Relaxing Piano Playlist Series 5 Episode 10

Feeling Tired? Need to unwind? Then how about some gentle, soothing piano music? Welcome to Episode 10 in Series 5 of the Relaxing Piano Playlist! in this episode, I play for you music by women composers ranging from Cecile Chaminade, Teresa Carreno, Fanny Hensl and Amy Beach. I finish this episode with undoubtedly an audience favourite of the second movement from Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto in C minor Op18.

Transcript

EPISODE 10

0:00:30
Hello and a very warm welcome to what is our final episode of Series 5, Episode 10 in the Relaxing Piano Playlist with your host James Quinn here at the piano, thank you very much for joining me. This episode is focused on a very special theme of music from women composers, which is always enlightening and wonderful work to help champion these composers to help promote more deservedly. In this episode, you’re going to hear a short number of pieces ranging from a wide variety of composers. We’ll also finish this episode with one more movement from a Piano Concerto, towards the end.

The first piece you will hear comes from the first of three new composers. In this instance you will hear a wonderful piece from the composer Cecile Chaminade. Born in a village near Paris on 8th of August in 1857, she was raised in a musical family where her mother was her initial piano teacher. She was discovered by a fellow teacher to study at Paris Conservatoire, however her father objected to this but did allow her to study with her teachers privately which included piano with Felix Le Couppey, violin and composition which included the likes of Benjamin Godard. She would later give recitals in France, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland also in England. Her music and performances were certainly gaining a following where even Queen Victoria even became an admirer of her work. In recognition of her career as a performer, educator and composer, she received many honours which included a Jubilee Medal from Queen Victoria and the National Order of the Legion of Honour from the French government which was a very significant milestone considering she was the first female composer to receive this. She died aged 86 in April of 1944 in Monte Carlo leaving a large impression of her musical and artistic success which would later attract more popularity through the 20th Century. To give you an idea of her compositional style, the piece that I will play for you is a short standalone work known as the Berceuse which she published as Opus 6.

The next piece that you will hear comes in the instalment of the Venezuelan composer Teresa Carreno. She was born in Caracas in December of 1853, and over the course of her more than five decades during her concert career she would become an internationally renowned concert pianist. She even had the nickname as the “Valkryie of the Piano”. As well being a pianist, she was also a soprano and a conductor. She would often be a leading interpretator of the works of Edward MacDowell and Edvard Grieg and others such as Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin Rubenstein to name but a few. To give you a sample of her compositional style, the piece that you will is perhaps one of her most well known works, known as the Little Waltz, which she composed initially for her daughter Teresita when she was a young child learning her dance steps.

For our penultimate piece we go to the composer Fanny Hensel. Originally born as Fanny Mendelssohn, she was the eldest of four siblings including her younger brother Felix in Hamburg in November of 1805. She  grew up in Berlin and received a thorough musical education with a few teachers including her own mother Lea Salomon. Because of the social conventions of the time her chances of success of a promising concert career was undoubtedly difficult isimply because she was a woman. In spite of this, she continued to compose a considerably large output of music which was unfortunate to gain the equal amount of attention compared to male composers at the time. she would She would later marry the artist William Hensel and only had one child. She sadly died at the young age of 41 in May of 1847. With the advancement of discovering and promoting her music to the audiences of today has helped to rekindle her vast repertoire of compositions ranging from piano works, chamber music, orchestral as well as over 250 German songs. To give you an idea of her compositional style the piece that you will hear is a standalone work, where she uses the style of a barcarolle and this is her Nocturne in G minor, which she composed in 1838. 

We then travel over the pond to the American composer Amy Beach for our last piece where you will hear a short standalone work known as the Old Chapel by Moonlight. She composed this in 1924 and was published as Op106 and uses very atmospheric and bell-like sound to vividly create such a haunting but beautiful piece.


We now have a movement from a piano concerto to finish both the episode and the series. The piece that you will hear comes from the Russian composer, Sergei Rachmaninoff, and in this case you’re going to hear one of his most cherished works for piano and orchestra. It is perhaps of his most performed and recorded concerto and remains an audience favourite. After his first symphony was lauded by critics the composer went through a psychological breakdown and a depression. It took an unlikely arrangement where he was convinced to see a physician by the name of Nikolai Dahl who used hypnotherapy to help him. After a period of three months of this treatment, Rachmaninoff felt he could compose again and vowed to make his next concerto even better than his first one, and he certainly did just that! For Rachmaninoff, it felt appropriate to dedicate the work to Mr Dahl.

It’s perhaps no surprise by now, but of course you’re going to hear the second movement set to the speed of Adagio Sostenuto from Piano Concerto No.2 in C minor Op.18 by Rachmaninoff.

So to recap, here is the order just once more: Berceuse Op.6 by Cecile Chaminade, Little wWaltz by Teresa Carreno, Nocturne in G minor by Fanny Hensel, Old Chapel at Moonlight Op106 by Amy Beach, and finally Movement 2 from Piano Concerto No.2 in C minor Op.18 by Rachmaninoff

So sit back, relax, and I hope that you all enjoy the music in this episode. Thank you.


00:39:22
That brings us to the end of this current series of the Relaxing Piano Playlist, I hope you enjoyed all the music throughout with a wide range of composers and styles. As always it has been a bit of juggling act to balance my time with this series on top of my regular work both teaching and performing, nonetheless I will always remain faithful to the great body of work that I pride myself on with this podcast that has grown over the past 5 years!

I like to quickly finish by saying a big thank you to those of you who continue to support my podcast, by choosing to downloading and listening to it, no matter where you are in the world. I always aim to do my absolute best to keep working on this podcast for you, so that my playing and the music that I choose for each episode reflects my vision and energy to provide the best content and musical experience for you.

This may be the end of Series 5, though I’m sure you will not be surprised to know that I will be planning to set up a Sixth series later in the Spring. There will be a short episode update nearer the time, where you will be able to hear when the exact date of Episode 1 of Series 6 will be available from one episode to the next. I’ll have these episodes released normally every 2 or 3 weeks.

All that’s left for me to say is just one very big special thank you to all of you once more, and without your very kind support, this podcast will never have been as successful as it has, and if you did want to know I do have some extraordinary news to relay to you, that currently with all of the episodes combined so far, this podcast has now been downloaded over 138,000 times which continues to amaze me, and this is due to your kind support. By choosing this podcast, listening and enjoying it in your own way, I can definitely assure you, this really does feel such a great well earned success.

Before I leave you, I can also reveal that both the Series 1 and 2 are now available as full length video performances on my YouTube channel, which if you’re interested is at JamesQuinnPianist. Series 3 will be rolling around sometime in May so you can imagine I’m literally playing some catch-up so that Series 4 and 5 will be available later in the year, so enough for me to be keeping myself busy indeed!

On that note, I will now bid you all a fond farewell for now, and Series 6 will be released later in mid-Spring so until then, we will meet again. 

This has been the Relaxing Piano Playlist with James Quinn. Thank you very much for listening, take very good care of yourselves and each other. Good bye for now.