As so often happens, some of the best projects come into being as offshoots from other plans. Such was the case with Amor y Corona. Last summer, as I was planning our “March of the Women” series, I chatted with Maureen (electronically, of course) about her performing a couple of short pieces on the series, potentially one of the Romances by Clara Schumann or one or two of the 6 Morceaux by Pauline Viardot García. The timing ended up not being ideal, and the series was already growing beyond our initial scope (with so much great music to include, it was hard to edit things out), so these became the core of a whole other project. Maureen was not familiar with Viardot’s works for violin and had also been looking for an excuse to learn Amy Beach’s Romance, which fit perfectly. And thus a recital program of Romanzas was born...

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