticism, which is artfully punctuated by crisp
fugato sections. The music evolves from a fine sense
of craftsmanship and an expert handling of musical
details.88
In conclusion, Amy Beach’s compositional style is characterized by
consistent thematic and phrase structure; overlapping texture; use of folk tunes;
lyrical and memorable melodies; beautiful counter-melodies; motivic manipulation
and development; preference for syncopated and repeated rhythmic figures as well
as the triplet figure; contrapuntal textures; sonata-allegro forms for instrumental
works; harmony built upon seventh, ninth, augmented, altered and Neapolitan
chords; modal harmony; whole-tone harmony; enharmonic modulations; extensive
chromaticism; and a variety of virtuoso piano techniques. The discussion and
analysis of the Variations, Op.80 that follows will substantiate the important
position of the Variations, Op.80 within Amy Beach’s compositional output and
within the flute repertoire.
87 Tuthill, p.302-3.
88 Thomas E. Warner, “Music for Flute and Strings by Three Americans,” American Music
1, no. 2 (Summer 1983): 107.
45
CHAPTER THREE
An Analysis of the Theme
Amy Beach used her own composition, An Indian Lullaby, a part song for
women’s voices on an anonymous text, as the main theme for the Theme and
Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80. A comparison between the original
vocal setting and the instrumental version is necessary in determining phrase
structure and form. There are very few differences between the two settings. The
text for the vocal setting is listed below.
Sleep in thy forest bed,

Where silent falls the tread
On the needles soft and deep,
Of the pine.... Of the pine
Rest in thy perfect dream,

Lull;d by the falling stream,
And the long, long hushing song
O f the pine.... Of the pine
Send, mighty spirit kind,

Send, not the rushing wind,
Send a gentle slumber song
To the pine, to the pine.
Breath fragrant as the rose

From the tassel’d branches blow,
46
Softly breathe upon my child,
Mother pine, Mother pine.89
Form
The voice setting is thirty-four measures long, in the key of A minor, and
in 9/8 time or compound triple meter. The setting presents the four stanzas of text
in a balanced binary form with clear four and eight-bar phrases. The string setting
is thirty-six measures long and is also in A minor and 9/8 time. Beach extends the
string setting by holding the two major cadences for an extra measure. Another
difference is found in tempo. The voice marking is “Andante quasi Adagio” while
the string marking is “lento di molto, sempre espressivo” with the dotted-quarter
note equalling 48.
Perhaps the most important similarity is the orchestration. Beach set the
instrumental setting for strings alone, perhaps to imitate the homogenous texture of
the women’s chorus. However, in the string setting she increased the contrapuntal
voice leading, developed the quarter-eighth note motive, and emphasized the
growing overlapping texture.
Both versions are in a balanced binary form, with the cadential material of
Part A returning at the end of Part B. Part A constitutes mm. 1-17 in the vocal
89 Block, Theme and Variations.
47
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setting and mm. 1-18 in the string setting. The phrases of Part A are in measure
groupings o f four, four, and eight. Both versions end with imperfect authentic
cadences in A minor, with the cadence extended a measure in the string setting.
Below are excerpts of the cadence points in both settings.
EXAMPLE 1: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM. 13-17.
pin.
EXAMPLE 2: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM.13-18.
Part B constitutes mm. 18-34 in the vocal setting and mm. 19-36 in the string
setting. The phrases are in measure groupings of eight, four, and four. As was
mentioned earlier, the cadential material of Part A returns at the end of Part B; thus,
48
Part B also concludes with an imperfect authentic cadence in A minor Below are
excerpts of the final cadences in Examples 3 and 4.
Soft gp . my d titt. Moth • c r pfi
PP
Soft • If b m t K c ^ l . op * oa my diiM.
£E____________ _______
EXAMPLE 3: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM.30-34.
EXAMPLE 4: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM.31-36..
49
Harmony
Although predominantly in A minor, Beach visits different tonal areas
within the theme. For the harmonic discussion, the string setting will be used. The
first phrase contains mm. 1-4 and has a half cadence in A minor. The chromatic
passing tones and perpetual quarter-eighth note motion prevent this from being a
solid cadence. The phrase in measures 5-8 cadences with an imperfect authentic
cadence in C major, the relative major. Although this is decidedly a stronger
cadence, the quarter-eighth note motion continues in the viola. Before the
definitive cadence in m.17 marking the end of Part A, the last phrase of this
section, consisting of eight bars, travels to the key area of F major in mm. 12-13.
The phrase cadences with an imperfect authentic cadence in A minor in m.17.
Part B begins with an eight-bar phrase stressing the dominant of A. Within
this phrase, mm.22-23, Beach travels to A major, the major tonic. Again, because
of the movement of the inner voices, the phrase continues and an imperfect
authentic cadence in A major occurs in m.26. In the subsequent phrases, the
chromatic voice leading in the first violin descends to a very weak half cadence in
m.30 before the return of the cadential material of Part A which leads us back to the
tonal area of A minor with an imperfect authentic cadence in m.35.
50
Melody
The melodic structure of the theme has the primary melody in the top voice
or first violin for the entire theme. Its overall range goes from D-sharp 3 up to F-
sharp 4 thus creating the range of a minor tenth. The melodic range in the first
phrase is a minor sixth; in the second, a minor seventh. In the third and final phrase
of Part A, the range extends to a minor ninth. The first phrase of Part B extends the
range to its fullest, the minor tenth, while the two remaining shorter phrases
comprise the descent of the tessitura. The last of these phrases, a restatement of the
closing of Part A, descends all the way to the D-sharp 3 once more before ending
on the A 3.
The main portion of the theme in Part A is characterized by the opening
descent from the pitch C 4 to E 3 on the first line. The skeleton of this phrase is
the step-wise descent to E, as shown in Example 5.
L ento di molto, sempre espressivo (J-=*.s)

dolce cantando
EXAMPLE 5: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM. 1-4.
51
The second phrase (mm.5-8) begins with an A minor arpeggio to D 4.
From D, the melodic skeleton descends by step to G 3, a contour that recalls the
first phrase (Example 6).
poco creae.
EXAMPLE 6: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.5-8.
The third and final phrase of Part A begins on E4 a step higher than the
climax of the previous phrase. The melodic shape of mm.9-12 is of a descent, but
not a step-wise one. Beach’s signature chromaticism enters in m.12 for the first
time before the abrupt change in melodic contour in m. 13. The ascending contour
on beat one of m.5 is now a descending one in m.13. Measures 13-17 contain more
leaps in the melody as well as the leading tones of the dominant and tonic. This
phrase marks the highest point in the range and dynamics of Part A. Example 7
shows mm.9-18 of the first violin part.
52
The opening melodic material of Part B is characterized by the ascending
and then descending perfect fourth figure in addition to the emphasis on B, the
dominant of E. This first phrase of Part B is eight bars long and marks the melodic
and dynamic climax of the theme by extending upwards in range to the F and then
the F-sharp as well as a crescendo followed by a subito piano in m.23 (See
Example8). The phrase continues to m.26 in the key of A major.
Measures 27-30 contain a descending step-wise motion in addition to
specific chromatic pitches that not only cancel the modality, from A major to A
minor, but also question the form of minor in m.30 where the G-sharp is cancelled.
The descending chromaticism is prevalent not only in the melody but throughout
the three other accompanying voices. Measures 27-30 o f violin I are shown below.
53
a fc ± = = fc = * fc
9) no
setnpre dim .
EXAMPLE 9: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.27-30..
The final phrase is a repetition of the closing phrase from the A section,
with a few differences. Measure 35 contains a molto ritard and the articulations of
the tonic and leading tone are marked with tenutos instead of slurs. Measure 36 has
a fermata reiterated with “lunga” for effect. The final phrase excerpt is below.
lunga
molto rit. /v\
im HP
m
■ ! 1
itz
PP
EXAMPLE 10: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.31-36..
Rhythm
The rhythmic pulse of the theme is based upon the continuous repetition of
two different rhythmic figures occurring in at least one part at all times with three
exceptions. The rhythmic figures are either a quarter-eighth note grouping or a
54
three-eighth note grouping. The figures are missing in the first two beats of m.16;
beats 2 and 3 of m.22; and the first two beats of m.34. Ail three measures
anticipate cadences. Measure 16 not only lacks the rhythmic figures on beats 1 and
2, but has the quarter-eighth figure in every part on beat three before the cadence
which ends Part A. The next occurrence in m.22 anticipates the elided cadence in
A major coupled with a subito piano, the only such dynamic in the theme.
Furthermore, m.22 immediately precedes the upper limit o f the melodic tessitura in
the first violin, the F sharp in m.23. The third and final disappearance of the
rhythmic figures occurs in m.34, simulating the close of the section as in m.16.
Again, the third beat shows the quarter-eighth note figure in every part, this time
with tenutos and a molto ritard. Thus the use of these two rhythmic figures
promotes continual linear motion and their absence precedes important harmonic
and melodic goals.
The two rhythmic figures discussed above are often paired between voices
and used imitatively. Measures 1-4 show the quarter-eighth note figure first in the
second violin and viola and then in the second violin and cello. Measures 5-8
show more intricate overlapping of voices. The violins begin together but by the
second beat, the viola is shadowing them and the cello has the most sustained
rhythm of the voices. Even at the cadence in m.8 the viola continues with the
rhythmic figure. In the third phrase of Part A, the rhythmic figure of quarter and
eighth is lengthened by a tied dotted-quarter note preceding it. Often this figure is
55
referred to as a “sigh” motif. This figure is in the paired violins with the viola
playing a variation of the figure. Also, the cello enters several beats later with a
fragment of the rhythmic figure. Measure 13 shows the viola and cello in parallel
rhythm all the way to the cadence in m.17. The violins are still paired with slight
deviations in m.13 and 16. Part A ends with the cadence in m.17 but the motion
continues on beat three in the paired voices of the second violin and viola.
The first phrase of Part B is characterized by the double-stop pizzicati on
beat two in the cello. The cello switches to a sustained rhythm in m.23. The
second violin and viola are paired in parallel rhythm that supports the melody in
the first violin. The second phrase o f Part B lacks the second violin and the
rhythmic figures pass from one voice to another and sometimes overlap in m.29.
The second violin enters as a pick-up to the last phrase where the rhythmic motion
slows and eventually ends with tutti rhythm on beat three of m.34.
Orchestration
As was mentioned earlier, Beach set the theme for strings alone, perhaps to
imitate the homogeneous texture of the women’s chorus. Beach went so far as to
assign the vocal lines to specific instruments. The parts vary little from each other.
For example, soprano I line is found in the violin I part. Between these parts, there
are rests for breathing in the vocal part in measures 2, 12, 19, 25, 27, and 29. The
56
dotted-quarter note is changed to a quarter note followed by an eighth note for the
text in m.14 and m.31. These are the only differences between the two settings of
the melody.
The soprano II and violin II parts have more differences. In mm. 1-4 there
are constant rhythms and passing tones in the violin part that employ the same
range but sometimes not the same pitch material as the corresponding soprano part.
In mm.5-12, the pitch material is more similar and in mm. 13-17, only the rhythm is
altered for the text. However, in mm. 18-21, the violin part has double-stops with
prevalent chromaticism while the soprano part is higher in range by almost a fifth.
In Part B, the measure numbers no longer match between the two settings. The
second violin rests from mm.27-30, beat 2 while the second soprano only rests
from m.26-27, beat 2. In the last phrase of Part B, the two parts have comparable
pitch and rhythmic characteristics but the soprano ends on E 3 whereas the violin
ends a third lower on C 3.
The alto I and viola parts share many similarities. For the entirety of Part
A, the two parts contain comparable range and pitch material with the exception of
more rhythmic motion in the viola. At the string cadence through mm. 17-18, the
second violin and viola finish m.17 with passing tones in eighth notes. The G-
sharp in m.20 of the voice is an octave higher than the G-sharp in m.21 of the viola
part. The alto I part, from the pick-up to m.26 to the end, is found in the cello part.
The second alto part, from the pick-up to m.27 to the end, is in the viola part.
57
R ep ro d u ced with p erm ission of the copyright ow ner. Further reproduction prohibited w ithout p erm ission.
Prior to m.27, the second alto and the cello parts correspond to each other..
In mm. 1-2, the cello holds a tonic pedal while the voice part moves with the upper
voices. The parts are nearly identical in range and pitch, with minor alterations in
the rhythm to accommodate the text, for the remainder of Part A. Beginning in
m.17 and ending in m.22, the cello has double-stop pizzicati on tonic and dominant
while the second alto moves homophonically with the upper voices. Measures 23-
26 in the cello are nearly identical to the corresponding vocal measures.
For the most part, the consistency with which Beach transcribed the vocal
setting to the string quartet suggests her satisfaction with the original
writing/scoring o f the four parts. However, she also introduced some significant
changes - in particular, the crossing of voices at the end of the theme. Beach
distinguished the string setting further by utilizing double-stops, pizzicato
articulations, and more contrapuntal writing and overlapping phrases.
In conclusion, the theme is in a balanced binary form with Parts A and B
being equal in length with similar phrase structure. Texturally, the theme is
presented as solo with accompaniment; the solo being the top voice of the four.
The theme is in the key of A minor (although Beach travels to the related key areas
of F and C major) and the final cadence in A minor is an imperfect authentic
cadence. Being in a compound meter, the theme presents two rhythmic figures for
repetition: the quarter-eighth note grouping or the three-eighth note grouping. As
58
might be expected, a variety of these characteristics will be discussed in the
analysis of each variation in the ensuing chapters.
59
CHAPTER FOUR
An Analysis of Variation I
Form
The first variation is in the same key, tempo, and meter as the theme. It is
forty bars in length due to a four-bar introduction by the solo flute. Variation I uses
the entire theme for variation. It is in binary form with mm. 1-20 comprising Part A
and mm.21-40 making Part B. This variation is increasingly colored by
chromaticism, causing marked cadences to become less frequent and even less
obvious. The key of the variation is A minor. However, the opening flute passage
incorporates two augmented seconds, D-sharp and G-sharp, thus creating the
Hungarian or gypsy minor (Example 11).
V a ria tio n I
dolce
EXAMPLE 11: VARIATION I (FLUTE) MM. I-4.
60
Harmony
The strings enter in m.5 with the theme in A minor. The harmony is
difficult to discern because of the chromatic passing tones and suspensions.
Essentially, prior to the imperfect authentic cadence in the relative major in m.12,
the harmonic progression consists of secondary dominants and diminished seventh
chords. The strength of the cadence in m.12, corresponding to the one in m.8 of the
theme, is weakened by the overlapping voices and continued rhythmic motion.
However, this cadence in C corresponds to the one in m.8 of the theme. The
remaining measures of Part A travel briefly to the tonal areas of E and F before
cadencing in A minor in m.20. This cadence also matches the one in m.17 of the
theme.
Part B begins in m.21 with emphasis on E as the dominant. The next eight
bars lead us to another imperfect authentic cadence in A major, corresponding to
the one in m.26 of the theme. Through the chromatic descent of the viola in m.28
and 29, the modality changes to A minor. A half-cadence in A minor occurs in
m.32, identical to m.30 in the theme, and is followed by the return o f the cadential
material from Part A. The tonality of A minor is confirmed in the last phrases of
Part B and an imperfect authentic cadence occurs in mm.39 through 40.
61
Melody
O f all the variations, the first features the theme most prominently. After
the flute introduction, the first phrase of the theme is found in violin I, scored an
octave higher, with slightly different rhythm, and with the last pitch in the viola
(Example 12).
EXAMPLE 12: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.5-8.
The theme momentarily disappears during the second phrase (mm.9-12), due to the
chromatic intertwining of the voices. The third phrase of the theme in Part A does
appear in mm. 13-20 in the cello (See Example 13).
62
EXAMPLE 13: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM. 13-20.
Part B o f Variation I begins in m.21 with the second half of the theme in the
second violin in mm.21-24. The flute finishes the eight-bar phrase with the melody
in mm.25-28. The melodic material here extends to its highest note, F-sharp 5. It
should also be noted that Beach puts this thematic material in the highest range of
the highest voice available (Example 14).
63
m fc a n ta b ile
m a rca to
cresc.
64
The second phrase o f the theme in Part B resumes in the first violin in m.29. Then,
in m.33, Beach puts the cadential material in the cello as she did at the end o f Part
A in this variation. Measures 36-40 prolong the tonic-dominant preparation among
the chromaticism of the other voices.
Rhythm
While retaining the tempo and meter of the theme, Beach initiates rhythmic
variety by using a new rhythmic figure which dominates the texture. Found in the
opening flute solo, a dotted-eighth beamed with three sixteenth notes figure is
found on nearly every beat in at least one part at all times. It is the distinguishing
feature of this variation. This new figure functions as the quarter-eighth figure and
triplet-eighth do in the theme. It is a unifying element that not only perpetuates
motion but also provides more opportunity for chromatic coloring and overlapping
voices. It can also be seen as a counter-rhythm to the rhythm of the melodic
material.
The rhythm in the accompaniment of Part A resembles the accompaniment
of the theme but also uses more sustained rhythms, creating a legato style. A new
accompanimental rhythm, eighth-quarter, is introduced in m.19. It is the reverse of
the sigh motif. This figure is found in the second violin and viola parts and it
changes to an abbreviated form in m.2l( at the beginning of Part B) where it is now
in the secco style. The legato style returns in m.25 in synchronization with the
65
subito piano and melodic climax. The chromatic figure of Variation I returns,
mostly in the flute and violins. The variation ends with the handing off of the
rhythmic motif between the top three voices (Example 15).
Orchestration
Beach chooses to begin Variation I with the flute solo without any string
accompaniment. The solo flute passage serves several functions. 1), it introduces
the wind color that was absent from the theme; 2), it introduces a new form of A
minor, the Hungarian or gypsy form with two augmented seconds; 3), it introduces
the new rhythmic figure that dominates this variation. In bar five, Beach adds the
strings and immediately creates a texture of five independent and equal voices.
For the majority of its part, the flute serves as a strong chromatic countermelody to
66
the theme. The theme itself is found in four of the five voices with only the viola
functioning harmonically.
In the orchestration o f the theme, Beach utilizes the fullest range of the
instruments. In m.5, the first violin has the theme an octave higher than the
original setting and the other instruments are in a much higher register as well. At
the appearance of the last phrase of Part A, Beach scores the theme in the cello in a
much lower range. The other strings are also in a much lower register. These
factors contribute to a darker instrumental color while the flute contrasts with a
higher tessitura. In m.21, Beach puts the first phrase o f Part B in the second violin
in its middle range with the other voices, except flute, supporting from below. As
was mentioned earlier, the four bars of the theme in the flute, mm.25-28, reflect the
melodic height of the theme in the highest register of the highest voice. In m.29,
the theme is in the first violin scored above the other voices in its original octave.
The cadential material of Part A, seen previously in the cello, returns in the cello in
the lowest register. The flute and first violin make their final chromatic ascent
followed immediately by their descent. The final cadence has the unusual scoring
of the flute in the middle o f the texture underneath the violins and just above the
viola and cello. The last cadence of Variation I is seen below.
67
EX A M PLE 16: V A R IA T IO N I (SCORE) M M .3 3 -4 0 .
68
In conclusion, Beach clearly maintains the presence of the original thematic
material in this first variation while introducing the solo flute countermelody and a
new rhythmic figure. While this variation retains the same key, tempo, and meter
of the theme, it also provides an opportunity for Beach to introduce her trademark
use of chromaticism resulting in infrequent and ambiguous cadences as well as an
overlapping and contrapuntal texture.
69
R ep ro d u ced with p erm ission of the copyright ow ner. Further reproduction prohibited w ithout p erm ission.
CHAPTER FIVE
An Analysis of Variation H
Form
The second variation is in 2/4 time or simple duple meter, and is ninety-
eight bars in length. Its tempo marking is Allegro giusto with the quarter note
equalling 138. This variation has an imitative texture throughout as well as
perpetual rhythmic figures in every part. Variation II is still in A minor and has a
ternary form based upon the manipulation of thematic fragments. Part A consists
of mm. 1-51; a very brief Part B in mm.52-65; and the return of A in mm.66-98. As
in Variation I, the chromaticism prevents us from clear tonalities and cadences.
Harmony
The harmony is directly affected by the constantly transposed thematic
fragments. Variation II begins in A minor and could have a half-cadence in mm.7-
8 based upon the sustained harmony and lack of melodic material. With the cello
entrance in m.22, the thematic fragments are transposed to E minor, the minor
70
dominant. In mm.28-30 of the viola part, there is a D pedal that, in addition to the
chromatic progression in mm.32-35, prepares us for the flute entrance in m.36 in
which the thematic fragment is in D minor. In m.44, the first violin brings us back
to A minor which ends Part A with an imperfect authentic cadence in m .51.
Part B, although brief, contains the cello pizzicato found at the beginning of
Part B in the theme. It also has the theme in the same key, V o f A minor. The
chromatic ascent of the cello in mm.56-60 prepare us for F-sharp as a tonality in
the return of Part A.
Measures 66-71 are in F-sharp minor due to the thematic fragments in the
cello. In m.72, the first violin has the theme in A minor but it is sequenced a half
step higher two bars later. Measures 78-82, have A minor scales in the flute and
violin parts over a dominant pedal in the viola part. In m.83, the opening flute
entrance returns with the thematic fragment again in D minor but including the
augmented seconds, D-sharp and G-sharp, from Variation I in m.87 in the viola and
second violin parts; in m.90 for the cello; and in m.91-92 for the flute. The
variation concludes in A minor with a rapidly ascending chromatic scale leading to
an imperfect authentic cadence.
Melody
Unlike Variation I which uses the entire theme with full phrases, Variation
II is a manipulation of only the first five notes of the first phrase in Part A and
71
nearly all the pitch material in the first half of the first phrase in Part B. This is a
much more selective choice of thematic material. In the excerpt below of mm. 1-6
of Variation II, the thematic fragment in the second violin is transposed every two
bars while bordered by the imitative texture of the first violin and viola parts.
V ariation II
A llegrro g-iusto (J =iss)
EXAMPLE 17: VARIATION H (SCORE) MM. 1-6.
The first violin repeats this part an octave higher in mm.9-14. The first transposed
excerpt is in E minor in the cello part. Measures 22 through 27 are seen below.
72
EXAMPLE 18: VARIATION H (SCORE) MM.22-27.
The next entrance of the theme is in D minor in the flute in mm.36-41. An
annotated excerpt is below.
ff
ff
EXAMPLE 19: VARIATION II (SCORE) MM.36-41.
73
The last statement of Part A is found in its original key and octave in the first violin
part.
Part B only uses the first half of the first phrase of the second part of the
theme. It is found in the cello part in the original key and uses nearly all the pitch
material. An excerpt of mm.52-55 is below.
nrco
m a r c a to
The first violin in m.56 has the theme transposed a half-step higher than the cello
statement.
The return of the A section is in m.66 with the thematic fragments in the
cello part in F-sharp minor. The first violin states the fragment in A minor in m.72
and then chromatically ascends two bars later. Measures 72-77 are shown below.
74
The last statement of the thematic material is in the flute in D minor in m.83. The
variation ends with a chromatic scale up to the high A in the flute part.
Rhythm
Beach develops two new rhythmic motives in Variation II. The first is an
eighth rest with two sixteenth notes followed by two eighth notes. The second
figure is simply two sixteenth notes with an eighth note, sometimes repeated and
sometimes followed by two eighth notes. These two figures set the energetic
dance-like motion from the beginning of this variation. The first figure is
exchanged imitatively between the viola and first violin in mm. 1-6 shown below.
75
EXAMPLE 22: VARIATION II (SCORE) MM. 1-6.
A contrapuntal texture results from the interplay between the voices of the first
figure. Transitional sections are filled with sequential scale patterns on eighth
notes. An excerpt of mm. 15-19 is below
yjt — T— - -[ | - ■ - [ ------- |
° ^ =►
* >- >•
> . . >•
>-
EXAMPLE 23: VARIATION H (SCORE) MM. 15-19.
76
The second rhythmic figure mentioned previously, first appears in the
strings in mm.30-31. After the flute entrance, the figure is found in great repetition
in mm.44-50. An excerpt is shown below.
Part B of Variation II has a variation of the rhythmic figures. The variation
uses either a quarter note or an eighth note tied to the first of four sixteenth notes.
This is most clear in mm.56-59.
77
erese.
The return of A brings back the rhythmic characteristics mentioned in Part
A. Its closing, however, utilizes a derivation of the sixteenth note figure developed
in Part B. Measures 94-98 below show the rhythmic energy of the close of
Variation II.
78
Orchestration
The basis of the texture of Variation II is highly imitative due to the
manipulation of the Part A thematic fragment. Beach uses the voices
contrapuntally at all times. The opening has a three-voice texture with the theme in
the second violin and the rhythmic figure exchanged between the first violin and
viola. When the theme moves to the first violin an octave higher, the viola line is
now in the second violin and the former first violin part is in the viola part. The
successive entrances of the theme in the cello in m.22 and flute in m.36 are in the
high register of both instruments. The entrance of the flute marks the full texture
with a fortissimo dynamic. With these successive entrances of the theme, the inner
voices continually exchange the rhythmic motives and also double the eighth-note
motion of the theme.
The texture of B is characterized by the dense writing of the strings. The
theme, found in the cello, is written above the viola and second violin parts and just
underneath the first violin part. The theme then moves to the first violin while the
other strings overlap each other with constant sixteenth notes. The flute enters and
leads the ensemble in a rallentando preparing for the return of A.
Beach utilizes a three-voice texture at the beginning of the return of A. The
theme is in the cello, which is scored higher than the viola and just underneath the
second violin. So, the theme is once more sandwiched between two imitative
79
voices in a dense texture. Beach treats transitional passages with eighth-note
passages of scales in contrary motion as in mm.78-82. Measure 83 repeats the flute
entrance in m.36 with full texture at fortissimo dynamic but with the two violin
parts switched. Ail voices begin a descent that ends with the downbeat of m.95 and
immediately turns around to begin a rapid chromatic scale between the violins and
flute that ends with a pizzicato A minor chord. The result is an exciting flourish.
In conclusion, Variation II is the first ternary form based upon the thematic
development of both parts of the main theme. Even though it is still in the original
key of A minor, Variation II presents a completely different character than the
melancholy main theme due to its meter, tempo, characteristic rhythms, and highly
imitative texture. Beach uses chromaticism extensively as well as creative voicing
in this fugal-like texture.
80
CHAPTER SIX
An Analysis of Variation HI
Form
Variation HI is in 6/8 time or compound duple with an expressive marking
of Andantino con morbidezza (quasi Valzer lento) and the eighth note equalling
132. The result is an eccentric waltz in A minor characterized by new rhythmic
motives, colorful orchestration, and extensive chromaticism. This variation is
thirty-four bars long and is in ternary form with Part A comprising mm. 1-18; Part B
in mm. 19-26; and the return of Part A in mm.27 to the end. Beach cleverly
disguises sections with obscure cadences and motivic derivatives.
Harmony
The variation begins with a two-bar introduction of successive French-sixth
chords descending chromatically in the second violin, viola, and cello. An elided
imperfect authentic cadence in A minor occurs in m.7. Beach continues, using a
progression of secondary dominants and diminished seventh chords increasingly
81
obscure by excessive chromaticism in every voice. Emphasis on the dominant
begins in m.14 preparing for the end of Part A with an imperfect authentic cadence
in A minor in m.18.
Part B, consisting of only eight bars, has a tonic pedal in the cello that
begins to descend chromatically in m.22. The brevity of this section causes the
cadence in C major in m.26 to be prepared as the dominant of F major rather than a
complete modulation to the relative major.
Part A returns with the pick-up notes in the second violin and is highly
chromatic in mm.27-28. Measure 29 marks strong dominant preparation in the
tonality of A. By m.33, the C-sharp decides the tonality and the variation ends with
an imperfect authentic cadence in A major with the C-sharp resounding more as a
picardy third than a major third. The last three bars of Variation m are below.
r i t.
PP
PP
PP
PP
PP
EXAMPLE 27: VARIATION HI (SCORE) MM.32-34.
82
Melody
In Variation EH, Beach utilizes excerpts from both parts of the main theme.
In Part A, the theme is disguised by extensive chromaticism and Beach’s use of a
few significant pitches from the theme. The violins enter in m.2 in thirds with the
primary pitches in the violin and the same melodic shape from the theme. Below is
an annotated example of mm.3-5.
arco
PP
Measures 7-9 of Variation HI are based upon the arpeggio figure in m.5 of the main
theme. This figure, however, is immediately treated chromatically and there is no
further evidence of thematic material. Below is an annotated excerpt of mm.7-9.
83
ntf
poco
p o c o C re te .
Measure 10 marks the use of the theme from m.9. This thematic material descends
beginning on E and is further colored and varied through chromaticism. Measures
10-12 are shown below.
EXAMPLE 30: VARIATION m (SCORE) MM. 10-12.
84
Part B consists of mm. 19-26 and the thematic material found in the flute
corresponds to the beginning of Part B in the theme. The main pitches are
disguised within a scale-like texture based upon the Hungarian minor,
incorporating the two augmented seconds. The excerpt below contains mm. 19-26
of the flute part.
EXAMPLE 31: VARIATION IH (FLUTE) MM. 19-26.
Part A returns in m.27 with thematic material from m.9 of the theme now
found transposed in the first violin part. The flute reiterates this fragment in its
original key with the pick-up into m.29. Beach fills all the voices with chromatic
passing tones. This variation ends with the picardy third in the flute. Below is an
excerpt of mm.27-31.
85
» * '• « a im .
EXAMPLE 32: VARIATION IH (SCORE) MM.27-31.
Rhythm
Variation EH begins with two contrasting rhythmic figures. The first is the
accompanimental figure of eighth-quarter found in the viola and cello. The v i o lins
86
enter in m.3 in parallel rhythm with the figure, dotted-eighth sixteenth eighth.
Measures 1-4 are shown below.
Variation III
A n dantlno con m orbidezza (quasi V a lz e r lento) («”= 132)
arco
PP
are o
PP
arco
PP
a rco
PP
EXAMPLE 33: VARIATION HI (SCORE) MM. 1-4.
In m.9, the rhythmic figure of the violins is expanded to a dotted-eighth with three
sixteenths. This figure is highly prevalent in the flute part in Part B.
Part B has a solo with accompaniment texture. The flowing solo is found in
the flute part while the strings provide a steady accompaniment. Downbeats are
found in the cello part while the viola part provides the remaining eighth-notes and
the violin parts exchange sixteenth notes that support the flute melody.
With the return of Part A, Beach creates an overlapping texture by extensive
use of tied notes. The combined rhythm of the voices results in constant sixteenth
notes for nearly all of the return of A. In the last few measures of this variation,
87
Beach has one voice finishing the phrase of another voice. Measures 32-34 are
shown below.
Orchestration
The orchestration of Part A is characterized by the pairing of strings and the
counter-melody of the flute. The violins are in thirds and in parallel motion from
mm. 1-16. The cello and viola are paired similarly but with the cello giving each
down beat and the viola entering on the second eighth note creating an “oom-pah”
bass line. The flute usually enters underneath the violins creating a dark color and
then ascends to the third octave but still at a very soft dynamic. The flourishes of
the flute are in contrary motion to the violin lines. Dynamically, Beach does very
little. The variation begins pianissimo has a poco crescendo to m.9 and then
88
returns to piano. A crescendo in m. 13 brings a forte in m. 15 with an immediate
decrescendo in m. 16. The violin parts take separate routes in m. 17.
Part B is characterized by the soloistic flute line accompanied by the steady
rhythm of the strings. The violins exchange scales in sixteenth notes; the viola
finishes the eighth notes of each beat; and the pizzicato from Part B of the theme
resurfaces in the cello again, on the tonic, and then descends chromatically
beginning in m.22 to give us a cadence in m.26. The following excerpt is of
mm. 19-26.
89
EXAMPLE 35: VARIATION IE (SCORE) MM. 19-26.
The return of Part A has the thickest and most sustained texture of this
variation. Rhythms are tied and the voices are in a close range causing an
overlapping texture. Below is an excerpt of mm.27-31.
90
dim .
m f p i i i dim .
pit'i dim .
p ii i dim .
arco dim.
mf
EXAMPLE 36: VARIATION ffl (SCORE) MM.27-31.
The accompanimental texture from m. I returns in m .31 and the variation closes
with sustained strings in a two-octave range and the flute ascending to the C-sharp
above the staff.
91
In conclusion, Variation m retains the duple meter of Variation II, but now
in compound meter, as well as the ternary form. This variation, however, explores
new harmonies and moves from minor to major modality with the closing picardy
third in the flute. Furthermore, Beach utilizes a trademark genre, the waltz, and
creates a texture based upon pairings of instruments and characteristic waltz
accompaniments in addition to new rhythmic figures. She also uses the flute in its
counter-melody function against the violins, as in Variation I.
92
CHAPTER SEVEN
An Analysis of Variation IV
Form
Variation IV is in 3/8 time with a tempo marking of Presto leggiero and the
dotted-quarter note at 112. This variation is 115 bars in length and is in a binary
form. Part A consists of mm. 1-44 and Part B begins in m.45 and finishes the
variation. This variation has a highly agitated character due to the never-ending
triplet ifures in the strings and the extensive chromaticism. The melodic material in
both sections is preceded by a 12-bar introduction in the strings.
Harmony
Part A of Variation IV is in F-sharp minor. Beach again makes frequent use
of secondary dominants and diminished seventh chords. The first cadence occurs
in the relative major in m.29, thus corresponding to the cadence I m.8 of the theme.
Measures 30-44 are highly chromatic, making it difficult to determine a chordal
analysis, but do come to an imperfect authentic cadence in F-sharp minor in m.44.
93
Part B begins in m.45 with the 12-bar introduction in the strings and still in
F-sharp minor. W ith the flute entrance in m.57, the strings become much more
chromatic and chord analysis becomes more difficult. The second half o f the theme
in the flute is in the original key and leads to an ambiguous cadence in the tonality
of A minor in m.70-72. Measures 97-100 show a progression of the V/V to the
tonic in F-sharp minor. The introductory bars return in an abbreviated form and the
variation ends on an unresolved harmony followed by a fermata. Below is an
excerpt of mm. 101-115.
EXAMPLE 37: VARIATION IV (SCORE) MM.101-115.
94
Melody
In Variation IV the theme is only found in the flute. The first entrance of
the flute marked dolce cantabile has the first phrase of the theme in F-sharp minor.
Below is an excerpt of mm. 13-29 in the flute part.
F I ..
dolce cantabile
ii—• --- ppa-----p----

i r S------
m =-B--------
d rm-.------i ------
r 1i----------
r »1—p—s—=—|
EXAMPLE 38: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) MM. 13-29.
The second phrase in the flute begins in m.30 and ends in m.44. While it is not a
direct quotation of the theme, only transposed as in the previous phrase, its shape
resembles the phrase in m.9 of the theme. Its main characteristics are its descent
and the chromatic passing tones. The phrase is shown below.
erete.
EXAMPLE 39: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) MM.30-44.
95
Part B of Variation IV again has the theme in the flute. The second part of
the main theme is found in F-sharp minor in m.57. Measures 57-65 are a direct
quotation of mm. 19-20 of the main theme. In m.66, the remaining thematic
material is in the original key of A minor. Below is an excerpt of mm.57-72.
i^=r\T--\r
«r
f |f |i1| frf
j r . . ..— t-
i£##=g CTVSC.
EXAMPLE 40: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) MM.57-72.
Measures 76-80 in the flute part serve as a preparation for the dynamic and
melodic climax found in m .81. Measure 8 1 corresponds to m.23 in the main
theme. The F-sharp marks the height of the melodic range and this time, Beach
pairs it with a climax in dynamic with forte in every voice. Measures 81-100
resemble the shape of the corresponding phrases in the theme but do not use precise
pitch material. Below is an excerpt of mm.76-100 in the flute part.
96
p i i dim .
EXAMPLE 4 1: VARIATION IV (FLUTE) MM.76-100.
The variation ends with the flute playing low D, then the E-flat just above as an
appoggiatura, and then the D again by itself. Although it is an unresolved
harmony, the D is the opening pitch of the cello solo in the next variation.
Rhythm
The essence of Variation IV lies in the triplet figure found in the strings.
The triplet is present in every single measure of this variation. Below is an excerpt
of mm. 1-12 of Variation IV.
97
Variation IV .
Presto leg-fflero W-=H2)
PP
PP
PP
PP
igi
EXAMPLE 42: VARIATION IV (SCORE) MM.1-I2.
Beach then sets the flute melody in more sustained and syncopated rhythm above
the strings. The quarter-eight-note pattern in the flute offers the necessary rhythmic
contrast. Below is an excerpt of mm.34-44.
dim .
d im .
d im .
d im .
98
In Part B, Beach makes similar use of the 12-bar introduction in the strings
followed by the syncopated line in the flute. The excerpt below shows the halt in
the triplet motion of the second violin and viola while the flute holds a sustained
appoggiatura.
EXAMPLE 44: VARIATION IV (SCORE) MM. 105-115.
Orchestration
Beach sets a simple texture and maintains it throughout the entire variation.
She uses the triplet figure to build a pyramid in the 12 bars of introduction. To
intensify the agitated character she gives the strings the dynamic pianissimo.
Furthermore, when all string voices are present, the chromaticism appears and
remains throughout the flute statements of Part A. In contrast to the perpetual
99
activity of the strings, the flute has the sustained lyrical phrases of the theme
marked dolce cantabile. The next excerpt below is of mm. 1-20.
Variation IY .
Presto leg-grlero (J- r 112)
d o lce c n n tn b ile
EXAMPLE 45: VARIATION IV (SCORE) MM. 1-20.
The climax in volume in Part A is a mere mezzo-forte in m.34 followed by a
diminuendo three bars later.
Beach begins the next section again with the pyramid structure of the
strings beginning with the viola but now filling in from the bass to the first violin.
The strings are again at a pianissimo dynamic against the piano in the upper
100
register of the flute. In m.66, the voices begin a crescendo that is intensified by the
increasing chromatic passing tones in the strings. The dynamic climax of forte
occurs in m.81 when the flute is on the high F-sharp, the melodic height of the
theme. A diminuendo begins in m.88 and continues until the strings are at triple
piano in m.97. Below is an excerpt of mm.93-99 where the voices are in their
lowest range and darkest color.
p i it d im , "* -
1 p*** dim.
pp
# M = rfr
■ $ -
p i it d im . t d
p i it d im . *331
*pp^
-f n i f}
' p i i i d im .
jjJ J J iij j v
*p p
In conclusion, Beach returns to a binary form and retains the compound
meter but now with one beat per measure. In this variation, Beach develops a new
rhythmic figure, her trademark triplet figure, which provides an unending pulse for
the variation. The texture resembles the solo with accompaniment texture of the
main theme with the thematic material only in the flute. Harmonically, Beach
maintains a relationship with A as a tonality, but now as the relative major. The
101
unresolved harmony at the close of the variation provides the pitch preparation for
Variation V.
102
CHAPTER EIGHT
An Analysis of Variation V
Form
Variation V is in common time with a tempo marking of Largo di molto,
con grand espressione with the quarter note at 52. This variation is divided into
three sections. The first section, in F-sharp major, is 70 bars in length, and uses
only the first part of the main theme. The second section is a 38 bar recapitulation
of Variation IV in F-sharp minor in which the thematic material is also from the
first part of the main theme. The third section of this variation is a 16 bar
recapitulation of Variation I in A minor beginning with the flute solo over sustained
strings. The strings play only a fragment o f the first part of the main theme in
mm.6-8.
Harmony
The harmonic structure of this variation is difficult to discern because of the
extensive chromaticism. The variation begins with a cello solo in F-sharp major
that is also very chromatic. A weak imperfect authentic cadence in first inversion
occurs on the second beat of m.5. At this point, the other strings have entered and
103
the writing is dense and overlapping, resulting in less frequent cadences. Another
weak imperfect authentic cadence in F-sharp major occurs in m. 13. The flute
enters in m. 14 and again, because of the overlapping phrases, the clearest cadence
finally happens on a strong beat in m.28.
Measures 28-29 begin a new section o f harmonic writing while the same
melodic material is used. Through the chromatic writing of the viola solo, Beach
ventures from F-sharp major to E-flat by way of D-sharp. However the harmonic
rest is avoided through the ever-changing chromatic writing. A brief cadence in F-
sharp occurs on the first beat of m.46. Although the phrase continues immediately,
the cadence cannot be ignored because of its correspondence with the dynamics and
melody. Continuing in m.46, Beach again moves to the tonality of E-flat through
chromaticism and enharmonic spellings. This area ends in m.57 but with an
unresolved harmony and tonality.
Measure 58 clearly marks the return of F-sharp as the tonality of this
section. Measures 58-70 have significantly less contrapuntal writing, making more
sustained harmonies and clearer progressions. An imperfect authentic cadence in
F-sharp major occurs in m.62. The first section of Variation V comes to a close on
another imperfect authentic cadence in F-sharp major in mm.67-70.
The 38 measure recapitulation of Variation IV begins in F-sharp m in or but,
as in the first section, moves enharmonically in m .21. The flute part ends in m.21
on F-sharp and its next entrance is 5 bars later, an octave higher on G-flat. The
104
chord in m.21 is actually the full diminished seventh of the dominant in E-flat
minor. Beach uses the previous minor tonic to now be the minor third of a new key
area. The string accompaniment sustains the dominant seventh of the dominant in
E-flat over eight bars and then, through chromaticism, ends on the dominant o f E
major. The preparation of E is necessary for the last section of this variation in A
minor.
The last sixteen bars of Variation V are a recapitulation of Variation I. The
flute solo, based upon the Hungarian minor scale, is now supported by an A minor
chord sustained in the strings for four bars. The flute solo continues with
enharmonic coloring of the augmented seconds and the variation comes to an end
on an unresolved harmony based on the dominant of A minor.
Melody
Beach begins Variation V with the theme in the cello in a very high range.
She only uses the first five pitches of the first phrase of the main theme and then
begins ascending chromatically until the cello is at the top of the treble clef on the
F-sharp in m.8 and then begins to descend. Below is an excerpt of mm. 1-13 of the
cello part.
105
EXAMPLE 47: VARIATION V (CELLO) MM.I-13.
The second violin enters in m.5 with the inversion of the theme in its lowest
register thus contrasting the cello part. Below is an excerpt of mm.5-13 in the
second violin part.
106
E X A M P L E 48: V A R IA T IO N V (V IO LIN II) M M .5-13.
The flute enters with the theme in m.14 and Beach chromatically sequences the
triplet figure. Six measures after the flute entrance, Beach places the theme in the
fust violin. The two parts overlap each other until m.24 where they begin unison
octaves. Below is an excerpt of mm. 14-25.
107
EXAM PLE 49: V A R IA T IO N V (SC O R E) M M . 14-25.
The middle portion of this first section begins in m.28 with a change in
accompaniment. Beach now places the theme in the viola in m.29. The viola is
joined by the second violin in m.37 for a brief duo. Below is an excerpt of mm.29-
38.
108
E X A M P L E 50: V A R IA T IO N V (SC O R E) M M .29-38.
The theme is then placed in the first violin on beat three o f m.39. This position
within the measure weakens the effect of the thematic material. A similar entrance
is found in the flute in m.42, but is a much shorter statement. The flute is also used
to echo or double the line of the first violin.
The last portion of this first section finds the theme again in the high
register of the cello in m.46. At this point, the accompanimental figure from the
previous section remains and the voices continue to overlap each other with
increasing chromaticism. Below is an excerpt of mm.46-50.
109
E X A M P L E 51: V A R IA T IO N V (S C O R E ) M M .46-50.
The next statement of thematic material occurs in m.58 in the second violin. The
register of this statement resembles that at the beginning o f the variation. The first
violin then takes over in m.62 an octave higher. The flute then ends the phrase that
closes the first section o f this variation. Below is an excerpt of mm.58-70.
110
.m artm lf maftu
VP
to:
PP
mollo exp ress to
pp
esp£
PP
I d o lc issim o
pp
EEL
pp
IT
pp
EXAMPLE 52: VARIATION V (SCORE) MM.58-70.
Ill
The recap of Variation IV again has the melody in the flute and, in
consistency with Variation V, uses only the first part of the first phrase of the main
theme. This time it is an octave lower in the flute. Below is an excerpt of mm. 13-
21 in this section.
PP
EXAMPLE 53: VAR. V, MID. SECTION (FLUTE) MM. 13-21.
The recapitulation of Variation I incorporates the flute solo and the main theme in
the strings. Below is an excerpt of mm. 1-8 of the last section of Variation V.
112
Tempo del Tema
Q uasi Cadenza
VPP
doles
plzz. « ro o ^ ‘
arco
VP
arco
VP
EXAMPLE 54: VAR. V, LAST SECTION (SCORE) MM.1-8.
Rhythm
In the area of rhythm, Beach employs the characteristic rhythms of
Variations I and IV in their respective recapitulations in Variation V. The first
section of Variation V, however, makes use of a combination of compound and
simple rhythmic figures. The opening cello solo contains the characteristic triplet
113
rhythms of the main theme but now in common time where the natural division is
two. At the end of m.4, Beach incorporates duple rhythms in the solo cello, and
then adds the other strings in contrasting rhythms. The two main duple figures are
an eighth rest followed by an eighth-dotted-eighth-sixteenth note grouping and an
eighth-quarter-eighth note grouping. Both can be seen in the opening cello solo.
Below is an excerpt o f mm. 1-13.
Variation. V
L a rg o d i m olto, con. g rand’esp ressio n ecJrsa )
Solo -
cresc. setnpre cresc.
r
sempre cantando
P P
EXAMPLE 55: VARIATION V (CELLO) MM.I-13.
The second of the duple rhythms becomes the basic accompaniment in the middle
portion of this first section. Measures 28-32 show Beach placing the triplet figure
in the solo viola against the syncopated duple figure in the violins.
114
sem pre op poco ores*
poco cresc
Pcaiitnbile
Beach also augments the syncopated duple rhythm to a quarter-half-quarter note
rhythm that is found in the flute part in mm.67-70.
pp
. a PP
XT
PP PPP
PPP
115
Orchestration
As with rhythm, Beach uses the same textures found in Variations I and IV
for their respective recapitulations in Variation V. Unlike the solo with
accompaniment texture of those variations, Variation V is characterized by its
dense and overlapping texture as well as its masterful display of color due to
register and dynamics. The opening cello solo is a prime example of such writing
Not only does the solo begin in a high register, but it is higher in range than the
accompaniment by m.8 and stays there until the flute entrance in m.14. At that
point, only the cello is below the first violin and flute.
Beach reinforces the sombre legato style of this variation with expressive
markings of “cantando sempre,” “dolce espressivo,” “sempre tranquilo,”
“cantabile,” and “marcato molto espressivo.” In terms of dynamics, Beach usually
has the accompaniment at pianissimo and the solo part with the theme reaching
forte and sometimes fortissimo. Below is an example of mm.29-35. At the height
of the viola solo, the viola and first violin are overlapping pitches but because of
timbre, the viola is clearly the solo line.
116
Vcantnbila.
poco craac.
The first collective forte occurs in m.44 and diminuendos a bar later. The
second collective dynamic is a fortissimo that is preceded by a crescendo and
followed by a decrescendo. In the following excerpt, the climax of the first section
of Variation V is very clear in addition to Beach’s high tessitura and overlapping
texture.
117
Subsequently, Beach ends the first section of Variation V with the instruments in
their lowest registers at their softest dynamic.
118
To summarize, Variation V is in three sections because of its harmonic
manipulation of Part A of the main theme, thus touching upon the tonalities of F-
sharp major, F-sharp minor, and A minor. Beach creates the richest texture yet
through the high tessituras of the solo instruments, the extensive chromaticism, the
mixture of compound and simple rhythmic figures, the overlapping phrases, and the
contrapuntal writing. The recapitulations of Variations I and IV anticipate the
extensive quotations to come in Variation VI.
119
CHAPTER NINE
An Analysis of Variation VI
Form
The sixth and last variation is in 2/4 or simple duple meter with a tempo
marked Allegro giocoso and the quarter note at 104. This variation deals only with
the second half of the main theme and is in five sections. The first section consists
of mm. 1-63 and is in F-sharp minor. Measures 64-77 comprise the next section in
E-flat with a tempo change to quarter note at 72. The third section consists of
mm.78-94 and stresses the dominant of A. The fourth section is a Vivo in A major
consisting of mm.95-106. In m.107, the strings repeat the opening theme in A
minor the flute enters in m.123 with a recapitulation of its solo from Variation I.
Harmony
The fugal writing of this first section makes it difficult to find clear
cadences. Although the cello begins this variation with the exact pitch material of
the second half of the theme, the key signature indicates F-sharp minor instead of A
minor. The cello begins on B; the viola enters 3 bars later a perfect fifth higher; the
120
R ep ro d u ced with p erm ission o f the copyright ow ner. Further reproduction prohibited w ithout perm ission.
second violin enters in m.7 on the B; and the first violin enters in m. 13 with the
thematic material on F-sharp. In m.18, Beach incorporates chromaticism,
secondary dominants and diminished seventh chords, and suspended harmonies to
further disguise the tonality. The flute enters in m.21 with the thematic material on
F-sharp and continues with a long phrase that eventually leads us to A major
through the sequences of mm.26-28. The chromatic descent of the cello, beginning
in m.26, also establishes the tonic and dominant when it arrives on double stops in
mm.32-34. Below is an excerpt of mm.26-32 where we clearly see the tonality of
A major but without a clear cadence.
orete. molto
cresc. molto
crete.m ol /0
crete. molo
crtte. motto
EXAMPLE 61: VARIATION VI (SCORE) MM.26-32.
In m.38, the A-sharp enters in the viola in passing sixteenth notes but
persists in m.41 while the second violin stresses F-sharp. F-sharp, as the new
tonality, is challenged immediately as the A-sharp in m.41 of the viola becomes a
B-flat in m.42, hence foreshadowing the dominant of the next section. Again,
Beach uses excessive chromaticism in all parts to weaken the harmonic structure
121
supporting the flute’s statement of the thematic material in m.45. She even states
the theme in the second violin the dominant harmony of the next key are of E-flat.
Beach further clouds the harmony by the use of enharmonics in the second violin
part. Below is an excerpt of mm.45-56 showing the use of chromatic passing tones
and enharmonic spellings.
poco a poco rallentandb
T ' î i — —
^ 1
J b iJ FT-rj-PA . [ marcJto ^
fsem pre p)
til V ""| '11 FI- ■—,T~ ~ ^ ! I -t-
= -J-------
sem prep
j L J g g 1zjL sem prep 1
Measure 64 is the beginning of the second section in E-flat major. The
harmony is clearly established in the first few measures but then Beach begins
again with chromaticism and enharmonic spellings in m.70 thus confusing the
122
function of E-flat as a tonic or as a dominant in A-flat major. Below is an excerpt
of the second section comprising mm.64-77.
nr. , ^
‘ p. molto qfc
PP
PP PP
PP
Measures 78-94 mark the third section, which compresses the fugal subject
into continuous sixteenth notes that function as an harmonic transition. The cello
begins in E-flat followed by the viola two bars later in B. Two measures after the
viola, the second violin enters in E followed by the first violin in B and then the
flute in E. Measures 87-94 stress E as the dominant of A and then the dominant of
F. The dominant of F requires a C-natural which conflicts with the A major of the
approaching Vivo. Below is an excerpt of mm.78-94.
123
%Umpo(J* too
m
.it!»■* -----~--------
~
|»|J,t f. - —: - -
H» 1 ■ ~
Sy*!1 pp t o a - c r
*1=
ijt -—
pp
pp
poco a poco acct-
5E mm + 0 *i'
UrrTn^f.nr
vm m tf mm m
lyrfil T^r
124
The fourth section, Vivo, comprises mm.95-106 and is clearly in A major.
The tonic harmony resonates until m.104 where Beach has the strings on a
pizzicato German sixth chord and the flute continues to hold the tonic. Below is an
excerpt of the end of the fourth section, mm. 101-106.
'T¥
EXAMPLE 65: VARIATION VI (SCORE) MM. 101-106.
The closing section of the work is clearly in A minor as it is a recapitulation
of the main theme and the flute solo from Variation I. In the recapitulation of the
theme in the strings, there is an elided half cadence in m .l 10; a cadence in the
relative major in m .l 14; and an elided cadence in F major in m.l 19. The cadence
in A minor occurs in m. 123 and is sustained under the flute solo. This final
cadence in A minor is not a perfect authentic cadence and Beach ends the work
subtly with the instruments in a high scoring. Below is an excerpt of the final bars,
mm.123-128.
125
Melody
In Variation VI, Beach utilizes only the second part of the main theme. She
begins the variation with the first seven pitches of the thematic material as a fugal
subject with real answers in the successive entrances. Below is an excerpt of
mm. 1-6 with the thematic subject in the cello and viola.
Variation VI .
Allegro giocoso (J=io«)
PP
PP
EXAMPLE 67: VARIATION VI (SCORE) MM. I-6.
126
Beach augments and displaces the metric accent of the theme in the flute part in
mm.45-51. At this point, the thematic subject is inconsistently lengthened in
relation to the opening statement. Below is an excerpt of the flute part from
mm.45-51.
tfx-:tC
itf rmf== 1 1
"|| irni='Z? 4
I | i=
îi.—
=
i
A lA .. p, =1 -
V _ jf 4 t
- .
y5
5
^
71
.11 I | | 'w
P^"
■J -----
^1-j-_. L t" Jfew

------- c
Beach closes the first section with the theme augmented in the second violin.
Below is an excerpt o f mm.53-57 in the second violin.
127
p oco a poco raUentanSo
The second section is characterized by the augmentation of the thematic
subject coupled with a significantly slower tempo. Beach extends the melodic line
found in the flute by repeating the descending perfect fourth two more times. The
following excerpt is of the flute part in the second section of Variation VI.
128
<J*!!i ------ ^
PP
ttm p r e aapraasioo
VP tem pra ta p re sk tv o
dolea m n rcn to
EXAMPLE 70: VARIATION VT (SCORE) MM.64-74.
The tMrd section, though brief, is a rapid succession of fugal entrances with
the subject compressed into one bar followed by a chromatically descending bar.
Beach uses the successive entrances to prepare the dominant of the next section in
A major. Below is an excerpt of the third section of Variation VI.
a tempo ( J = 104)
129
A brief fourth section has the original thematic subject in A major in the
flute. Below is an excerpt of the flute part in the fourth section of Variation VI.
Vivo
.c =
EXAMPLE 72: VARIATION VI (FLUTE) MM.95-99.
The fifth and last section is a recapitulation of the first half of the main
theme for strings alone with a restatement of the flute material of Variation I in
m.123. As in the main theme, the theme is found in the first violin while the other
voices provide rhythmic flow and supporting harmony. The flute solo that closes
the work is again based upon the Hungarian minor and ends with the D-sharp as a
leading tone to the dominant.
Rhythm
The first section of Variation VI is characterized by the rhythmic
organization of the central pitches into a fugal subject. The primary rhythm of the
subject is two measures long with the first consisting of a quarter note followed by
two eighth notes and the second containing an eighth beamed with two sixteenths
followed by two eighths. After a fugal statement, the rhythmic activity consists of
running sixteenth notes occasionally interspersed with eighth and quarter notes.
130
Below is an excerpt of the cello part containing the opening statement and
remaining rhythmic figuration.
V ariation "VI
A U egro giocoso
Viol*
EXAMPLE 73: VARIATION VI (CELLO) MM. 1-6.
A syncopated figure from Variation V appears in every voice at the end of the first
section of Variation VI. The following excerpt shows the prevalence of the eighth-
quarter-eighth note figure.
poco a poco rallentanSo
131
As was mentioned previously, the second section of Variation VI is
characterized by the augmentation of the subject but also contains a rhythmic figure
found in the opening cello solo of Variation V. Once more, Beach places the
reappearance of this figure in several of the inner voices. The following excerpt
shows the exchange of the two eighth notes followed by the dotted-eighth and
sixteenth notes.
p- molto
aem pra eapreshix
The third section is noted for the compression of the fugal subject into straight
sixteenth notes. In the second measure of the flute entrance, the cello switches to
the syncopated figure cited in Figure 74. The cello then states the theme in m .91
132
poco a poco ncce- lerando
EXAMPLE 76: VARIATION VT (SCORE) MM.86-90.
The fourth section, Vivo, contains the fugal subject of section one in the
flute contrasted with the syncopated figure at the end of section one, now in the
cello, and the running sixteenth note figure of section three. Below is an excerpt of
mm.95-97 showing the juxtaposition of the three rhythmic figures.
Vivo
133
The closing section of Variation VI is a recapitulation of the main theme
and flute solo of Variation I in the original key and meter. This time the flute solo
is over sustained harmony in the strings followed by the use of duple eighth notes
in the violins and viola in m. 126. Otherwise, the characteristic rhythmic figures of
the main theme and first variation are prominent.
Orchestration
The beginning of the first section of Variation VI has a fugal structure with
the first statement in the cello and each successive entrance in a higher voice thus
creating a pyramid. Even though Beach has the voices marked pianissimo, each
entrance is heard because it is in the highest voice of the texture. The voices are
treated equally in the texture and after the fortissimo in m.32, Beach begins the
fugal texture again but now in reverse order. In m.34 the theme is stated in the first
violin and one measure later in the second violin and so on with the viola and cello.
In m.42, Beach uses a quarter note tied to the first of four sixteenths to create an
overlapping texture. After the flute states the theme in its lowest register, it quickly
jumps to its highest register to begin the rallentando that prepares for the next
slower section.
The second section beginning in m.64 contains the theme in the flute in its
high register supported by sustained harmony in the upper registers of the strings at
134
a pianissimo dynamic. The flute part is marked “dolce expressivo” while the cello
is marked “dolce marcato.” In m.68, Beach reintroduces the syncopated figure in
the cello followed by the dotted-eighth figure a few measures later in the other
strings. The rhythmic motion begins to slow in m.74 with a molto ritard. The
lyrical second section comes to a close in m.77 on a pianissimo fermata. Below is
an excerpt o f mm.64-77 showing the high tessitura and overlapping texture.
rri. ,
molto t
dole* otpn
Mwmbrt ttp r tto io o
dole* maretilo esp ressto o
The third section functions as a rapid transition to the Vivo. The pianissimo
dynamic remains but the fugal subject is compressed and the layering of the rapid
sixteenth notes creates an agitated mood. By the time the poco a poco accelerando
begins in m.87, the voices are entering in higher registers and the chromaticism is
heavier in all voices. A collective forte occurs in m .91 when the cello states the
theme and is quickly followed by a piu crescendo to a fortissimo on the downbeat
of the Vivo. Below is an excerpt of the third section showing the climactic
development through the texture.
135
$=».. = = d
ft:r = =
w < =
1 7 ^ i I
1 r ■ - = j
j f j f -
% -
J ■! -IJ J J *'bl
pp 1
— *-*— p m — ■■
PP
poco a poco ccc*~
i tf M - c x f r f r r r r m m r - iHTFfFFF,
fill #fVM
f t f t f t f e - r ■r > / r
ptHf iv t c
îii c r r r c
r‘*n?
136
The Vivo section has a bright jubilant character due to the theme being in
the brilliant register for the flute coupled with the major tonality, brisk tempo, and
the juxtaposition of various rhythmic figures. Beach cleverly achieves a
descending flourish beginning in m.99 by passing the sixteenth-note figure from
the highest to the lowest voice in conjunction with a significant change in timbre.
The flourish ends on the downbeat of m. 104 with triple stop pizzicatos marked
sforzando on a German sixth chord in the strings while the flute continues to linger
on the tonic pitch that remains and changes the modality in the last section. Below
is an excerpt o f mm.99-106 showing the flourish.
T
ptMrfffgpli
The recapitulation of the main theme has the same orchestration and
dynamic structure of the original. Beach states the entire first half of the theme and
adds the flute on the cadence. The flute solo from the opening of Variation I is
137
not considered closing material. The piece comes to a very subtle end with all
voices at triple piano in high registers. The cello and flute outline the A minor triad
with tonic and dominant while the violins and viola fill in the triad with double
stops. Perhaps in an effort to have part of Part B of the theme, Beach reintroduces
the pizzicato double-stops in the cello in mm. 123-125. The final musical excerpt
below ends the Variations, Op.80.
11 W - 1 ' Y------- 1----------------------- F------------ r - r l ------- ♦ H

iP pp
2 2
fr b fr t -\r & 3 1
J J—
^ p p
■p-' fT\
^ p p
* ----------- X .R
L
gp pjf- p r y
pp ^
S in) lrtO “
In conclusion, Variation VI is characterized by its fugal opening,
reminiscent of finale movements, and its harmonic manipulation of Part B of the
main theme. Beach touches upon the tonalities of F-sharp minor, E-flat major, A
major, and finally A minor, in the five sections of this variation; the third section
only serves as a dominant preparation. Variation VI is further distinguished by the
fugal subject rhythm and its compression as it enters in each voice of the five-voice
138
texture. The recapitulation of the first part of the main theme as used in Variation I
provides subtle closure to the entire work.
139
R ep ro d u ced with p erm ission o f the copyright ow ner. Further reproduction prohibited w ithout p erm ission .
CHAPTER TEN
Summary and Conclusions

The intent of this treatise was to 1) provide a biography of the composer,
Amy Beach; 2) provide a history and compositional style analysis of her chamber
works; 3) present a complete analysis of the Theme and Variations', and 4) address
the place o f the Variations among the other chamber works of Amy Beach based
upon the similarities of compositional techniques and style found in this work and
others. The purpose of this study is to reintroduce a substantial piece into the
chamber music repertoire for flute as well as present a scholarly study of Beach’s
compositional style, together with a discussion about its position in the chamber
music output of one of America’s earliest notable composers.
The composer Amy Beach is deserving of a significant place in the history
of American music. A child prodigy bom of colonial ancestry, her roots as a native
talent were deep. Her success as a self-taught composer was a manifestation of the
"American dream" and her European tours proved her worthy o f international
recognition as a highly regarded artist. As a successful woman composer, her
influence helped found and lead organizations of women musicians and children's
140
clubs. During her lifetime, only three of her works remained unpublished; a
significant achievement for any composer, regardless of gender.
In setting her own composition, Indian Lullaby, for the string quartet,
Beach maintained voicing and phrasing while extending the major cadences and
incorporating more contrapuntal writing. In Variation I, Beach introduces the solo
flute and a new rhythmic motive while retaining the thematic material almost
exactly as it appeared in the theme. She also begins using chromaticism to cloud
the harmonic progressions and cadences. Variation H uses both parts of the main
theme but in a ternary form with a dance-like character and a highly imitative
texture. Beach uses her trademark genre of the waltz in ternary form for Variation
EH while further developing the counter-melody in the flute part and the
chromaticism in all the voices. Variation IV retains the compound meter of the
previous variation and contains Beach’s trademark triplet rhythm in every bar in
the string parts while the thematic material is only found in the flute part. Beach
presents her best orchestration in Variation V with the opening cello solo followed
by successive entrances creating a dense, overlapping, and highly chromatic
texture, which is further embellished by the integration of compound and simple
rhythmic figures. The opening of Variation VI shows Beach’s ability to write fugal
passages in a five-voice texture after which she inserts recapitulations of previous
themes. The work comes to a subtle close on an imperfect authentic cadence in A
minor.
141
Just as her contemporaries, the "New-England" composers, Amy Beach
wrote the majority of her chamber music for strings and piano. Only three works
contain the flute and of those compositions, only one is of significant structure.
The Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String Quartet, Op.80 represents several
achievements for Amy Beach. Opus 80 is a sophisticated structured set of
variations in which Beach manipulates thematic material from either the first or
second parts of the main theme or from the whole theme, with thematic quotations
sometimes limited to as few as five notes. The work contains many characteristics
of Beach's style: extensive chromaticism, secondary chords, ambiguous cadences,
enharmonic modulations, contrapuntal writing, elaboration of the triplet rhythm,
use of the waltz movement, development of counter-melodies, rich overlapping
texture, and cyclic writing. While the formal structure of each variation is based
upon the quotation of melodic material from the main theme, in the last two
variations, Beach inserts recapitulations of previous variations, such as Variation I,
to create a contrasting section that does not necessarily use different thematic
material. Her effective use of extensive chromaticism, secondary chords,
enharmonic modulations, and ambiguous cadences can be directly attributed to her
independent study of the works of Wagner, Liszt, and Berlioz. Her approach to
melody and form are linked to her deep appreciation for the romantic works of
Brahms.
142
Among her other chamber works, Opus 80 retains a high position. It is only
one of two sets of formal variations, the other being the Variations on Balkan
Themes, Op.60. In Op.80, Beach based her variations on her own composition
rather than folk material. In length and structure, Op.80 ranks with Beach's other
works for strings and piano: the Sonata in A moll, Op.34; the Quintet in F-Sharp
Minor, Op.67; and the Trio, Op. 150. In terms o f orchestration, Op.80 is perhaps
held in higher esteem because of its equal five-voice texture with minimal sections
of solo with accompaniment writing. The Variations, Op.80 has been praised on
numerous occasions for its scoring and absence of piano-heavy texture.
The Variations, Op.80 also retains a significant position in the flute
repertoire. During Beach's lifetime, the work enjoyed documented success and
popularity with performances by leading American flutists. Sadly, after Beach's
death and the decline in popularity of her "romantic" style, the piece became
unavailable to the public. With recent performances and recordings by leading
flutists, Eugenia Zuckerman and Doriot Anthony Dwyer, the music was
republished by Hildegard Publishing in 1996. The republishing of the Variations,
Op.80 marks the addition of a work for flute with string quartet to a short list of
works for the same instrumentation by Boccherini, Kuhlau, Ginastera, and Reicha.
Among these works, Amy Beach's Theme and Variations fo r Flute and String
Quartet, Op.80 represents a significant contribution to the chamber music
repertoire for flute and strings by one of America's earliest, notable composers.
143
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35/7 (July 1930), pp.21-22.
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Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1981.
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by Nicholas Slonimsky. New York: Schirmer Books, 1992.
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Mu Phi Epsilon 36/2 (February 1942), pp.71-72.
Beach, Mrs. H.H.A. "Work Out Your Own Salvation." Etude 36/1 (January 1918),
p p.11-12.
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Authors, and Publishers. 2nd ed., McNamara, Daniel I., ed. New York:
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Flute and String Quartet, Op.80. Bryn Mawr, PA: Hildegard Publishing,
1996.
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in F Sharp Minor, Op.67. Women Composers Series. New York: Da
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Virginia Eskin, piano. Northeastern Records, NR 223-CD, 1987.
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Brooks, Benjamin. "The 'How' of Creative Composition: A Conference with Mrs.
H.H.A. Beach." Etude 61/3 (March 1943), pp.151, 208-209.
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147
VITA
Carolyn Marie Totaro-Treybig graduated summa cum laude in 1991 from
the Baldwin-Wallace Conservatory of Music in Berea, Ohio with a BM in Flute as
well as with a BME degree. At Baldwin-Wallace, Carolyn studied flute and
piccolo with Mr. W illiam Hebert (formerly of the Cleveland Orchestra).
From 1991 to 1994, Carolyn attended the University of Akron in Akron,
Ohio where she studied flute with Mr. George Pope (principal flute of the Akron
Symphony and Lyric Opera Cleveland). At the University of Akron, she
completed a MM in Flute and a MM in Music history with a thesis, The Flute in the
Traditional Music o f Ireland.
From the Fall of 1994 to the Spring of 1995, Carolyn studied privately with
Mr. Peter Lloyd, o f the Royal Northern College of Music, in Manchester, England.
Dr. Treybig completed her DMA in Flute at the University of Texas at
Austin where she studied with Ms. Jacqueline Hofto, former flute instructor at the
University of North Texas and the Interlochen Arts Academy.
Permanent Address: 1199 Clifton Avenue, Akron, Ohio 44310
This treatise was typed by the author.
148

Amy Beach

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Amy Beach

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INFORMATION TO USERS

Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning

Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced

Bell & Howell Information and Learning

Carolyn Marie Treybig

Carroll Gonzo, Co-Supervisof

‘"lacqii&Iine Hofto, Co^upervisor

Carolyn Marie Treybig, B.M., B.M.E., M.M., M.M.

The University of Texas at Austin

for the Degree of

Doctor of Musical Arts

The University of Texas at Austin

UMI Microform 9947467

This microform edition is protected against unauthorized

Hildegard Publishing for granting me copyright permission for including musical

Carolyn Marie Treybig, D.M.A.

Co-Supervisors: Carroll Gonzo and Jacqueline Hofto

The intent of this treatise is to 1) provide a biography of the composer,

one of America's earliest notable composers.

Quartet, Op.80 represents several achievements for Amy Beach. Opus 80 is a

sophisticated structured set of variations in which Beach manipulates thematic

work contains many characteristics of Beach's style: ambiguous cadences,

development of counter-melodies, rich overlapping texture, and cyclic writing.

sections of solo with accompaniment writing.

List of Examples......................................................................................................... xii

A Biographical Sketch of Amy Beach.........................................................................3

A Study of the Compositional Style of Amy Beach:............................................... 26

In Selected Chamber W orks.......................................................................................26

An Analysis of the Theme.......................................................................................... 46

An Analysis of Variation I ......................................................................................... 60

An Analysis of Variation II........................................................................................ 70

An Analysis of Variation HI....................................................................................... 81

An Analysis of Variation IV....................................................................................... 93

An Analysis of Variation V ....................................................................................... 103

Form ............................................................................................................................. 103

An Analysis of Variation V I...................................................................................... 120

Form ............................................................................................................................. 120

Summary and Conclusions........................................................................................ 140

FIGURE I : CHARLES ABBOTT CHENEY 4

FIGURE 2: C LAR A IMOGENE MARCY CHENEY 5

FIGURE 3: A M Y MARCY CHENEY, C. 1870 6

FIGURE 4: A M Y CHENEY, C. 1880 9

FIGURE 5: DR. H.H.A. BEACH II

FIGURE 6: DR. A N D MRS. H.H.A. BEACH, C. 1890 12

FIGURE 7: M RS. H.H.A. BEACH. C. 1900 17

FIGURE 8: A M Y BEACH, C. 1937 23

EXAMPLE 1: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM. 13-17. 48

EXAMPLE 2: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM. 13-18. 48

EXAMPLE 3: THEME (VOCAL SETTING) MM.30-34. 49

EXAMPLE 4: THEME (STRING SETTING) MM.31-36.. 49

EXAMPLE 5: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM. 1-4. 51

EXAMPLE 6: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.5-8. 52

EXAMPLE 7: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM.9-18. 52

EXAMPLE 8: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM. 19-26. 53

EXAMPLE 9: THEME (VIOLIN I) MM .27-30.. 54

EXAMPLE 10:: THEME (VIOLIN I) M M .31-36.. 54

EXAMPLE 11:: VARIATION I (FLUTE) MM. 1-4. 60

EXAMPLE 12:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.5-8. 62

EXAMPLE 13:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM. 13-20. 63

EXAMPLE 14:: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.21-28. 64

EXAMPLE 15: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.37-40. 66

EXAMPLE 16: VARIATION I (SCORE) MM.33-40. 68

EXAMPLE 17: VARIATION n (SCORE) MM. 1-6. 72