Echo

The atmosphere of Echo is inspired by the myth of the mountain nymph bearing the same name: her incessant chattering causes the goddess Hera to condemn her to silence and the mere repetition of others’ speech. Echo then falls in love with the youth Narcissus who however displays no interest for her and is only enamoured with his own beauty. Echo, stricken by lovesickness, subsequently wastes away alone in the forest… until nothing remains but her “echo”.

 

A line drawn from the joyfulness of Handel’s music via the charm of the melody and harmony of César Franck to the insistence of minimal music provides an accurate stylistic description of this unproblematic organ concerto. The pleasure of effortless virtuoso music-making stands clearly in the foreground – in a manner of speaking, naïve and nymph-like. The echo is integrated in various ways as a stylistic element (repeats, canons, etc.).

On a deeper level, the movements can also be seen as programmatic:
1st movement: Dance describes the mountain nymph Echo with her somewhat dance-like nature; the underlying rhythm here is characterised by the 11/8 time signature
2nd movement: Echo and Narcissus describes the nymph’s incandescent love, wooing and subsequent melancholy and is harmonically and melodically somewhat more profound (constructed on an eight-note modus and an eight-note motif series). A ritornello of a similar nature to J. S. Bach’s Violin Concerto in A minor displays the affinity of the entire composition to the joyful music-making of the Baroque.

3rd movement: Finale (Presto) is a virtuoso movement with characteristics going beyond the characteristic melancholy of Echo, depicting intimations of her “chattiness”, “joviality” and “beauty” according to mythological tradition. Enjott Schneider