The Magic Flute stands out for its eclectic blend of musical styles. While only one scene – the duet of the Armored Men in Act 2 – includes a confirmed musical quotation, some scholars have posited that the opera contains a multitude of musical borrowings and allusions. Flute’s referential character owes much to Mozart’s ingenious use of musical topics. However, allusions to specific works have also been proposed throughout the opera’s history. In 1950, A. Hyatt King assembled an inventory of Flute’s “sources and affinities,” suggesting many plausible but largely unsubstantiated melodic precedents in works by Mozart and others. Scholars have particularly disagreed about the “source” from which Mozart allegedly derived Papageno’s aria “Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen.” As in the case of the duet of the Armored Men (which quotes a Lutheran chorale), the desire to link Mozart and J. S. Bach has led to divergent claims about the melody’s provenance.

Song served as a primary generative force throughout Amy Beach’s prolific compositional career. Her three major pieces for orchestra alone-Bal Masqué (1893), the “Gaelic” Symphony (1896), and the Piano Concerto (1900)-are no exception. This chapter argues that Beach’s affinity for song not only shaped her approach to large-scale orchestral composition, but also facilitated positive responses to her works well beyond their premieres. Beach’s ultimate success with song-inspired orchestral composition reflected broader trends of the era overshadowed by experimental modernisms.