Ekaterina Walter-Kühne was born in 1870 in St. Petersburg, Russia. As a young girl, she studied harp with Albert Zabel, solo harpist with the Imperial Ballet in St. Petersburg. Although Zabel was originally from Germany, he soon became the best-known performer and harp pedagogue in Russia, teaching at the St. Petersburg Conservatoire. Ekaterina studied with him for seven years before launching her own career. She became a solo harpist with the Mariinsky Theater and taught harp at some of Russia’s most prestigious music schools - the Smolnyi Institute and the St. Petersburg Conservatoire. She was also very popular with the aristocracy, frequently playing her own arrangements of popular opera themes from Faust, Rigoletto, and Eugene Onegin. Walter-Kühne’s student Ksenia Erdely, the harpist to whom the Fantasie from is dedicated, became principal harpist with the Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra and notably co-composed and edited Gliere’s Concerto for Harp. Other students like Eleonor Damskaya and Maria Gorelova also achieved well-deserved fame through their orchestral and solo careers. Ekaterina Walter-Kühne has remained an undying name in the harp world and has left a truly lasting legacy through her many students and her elegant compositions.



In 1879, Tchaikovsky wrote his opera Eugene Onegin based on a novel of the same name by Alexander Pushkin. Ekaterina Walter-Kühne wrote Fantaisie sur un theme de l’opera Eugene Onegin in 1909. In her composition, Walter-Kühne masterfully captures the beauty and style of Tchaikovsky’s music while skillfully adapting it to the idiom of the harp. She incorporates three themes from varying parts of the opera. The Fantasie opens first with a simple version and then a much more decorated version of the Overture before leading into the Waltz from Act Two. Walter-Kühne presents the Waltz as a series of variations brilliantly embellished with arpeggios, trills, and rolled chords. Lensky’s Arioso to Olga is the third theme used and provides an amorous, yet pensive contrast to the Waltz. While Lensky rejoices in his happy love for Olga, the listener feels a brief moment of apprehension through a minor key change. It is as if Tchaikovsky is warning of the coming tragedy of Lensky’s death. To finish the Fantasie, Walter-Kühne returns to the Waltz theme. The momentum builds through repetition of the tonic alternated with VI dominant seventh and brings the Waltz to an ecstatic conclusion.


Lauren's website: laurenswain.com

Like and subscribe!

свернуть