Hermit Thrush, Op. 92

• Hermit Thrush is a set of two pieces for piano solo. Beach published the set in 1922.¹
• In her score, Beach explains that each movement includes transcribed birdsong, collected at the MacDowell Colony. Beach spent many summers composing at the MacDowell Colony in the latter half of her life, and she left the colony a legacy gift of her music copyrights.²

“These bird-calls are exact notations of hermit-thrush songs, in the original keys but an octave lower, obtained at MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, New Hampshire.”

Amy Beach³

Movements

1. A Hermit Thrush at Eve, Op. 92, No. 1 

“Holy, holy! _ In the hush, 
Hearken to the hermit thrush, 
All the air 
Is in prayer.”

John Vance Cheney.⁴ (This quotation is from Cheney’s poem ”The Hermit Thrush.”) 

2. A Hermit Thrush at Morn, Op. 92, No. 2 

“I heard from morn to morn a merry thrush 
Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound 
With joy.”

J. Clare.⁵ (This quotation is from Clare’s sonnet “The Thrush’s Nest.”) 

1. Amy Beach, Hermit Thrush, Op. 92 (Boston: Arthur P. Schmidt, 1922).
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid., 3, 43.
4. Ibid., 2.
5. Ibid., 43.