Nationality versus
Universality: The Identity
of George W. Chadwick's Symphonic Poems
By Hon-Lun Yang
The relationship between American society
and its European past has never been easy to unravel; likewise the relationship
between American music and European music. A case in point is the American
music produced in the so-called Gilded Age, represented by works of the
composers of the "Second New England School," namely John Knowles Paine,
George W. Chadwick, Arthur Foote, Edward MacDowell, Horatio Parker, and
Amy Cheney Beach. These composers are also known as "New England's Classical
Romanticists," "The American Europeans," "the Boston Classicists," and
even "the Academics." Though it is convenient to view these composers
as belonging to a school, following certain established customs, which
they did to a degree, it is essential to keep in mind that their compositional
styles and musical languages are utterly different, each embracing his
or her own stylistic features. Their compositions also evinced inuences
of various sources and clear stylistic developments. But only through
a certain familiarity with the works of the individual composers could
one avoid such casual statements as "[Paine's An] Island Fantasy, artistically
speaking, [was] within easy sailing distance of Mendelssohn's Hebrides."
After all, first-hand knowledge of Paine's and Mendelssohn's two pieces
would lead to the conclusion that their subject matter, impetus, musical
form, and musical language are significantly different. Nevertheless, detailed
studies of the music of the
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