Ferruccio Busoni - Indianische Fantasie, Op. 44 (1914)

Ferruccio Busoni (1 April 1866 – 27 July 1924) was an Italian composer, pianist, conductor, editor, writer, and teacher. His international career and reputation led him to work closely with many of the leading musicians, artists and literary figures of his time, and he was a sought-after keyboard instructor and a teacher of composition.

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Indianische Fantasie, Op. 44 (1913-14)
Dedication: Natalie Curtis

1. Fantasy (0:00)
2. Canzona (12:00)
3. Finale (20:55)

Description by Adrian Corleonis [-]
The Indian Fantasy looms as a sport in which the composer -- in reaction to the occult nature of the path opening before him -- casts off the mantle of the alchemist in sound and most subtle of the makers of modernism to embrace the model of Liszt's Hungarian Fantasy for piano and orchestra, that is, a mélange of Nativist exotica and scene painting whipped up in broad strokes with virtuosic flair. On tour in New York in 1910 he ran across Natalie Curtis, a wealthy and talented former pupil, who presented him with a copy of her just published Indians' Book, a groundbreaking collection of "Redskin" melodies that fired Busoni's ambition to employ them. In three extensive continuous movements, the Indian Fantasy was composed between April 1913 and February 1914. Inescapably, the pentatonic character of the melodies produces Indianist cliché chiming risibly -- but at moments with startling visionary eloquence -- with oddments of Busoni's Modernist style. Busoni took the piano for its premiere with the Berlin Philharmonic on March 12, 1914. Only in the orchestral Gesang vom Reigen der Geister (1915) would Busoni's modernism meld persuasively with "Redskin" materials.