July 20, 2026: Other Minds Presents Mavericks 250: Alexander Reinagle
OTHER MINDS PRESENTS
AS PART OF OUR SERIES IN CELEBRATION OF AMERICA’S SEMIQUINCENTENNIAL:
MAVERICKS 250
AT MILLS/NORTHEASTERN, OAKLAND
ALEXANDER REINAGLE:
COMPOSING A NEW NATION
STEPHEN SIEK, PIANO & FORTEPIANO
MONDAY, JULY 20, 2026 AT 7:30 PM
SAN FRANCISCO—May 21, 2026—Other Minds holds certain truths to be self-evident—what better way to celebrate the American semiquincentennial than with a summer concert featuring an early—very early—American Maverick Composer? We’re ecstatic to feature the Federalist era’s Alexander Reinagle (1756–1809), friend of C.P.E. Bach, and George Washington’s favorite composer. The event will take place at Littlefield Concert Hall, Mills College at Northeastern University in Oakland, and is presented in cooperation with the Center for Contemporary Music, Northeastern University and Mills Performing Arts.
On the occasion of the 240th anniversary of his first concert in The New World, on Monday, July 20th, at 7:30 PM, Other Minds will spotlight the Federalist era’s Alexander Reinagle (1756–1809). Presenting Reinagle’s work on both piano, as well as the more historically appropriate fortepiano, will be Stephen Siek, whose recording of the Philadelphia Sonatas remains the gold standard. Siek will also present commentary on the work as well as a lecture with projections illustrating the life and work of the composer. The repertoire will include Sonata No. 3 in C Major, Sonata No. 2 in E Major, Variations on Lea Rigg, and Variations on Steer Her Up and Had Her Gawn. The latter two works are based on Scottish folk tunes. “This music is infectious and addictive,” says Charles Amirkhanian. “I think The Philadelphia Sonatas could rightfully be called The Earworm Sonatas.”
Alexander Reinagle was born in Edinburgh and emigrated to America in 1786. He soon established himself as Philadelphia’s most renowned musician, and after George Washington heard him at the Constitutional Convention in 1787, Washington engaged him to give piano lessons to Martha’s granddaughter, Nelly Custis. Nelly was ten when she began her instruction in 1789, and within a few years, Reinagle had completed several large Sonatas for the piano which are today known as the Philadelphia Sonatas. Although they were not published till long after his death, he performed them frequently at public concerts, and today they are regarded as the most significant keyboard music composed in Early America.
This concert is sponsored by a generous donation from Gretchen Brosius. The PastForward Piano Series is supported in part by a grant from the Ross McKee Foundation.
Alexander Reinagle: Composing a New Nation will be held at 7:30 pm on Monday, July 20th, 2026 at Littlefield Concert Hall, Mills College at Northeastern in Oakland. Tickets are available at a sliding scale starting at $23.
Stephen Siek, pianist and musicologist, is the author of England’s Piano Sage: The Life and Teachings of Tobias Matthay (Scarecrow Press, 2012; 2nd ed., H. L. Marston, 2020) and of A Dictionary for the Modern Pianist (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016; Bloomsbury, 2025). His interest in Alexander Reinagle (c.1750–1809) began in the 1980s when he first began teaching courses in Early American Music, and his doctoral dissertation (U. of Cincinnati, 1991) focused extensively on Reinagle and his music in the first concentrated study of Benjamin Carr’s Musical Journal (1800–1804)—the earliest collection of exclusively secular music in the new Republic. In the summer 1993 issue of American Music, he presented original research concerning Reinagle, Carr, and other musical figures active in post-Revolutionary Philadelphia, and his recording of Reinagle’s Philadelphia Sonatas(1998) on the Titanic label soon met with high acclaim.
Siek has concertized extensively throughout the U. S., Canada, and the UK, and has presented numerous lecture/recitals for organizations such as the Historical Keyboard Society of America, the American Liszt Society, and the Society for American Music. His scholarly papers have been presented at institutions ranging from Yale to the University of Nottingham, and in 2015 he performed at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow for the Tenth Biennial International Conference on Music in Nineteenth-Century Britain.
His numerous articles have appeared in such journals as the American Music Teacher, the Piano Quarterly, the Piano Journal of the European Piano Teachers’ Association, and International Piano. He is also a contributor to the Revised New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, as well as the new edition of the Grove Dictionary of American Music. His other scholarly writings have included pieces for the American Musical Instrument Society Journal, and Symposium (the journal of the College Music Society).
A recognized authority on historic pianism, Siek moderated a panel of experts at the Eastman School of Music in 2015, and he has annotated over two dozen CDs for leading labels which commemorate some of the greatest artists of the past. For APR, his annotations include memorials to Harriet Cohen, Myra Hess, Irene Scharrer, Bartlett & Robertson, and Tobias Matthay, and he has annotated the entire Decca catalogue of Dame Moura Lympany, as well the highly acclaimed complete Decca LPs of Ruth Slenczysnka. He has also annotated the complete Deutsche Grammophon catalogue of Andor Foldes, and for the Hyperion label, Garrick Ohlsson’s highly praised disc of the solo works of Charles Tomlinson Griffes.
Siek is a past president of the American Matthay Association, and holds Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in piano from the University of Maryland. He also holds a Ph.D. in musicology from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, and for many years he served as a professor of music at Wittenberg University in Ohio. He now lives in Tempe, Arizona, where he currently directs the Academy for Continued Learning for the Emeritus College at Arizona State University, and serves as a Faculty Associate in the School of Music. In 2019, at a ceremony in London, he was awarded the status of Honorary Associate by the Royal Academy of Music.
