Is It Mars?

Sudara

“Est-ce Mars” (better translated to “Is it March?”) is a piece of piano music by Sweelinck (1562-1621).

Writing this, I just found out that the actual theme was written by Pierre Guédron, a French singer, in 1613.

What is fantastic here is that my great-grandfather Putnam Aldrich played this piece many decades before…

A few years ago I dug up some recordings he made. I sent them over to my piano teacher who identified this piece as something I might enjoy playing.

Long story short: the riff that starts this song (and continues through the first half) is a note-for-note lifting of my favorite part of Sweelinck’s “Est-ce Mars” variations.

Here’s my great-grandfather playing variation IV:

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