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The Music of Robert Louis Stevenson

Sicilienne de Mozart

By J.F.M. Russell ©2019

Robert Louis Stevenson began studying the piano and composition at age 36 and learned the penny whistle two years later. He played the flageolet, a version of the whistle equipped with keys, almost until the end of his life. His arrangements and compositions include more than 120 pieces. This site describes his complete works through facsimiles, transcriptions, recordings, quotations and commentary.

"An interesting chapter in his life will be written when all his scattered pieces are brought together, and the musical side of his character unexpectedly revealed to the vast public that knows him now only as the winsome versifier and the accomplished romancer."

Robert Murrell Stevenson in Robert Louis Stevenson's Musical Interests, 1957.

Facsimile:

Transcription:

Recording:

Manuscript Location:

Yale University Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Stevenson Library of E.L. Beinecke 6599

Source:

String Quartet No.15 in D minor, K.421/417b (Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus) via IMSLP:

Significant References in Works of R.L.S.:

None.

Comments:

A unique work for Stevenson, this Mozart quartet does not appear in any of RLS's usual sources and is his only arrangement of a string quartet movement. The first part of this duet is marked for flageolet and is a combination of the first and second violin (transposed up an octave) parts, neither of which continually plays the melody.

What instrument RLS had in mind for the lower part is a mystery because of its combination of treble and bass clefs. The members of the family band varied with the years, but consisted of combinations of violin, flageolet (or penny whistle), guitar, piano, transverse flute, and clarinet. The second part has been derived from the viola and cello parts of the quartet.

In contrast to Mozart, Stevenson marked his work "allegretto" not allegro. Played at the slower tempo it can be seen as a siciliano, but Mozart doesn't call it that.