A Dutch composer with an Impressionistic and Romantic style

The Dutch composer Bernhard van den Sigtenhorst Meyer (1888–1953) is a name that rarely surfaces outside academic circles, yet once you’ve heard his music, it’s hard to forget. His style is transparent, delicate, and often meditative – a sound world in which nature and landscape are not merely depicted, but practically embodied. Six Views of Mount Fuji, composed in 1923, is one of his most developed piano works and stands as a highlight of his output.

The cycle was inspired by the famous ukiyo-e series Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji by Katsushika Hokusai, created using traditional Japanese colour woodblock printing techniques. Sigtenhorst Meyer, who was fascinated by Eastern art and philosophy, found in these visual representations the starting point for six character pieces, each with its own colour, atmosphere, and movement.

The movements range from the stately and dark opening piece (The Birth of Fuji) to the playful motorics of The Fuji in the Rain and the massive block-like chords of The Fuji in the Snow. Elsewhere, lightness emerges, as in Clouds like Sheep around Fuji, or poetic stillness, as in The Fuji through the Reeds. The cycle concludes with a dramatic finale (The Fuji from the High Sea), where the mountain rises from an unruly, undulating sea. The work is intended to be performed as a continuous whole.

Stylistically, Sigtenhorst Meyer moves between late Romanticism and Impressionism, but without direct imitation of Debussy or Satie. His harmony is often modal, his texture transparent, and his idiom deeply connected to the visual arts. The music is more contemplative than virtuosic, inviting attention and inner peace – both from the performer and the listener.

This new Urtext edition from Felix Editions is based on the original 1923 publication, carefully checked and edited by pianist and pedagogue Marius van Paassen, who has long championed the reappraisal of Sigtenhorst Meyer’s piano music.

Six Views of Mount Fuji is not a ‘forgotten masterpiece’ in the usual sense, but rather a rare discovery: a work that moves beyond the standard repertoire and draws its value from precisely that distinction. For pianists seeking poetic repertoire with depth, subtlety, and expressive power, this cycle invites both study and exploration.

Discover the edition now via the link below – and let yourself be carried away through six musical faces of a silent mountain.