Dreaming Amy Beach

This was my first encounter with the music of Amy Beach, an American pianist and composer of the early 1900s. I was thunderstruck by it. I asked fellow European and American musicians, pianists, conductors, soloists and musicologists who gravitate around my Theater (Teatro alla Scala, Milano) if they had any information on her, but to no avail. No one knew her. Some had heard her name, but no one had actually listened to her compositions. Today I can say that Amy Beach is almost unknown in America. I can also say that she is unknown in Europe, given the caliber of the musicians I talked to about her, and the fact that they hadn't heard of her. Starting with manuscripts requested from the University of New Hampshire, I began transcribing four pieces and a sonata, originally written for Violin and Cello and Piano, into a version for Viola and Piano. I discovered that, not only the music, but also the incredible life of Mrs. H. H. A. Beach (that is how she signed her compositions) is a beautiful novel that remained locked in a drawer all this time. In fact, I have every intention of reopening that drawer through this CD and through the musical edition that printed my transcriptions for Viola and Piano. I believe that the instrument of the Viola and it's alto key have given a new color to this music, enhancing it, but never altering it's true essence. Born with this CD is a project of popularization and knowledge of Amy Beach's compositions and life story, a story and music that are at once incredibly modern and of other times. Matteo Amadasi