Piano Concerto no. 2 in D minor, op. 23

MacDowell wrote the D minor concerto in Germany in the mid-1880s, while living in Frankfurt and Wiesbaden, and dedicated it to Teresa Carreño, who had taught him as a child in New York and who took it into her repertoire. He played the first performance himself in New York on 5 March 1889, with Theodore Thomas conducting, shortly before returning to the United States for good. The second movement is a fleet scherzo, written, he said, with Shakespeare's Beatrice in mind. It became the first American concerto to hold a place in the international repertoire.