Gwyneth Walker

Variations on "Amazing Grace"

for Organ (1985)

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Variations on "Amazing Grace" is a short set of continuous, free-flowing variations on the familiar American hymn tune. It opens with a simple presentation of the hymn tune in a single voice. The counterpoint slowly increases, voice by voice, to lead to treatments of it in full harmonic complexity and color. The work was composed as a wedding gift for the composer's cousin, Arthur Walker, and was premiered at his wedding ceremony.

Notes by Carson Cooman