My original post on variations is here. The theme in question in this verse is Hotspur's death speech from the end of Henry the Fourth, Part One.   This verse treats the material quite differently than the original; it was written a bit later than the first two variations -  around 1971. Why is there sadness?…

My memory is a little shaky here (the variations were all written in 1965), but I believe the theme here comes from an English translation of  La Vita Nuova (The New Life), rather than from The Divine Comedy.  In any event, the lady in question is Beatrice. Variations on a theme by Dante 1965 So…

When I was twenty or twenty-one, I was very much under the influence of my college friends who were serious musicians, despite the fact that I was devoid of musical talent myself.   When I grasped the idea that serious composers of music often took musical themes from other composers and played with them in their…