Page 219 - (DK) The Classical Music Book - Big Ideas Simply Explained

NATIONALISM 1830–1920 217

See also: Dvorˇák’s Symphony No. 9 212–215 ■ Ives’s Symphony No. 4 254–255 ■
Rhapsody in Blue 258–261 ■ Ionisation 268–269 ■ Appalachian Spring 286–287

He was mentored by Liszt, who contemporaneous Lyric Pieces, due
introduced the young composer to to their inherent nationalism and
publishers in Leipzig during his celebration of the countryside.
time in Germany. Woodland Sketches is an opus
of ten pieces. Possibly inspired by
Country life MacDowell’s move to the farm that
MacDowell published orchestral later became the artist’s colony
works, concertos, sonatas, and bearing his name, they celebrate
songs but is universally identified not only the landscape but also the
with miniature piano pieces, and everyday American experience. In
most particularly the Woodland parts such as “A Deserted Farm” Edward MacDowell
Sketches of 1896. Following on from and “At an Old Trysting Place,”
a tradition started by Mendelssohn they also borrowed some melodic Born in New York in 1860,
and Schumann—writing suites of material from Native American MacDowell studied the piano
short works aimed at the amateur songs. Tending toward starker from early childhood and, at
domestic market—these could also textures than European Romantic the age of 17, was offered a
be seen as a counterpart to Grieg’s piano music, and occasionally scholarship to the Paris
verging on impressionistic harmony, Conservatoire. After his time
as in the more complex “By a in Paris, he went to Frankfurt
The MacDowell Colony in New Meadow Brook,” these sketches to study composition with
Hampshire, pictured here in 1948, has Joachim Raff. Raff introduced
supported thousands of artists since contain elements that became a him to Franz Liszt, who
1907. MacDowell’s pianist wife, Marian, part of the American musical arranged a performance of
led the colony for almost 25 years. language of the 1920s and 1930s. ■
MacDowell’s First Modern
Suite, Op. 10 in Zurich.
In 1888, MacDowell
returned to New York and
premiered his Piano Concerto
No. 2. He was then invited to
create a department of music
at Columbia University. Eight
years later, he resigned in a
dispute over courses. Amid
the bad publicity, MacDowell
suffered a nervous breakdown
and further health problems.
He never recovered. Just
before his death in 1908, he
and his wife established the
MacDowell Colony, where
artists of all kinds are
supported in residence.

Other key works
1883 First Modern Suite, Op. 10
1890 Piano Concerto No. 2,
Op. 23
1892 Indian Suite, Op. 48

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