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Lecture/Recital for FA 120 A

Sketches, Op. 58 Robert Schumann

“Not Fast, and Very Marked” (C Minor) (1810-1856)

“Not Fast, and Very Marked” (C Major)

“Lively” (F Minor)

“Cheerfully” (D-flat Major)

Robert Schumann was a Conservative Romantic Composer who was born in Germany. He was a pianist who had problems with his right hand so, rather than playing, he composed almost exclusively for piano. He married his piano teacher’s daughter, Clara Wieck, a concert pianist and she performed his many works.

He composed Character pieces for the piano which are in ternary form (ABA) with the outer sections more lively and the middle section more lyrical. Schumann composed these four pieces for a fairly new music instrument, the pedal piano, which was a piano with a pedal board similar to that of an organ. The piano pedal never really became accepted as Schumann had hoped and it is rarely encountered today. However, these pieces work very well on the organ.

Prelude and Fugue on the name B.A.C.H. Franz Liszt

(1811-1886)

Franz Liszt was a Radical Romantic Composer who was born in Hungary but studied in Vienna and later lived in France, a musical center of during the Romantic Period. He was a virtuoso pianist and this piece, even though composed for the organ, requires many techniques of piano performance that are very difficult to play such as runs and octaves. This piece is a tribute to Johann Sebastian Bach, a German Baroque Organist and uses a 4 note motive based on the spelling of Bach’s name. In the German way of naming notes, B = B-flats, and H =B Natural. Therefore, you can spell Bach’s name on the keyboard (play motive). Bach himself composed pieces based upon this motive of his name. Composers through the ages have done so as well. Liszt takes this theme and uses the romantic technique known as Thematic Transformation in which a theme is repeated but takes on different characters creating different moods. Liszt further pays tribute to Bach by using the genre of the Prelude and Fugue, which was a popular genre used by Bach during the Baroque period.

Reverie William Grant Still

Elegy (1895-1976)

William Grant Still, who was affectionately known as the “Dean of African-American Composers”, lived from 1895-1978. He successfully fused African-American music, such as spirituals, blues and jazz, with the European classical tradition. While his success was found within his large symphonic works, he loved composing for solo and chamber groups. Reverie and Elegy, composed for solo organ, can best be described as simple and contemplative, with spiritual overtones. Still believed that music should be, at its core, melodic centered and to the point. Both pieces embody a high level of sophistication, thought, craftsmanship and great subtlety

Five Dances for Organ Calvin Hampton

The Primitives (1938-1984)

At the Ballet

Calvin Hampton is an important figure in American music of the mid-to-late twentieth century. He was a composer of many genres, but was noted by his contemporaries as an organist and composer. However, since his death in 1984, his organ works---particularly the Five Dances for Organ---have become well-known through recitals. The Primitives is meant to sound like a tribal dance vacillating between triple and duple meter while making use of dissonance (harsh sounds) and syncopation (off beat stresses). The piece makes use of a rhythmic ostinato pattern repeated over and over again At the Ballet also features an more gentle ostinato pattern with a simple tune played in the pedal part.

Kimberly Ann Hess is Instructor of Music at Marymount University in Arlington, VA where she teaches both Music History and Theory. From 2002-2006, she was Director of Liturgical Music at Georgetown University where she directed the chapel choir, served as chapel organist, and oversaw the music for all campus liturgies. In addition, at Georgetown, she taught organ and music courses through the Program in Performing Arts. She was College Organist at Stonehill College in Massachusetts from 1994-2001.

She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Organ Performance from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, a Master of Music degree in Sacred Music from the University of Notre Dame and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Organ Performance from the University of Illinois.

In 1994, Dr. Hess won first prize in both the Arthur Poister National Organ Competition in New York and the Gruenstein Memorial Organ Contest for Women, a national competition sponsored by the Chicago Club of Women Organists.

She has performed at places including Princeton University in New Jersey, St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, the Church of the Ascension in Chicago, St. John's Cathedral in Milwaukee, the University of Syracuse, City Hall in Portland, Maine, The Cathedral of the Holy Cross and King's Chapel in Boston, the Washington National Cathedral and the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC, and Methuen Hall in Methuen, MA. She has been a featured recitalist for National Conventions of the Organ Historical Society in 1992 (Maine), 1994 (Connecticut), 2000 (Boston), 2005 (Southeastern, Massachusetts) and 2011 (Washington, DC); and her playing can be heard in the OHS Historical Organs series of recordings from those events.