Carl Reinecke (b. 1824 in Hamburg – d. 1910 in Frankfurt, Germany) was born into a musical family: his father, J.P. Rudolf Reinecke, was a well-respected music theorist and piano professor. Carl was his student, and at age twenty-one, he was already touring Europe as a pianist, going as far as Riga in today’s Latvia. From 1846, he was a court pianist to King Christian VIII at the Danish Royal Court for two years before moving to Paris to teach piano and counterpoint. In fact, one of his students was Franz Liszt’s daughter Cosima, and although he was musically conservative, he was much admired by Liszt, along with Mendelssohn and the Schumanns, for his piano skills and ability to teach. In 1860, Reinecke was hired at the Leipzig Conservatory, and is considered  to have been the driving force in improving the conservatory and its program, and turning it into the one of the leading conservatories in nineteenth century Europe. He helped safeguard the tradition of classical music as he found it important that, despite music going towards a new direction, composers such as Bach and Palestrina should still be recognized and taught. Some of the notable students at the conservatory included Grieg and Svendsen. In 1897, he became director of the Leipzig Conservatory until 1902 when he retired. He still continued to conduct and compose until his death in 1910. The majority of his compositions were piano works, but he also composed works for orchestra and chamber. His style respected tonality (by the time of his death, Schoenberg was already establishing atonality), and his melodic lines are finely woven, warm and deeply romantic.

Sonata Undine for Flute and Piano has become a standard piece in the flute repertoire, and is the most famous and the most often performed out of Reinecke’s flute compositions. Not too far behind are  two other works, Ballade for flute and piano (1908) and Flute Concerto for flute and orchestra (1908). Sonata Undine was composed in 1882 and premiered the same year. It is dedicated to Wilhelm Barge, who was the principal flutist of the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra, but there is no evidence that he actually performed the piece. This piece is technically demanding for both flutist and pianist, and more of a chamber piece with both piano and flute having their own roles, rather than piano accompanying the flute. The piano part displays Reinecke’s typical and demanding legato passages along with staccato runs, while the challenges for flute include long-breathed phrases, large leaps and the production of sound to equally interact with the piano. This sonata is based on a somewhat convoluted German fairytale by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, about Undine, a water spirit, and her quest to obtain an immortal soul through true love of a mortal man. The flute melody in the first movement brings underwater sounds and shows Undine in her natural habitat. She  leaves that world in human form, as a child and gets adopted by the fisherman and his wife who found her. They take her in to raise her as their own after the loss of their first child. The running 8th notes played by the flute and piano depict the waves of the sea that fade as the listener is taken to land. The second movement depicts Undine as she grows up, exploring the world around her. The piano and flute melodic lines chase each other, portraying  mischief and playfulness. A beautiful piano solo represents the knight Huldebrand who comes and asks the family for shelter from the storm. There is an exchange of fast and slow melodic sections, and finally the slow flute melody reveals Undine falling in love with the knight. The feelings are mutual and by the end of the movement, they get married. The third, slow movement celebrates the marriage between Undine and Huldebrand and brings another woman into their life: Bertalda, the duke’s foster daughter who happens to be the biological daughter of the fisherman and his wife, whom they thought dead. They are all good friends but an abrupt fast flute section interrupts the idyll as Undine’s uncle appears from the fountain to warn her of Bertalda. Undine seals the fountain to keep away the uncle and accepts Bertalda to her home. A peaceful melody portrays their life, though with some growing unease as the awkward love triangle starts to form. The fourth movement shows the three friends on a boat, but after Huldebrand accuses Undine of being a sorceress and repents marrying her, she disappears into the river, warning him to remain true to her. He nevertheless prepares to marry Bertalda. On the night of their wedding, the fountain gets unsealed through which Undine comes back to give Huldebrand a last mortal kiss. The melody from the second movement reappears at the end, as Undine transforms into a stream to encircle her loved one’s grave. The circle is now closed and Undine and Huldebrand are together forever.