Amy Beach was born in New Hampshire in 1867 and it quickly became clear that she was not quite like other babies.
By the age of one she’s said to have been able to sing 40 different songs and when she was two she could harmonise the lullabies her mother sang to send her to sleep.
Her composing career began soon afterwards, when she composed three waltzes while staying at her grandfather’s for the summer… impressive, you might think. But what makes this particular story truly astonishing is that her grandfather did not own a piano.
Little Amy composed the pieces in her head and then played them when she returned home to her parents at the end of the summer.
Then she moved on to play the music of Beethoven, and she gave her first concert at age 16.
Here is pianist Kirsten Johnson to play Amy Beach’s Nocturne Op. 107:
Thank you, Hank, for blogging about Amy Beach and her music. More info on my recordings of her complete piano repertoire is here https://www.kirstenjohnsonpiano.com/recordings/the-amy-beach-project/.