Franz Schubert

I

Introduction

Franz Schubert (1797-1828), Austrian composer who is considered the greatest of all art song composers and who excelled at chamber music, piano music, and orchestral music. His reputation as the father of German lieder (art songs) rests on a body of more than 600 songs, which rank among the masterpieces of 19th-century romanticism. His instrumental works bridge the classical tradition of the 18th century and the romanticism of the 19th, borrowing the structures of the former and incorporating the emotionalism of the latter.

II

Early Years

Franz Peter Schubert was born on January 31, 1797, in Vienna, Austria. The son of a parish schoolmaster and amateur cellist, he became a choirboy in the Imperial Court Chapel in 1808 and began studies at the school for court singers. He also played violin in the school orchestra.

During the years 1810 to 1813 Schubert composed numerous works: an opera, a symphony, pieces for the piano, and songs. His first songs, among them “Hagars Klage” (Hagar’s Lament, 1811) and “Der Vatermörder” (The Patricide, 1811), greatly impressed his teachers and attracted the interest of composer Antonio Salieri. From 1812 to 1817 Salieri gave Schubert lessons in composition. When Schubert’s voice changed in 1813, he left the court school and began teaching in his father’s school. The following year, at the age of 17, he completed his first opera, Des Teufels Lustschloss (The Devil’s Pleasure-Castle); his first mass, in F Major; and 17 songs, including such masterpieces as “Der Taucher” (The Diver) and “Gretchen am Spinnrade” (Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel). With “Gretchen am Spinnrade” Schubert set to music a poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and produced the first great German song.

Schubert’s output during 1815 and 1816 was phenomenal. In 1815 he completed his second and third symphonies and wrote two masses, in G and B-flat Major; other sacred works; some chamber music; and 146 songs. That year, he also worked on five operas. In 1816 he wrote his Symphony in C Minor, known as the Tragic Symphony; the Symphony in B-flat Major; additional sacred music; an opera; and more than 100 songs. The 1815-1816 songs included “Der Wanderer” and the celebrated “Erlkönig” (Erl, or Elf, King), which rapidly won him recognition. “Erlkönig” was a musical setting of a well-known poem by Goethe, based on a mythological figure of death.

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At about this time, Schubert met through friends a well-known baritone, Johann Michael Vogl. By his inspired interpretations, Vogl made Schubert’s songs familiar in the drawing rooms of Vienna. In 1818 Schubert gave up teaching and devoted himself exclusively to composition. Although some of his songs had been printed by 1821, he received very little money for them and his existence was a continual struggle against poverty. While on a walking trip with Vogl in 1819, Schubert composed the popular Quintet in A Major.

III

Later Years

Schubert produced fewer pieces from 1820 to 1822, and some of the works from this time never saw completion. In 1820 Schubert wrote music for Die Zauberharfe (The Magic Harp), a melodrama, and Die Zwillingsbrüder (The Twin Brothers, 1820), an unsuccessful operetta. He also composed sacred music, such as the Twenty-third Psalm and the unfinished oratorio Lazarus. In 1822 he wrote the Symphony in B Minor, known as the Unfinished Symphony, and the Mass in A-flat.

The year 1823 was one of illness and depression for Schubert. However, no hint of the composer’s dejection appears in his charming song cycle Die schöne Müllerin (The Miller’s Beautiful Daughter) or in the music for an insignificant play called Rosamunde, both composed in 1823. (A song cycle is a set of songs conceived as a unit and generally based on a group of poems by a single poet.) The beginning of 1824 was devoted to the Quartet in A Minor, the Quartet in D Minor (known as Death and the Maiden), and the Octet in F. Later in the year he wrote his two piano duets, the Grand Duo Sonata in C Major and the Variations on an Original Theme in A-flat Major. In 1825 he again joined Vogl in the forests of Oberösterreich (Upper Austria), and the Sonata in D Major for piano of that year reflects Schubert’s restored spirits.

Schubert composed his last string quartet, in G Major, during the summer of 1826. By then his songs were widely known in Vienna; the Viennese held parties called “Schubertiads,” gatherings that were devoted entirely to his music. For the next two years Schubert wrote constantly, producing the song cycle Die Winterreise (Winter Journey) and the piano pieces called Moments musicaux and Impromptus in 1827. By 1828 Schubert’s health was seriously impaired by the syphilis he had contracted some years earlier, probably in 1822. He worked feverishly during his last year; masterpiece followed masterpiece. The Ninth Symphony in C Major, the Mass in E-flat Major, the String Quintet in C Major, his last three piano sonatas, and his last collection of songs, Schwanengesang (Swan Song), were written in 1828. Schubert died on November 19, 1828, at the age of 31.

IV

Songs

The song, as shaped by Schubert, was so original a contribution to 19th-century music that it constituted a new art form known by its German name of Lied. Schubert’s songs almost invariably employ a piano accompaniment, and they consist primarily of settings of romantic poetry, including the work of such writers as Goethe and Sir Walter Scott. The songs use an enormous variety of melodic techniques, from simple melodies derived from folk tunes, which repeat in most or all verses, to highly expressive melodies that vary in each verse and help convey the meaning and mood of each line of text. “Heidenröslein” is an example of the former; “Die junge Nonne” of the latter.

Using the piano, Schubert was able to compose accompaniments that served as meaningful backgrounds to his songs. This background may be pictorial—the sound of rippling water in Die schöne Müllerin and the spinning wheel of “Gretchen am Spinnrad.” Or the background may be emotional—the chords that suggest the evening piety of “Im Abendrot” or the midnight terror of “Der Doppelgänger.” It may provide a magical blending of the scene and the emotion of the poem: The piano’s drone and tinkle in “Der Leiermann” (The Organ Grinder) imitate the hand organ while they also convey the wintry landscape and the wanderer’s despair.

Schubert’s greatest songs are settings of the poets he loved, among them the greatest poets of German literature: Goethe, Friedrich von Schiller, and Heinrich Heine. But Schubert also made musical poetry of works by minor writers such as Wilhelm Müller, whose poems he used for the song cycles Die schöne Müllerin and Winterreise.

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