Critical and Historical Essays : Lectures delivered at Columbia University

Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860 – January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites Woodland Sketches, Sea Pieces and New England Idylls. Woodland Sketches includes his most popular short piece, “To a Wild Rose”. In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters. MacDowell published two books of Technical Exercises for piano; piano duet transcriptions of Hamlet and Ophelia for orchestra (op. 22); First Suite for orchestra (op.42); and a piano solo version of op. 42, no. 4, “The Shepherdess’ Song”, renamed “The Song of the Shepherdess”.