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CHAPTER 18
1. How was the early Lied influenced by trends in German literature? Describe some
aspects of Johann Gottfried von Herder’s thought and how it influenced Romanticism in
music.
A contemporary movement in German literature toward oral culture and folklore was of great
consequence to the early Lied. At this time, a great amount of literature was being either
discovered among the peasantry or invented along folkish lines. Early Lieder aimed to set this
new, folkish art on simple and rustic lines, and often employed strophic form to do so.
Herder’s belief in the lack of universal values, and in the unique worth of every individual
society, provided a philosophical grounding for the emerging nationalism which Romanticism
fostered. Such thought freed composers from any compunction to compose for a universal
audience or express universal truths, and instead allowed them to expound upon nationalistic
themes in the vernacular languages.
2. What is inwardness, and how is it related to the ideals and culture of Romanticism?
What innovations in harmonic language does Schubert use to express the idea of
“inwardness”?
Inwardness (or Innigkeit) is the contemplative and deeply subjective experience associated with
reverie or meditation. It is an artistic mood that naturally appealed to the Romantics, who prized
individuality and put the subjective experience on a par with the objective one. The most reliable
methods Schubert employed to depict “inwardness” was modulation to the flat submediant key
area and the use of modal mixture, both of which evoke the distance and nostalgia of inwardness.
3. What types of works was Schubert best known for in his time?
In his own time, Schubert’s reputation was not entirely different from the one he enjoys in our
present age. He was then, as he is now, renowned for his contribution to the Lied, and for his
imaginative work with piano character pieces. But the more salon-oriented public of Schubert’s
day maintained an interest in the domestic and intimate works which we now associate less
strongly with the composer: his piano duets, part songs, fantasies, and variations.
4. Describe the various ways in which Schubert’s Erlkönig reflects its poetry. What musical
techniques does Schubert use to depict the different voices of the poem, the movement of
the horse, and the anxious mood?
Erlkönig is a study in faithful yet imaginative text setting. Although scored for a single voice, it
depicts four distinct characters (a son, his father, the erlkönig, and a narrator) through the use of
distinctive vocal ranges and musical textures for each personage. Although not exactly a
character, the father’s horse is also given musical depiction: the frenetic octaves in the right
hand, which beat out the clattering of hooves. The sense of growing anxiety, as the erlkönig
gradually becomes a more corporeal and menacing figure, is reflected in Schubert’s use of
frequent modulations and transposed repetitions.
5. What were Schubertiades, and how do they reflect cultural trends in Schubert’s time?
The Schubertiade was a kind of salon: an informal and intimate gathering of the artistically
inclined, usually in the residence of an aristocrat, to both engage in conversation and be
aesthetically edified by performance of some kind. The Schubertiade was unique among salons
for its bohemian nature and its focus upon a single artist.
The Schubertiades (and the salon in general) belonged to a public which had begun to form a
new appreciation for personal and private music Schubert, whose music has a markedly inward
character and seems to address its listeners as individuals, predictably flourished in the salon.
6. Discuss the innovative features in Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony. How did
Schubert bring the introspective mood associated with his smaller works to this symphony?
Compare and contrast this symphony with Beethoven’s symphonies in the heroic style,
such as the Eroica and the Fifth.
In the “Unfinished” Symphony, several innovative features are on display. In the first movement,
Schubert shows little interest in the harmonic instability and transitional passages typical of a
sonata: He allows his first theme to reach a definitive full cadence, and uses a scant four
measures as a link to the subsequent theme. The “Unfinished” Symphony is also groundbreaking
in its use of large-scale key area, avoiding the relative minor or the dominant in favor of the
submediant.
The work, although fully symphonic, shares some features with the more inward genre of the
Lied. After a short introduction, an accompaniment-like figure appears in the first and second
violins, in a manner similar to the “vamp” which begins many songs. The themes which he then
proposes are remarkably lyrical: Schubert avoids employing a vigorous first theme, as so many
of his fellow composers would favor.
The “Unfinished” Symphony is quite distinct from Beethoven’s heroic style. In Beethoven’s
Fifth Symphony, motivic invention and repetition drives the entire work, whereas Schubert
prefers much broader lyrical themes to populate the “Unfinished” Symphony.
7. What musical techniques does Schubert use to express the contrasting moods of his two
late songs, Der Doppelgänger and Taubenpost?
In Der Doppelgänger, Schubert depicts the terror inspired by the titular “double” with the use of
the minor mode and a ground bass which, beyond its expected and conventional pattern of
reptition, employs a series of unstable intervals to imply the repetitive compulsiveness of the
behavior depicted. By way of contrast, Taubenpost is a cheerful and reassuring piece, in the
major mode with a clear strophic form.