A piano trio is a group of piano and two other instruments, usually a violin and a cello, or a piece of music written for such a group. It is one of the most common forms found in classical chamber music. The term can also refer to a group of musicians who regularly play this repertoire together; for a number of well-known piano trios, see below.

Form

Works titled "Piano Trio" tend to be in the same overall shape as a sonata. Initially this was in the three movement form, though some of Haydn's have two movements. With the early 19th century, particularly Beethoven, this genre was felt to be more appropriate to cast in the four movement form. Piano trios that are set in the Sonata tradition share the general concerns of such works for their era, and often are reflective directly of symphonic practice with individual movements laid out according to the composer's understanding of the sonata form.

In the Classical period, home music making made the piano trio a very popular genre for arrangements of other works. For example Beethoven transcribed his first two symphonies for piano trio. Thus a large number of works exist for the arrangement of piano, violin and violoncello which are not generally titled or numbered as piano trios, but which are nonetheless part of the overall genre. These include single movements as well as sets of variations such as Beethoven's Variations on ‘Ich bin der Schneider Kakadu’ Op. 121a and Variations in E flat major Op. 44.

After the classical era, works for piano and two instruments continue to be written which are not presented as in the sonata tradition, or are arrangements of other works. Many of these individual works are popular on concert programs, for example Suk's Elegie.

For individual articles treating works for piano trio, see :Category:Compositions for piano trio.

The role of the three instruments

The piano trios of the Classical era, notably those of Haydn, are dominated by the piano part. The violin only plays the melody a certain amount of the time, and is often doubled by the piano when it does. The cello part is very much subordinated, usually just doubling the bass line in the piano. It is thought that this practice was quite intentional on Haydn's part and was related to the sonority of the instruments of Haydn's day: the piano was fairly weak and "tinkling" in tone, and benefited from the tonal strengthening of other instruments. Mozart's earlier trios are also rather dominated by the piano part.

With time, a new ideal of piano trio composition arose, in which each of the three instruments was supposed to contribute equally to the music. This is seen, for instance, in Beethoven's trios, and was likely in part the result of the increase in the power and sonority of the piano that took place during Beethoven's career, making it more feasible for the piano to play independently in an ensemble. The new idea of equality was never implemented completely; the extent to which it is realized varies from one composition to the next, as well as among movements within a single composition. Certainly by the mid nineteenth century, all three instruments had been modified to have a very powerful sound, and each can hold its own in a modern ensemble.

The earlier trios are now frequently performed and recorded using authentic instruments, of the kind for which they were originally written. Such performances restore the sonic balance the composer would have expected, and have proven popular.

Other combinations

Some rather rare combinations of instruments have nonetheless inspired a few outstanding works. Haydn wrote numerous trios for flute, cello & piano, a combination Carl Maria von Weber wrote one work for (op. 63), while Beethoven wrote his Trio in G major, WoO 37 (1786) for flute, bassoon, and piano. Francis Poulenc's Trio op. 43 (1926) is for oboe, bassoon and piano. The Horn-violin-piano trio is exemplified by Brahms' Trio Op. 114 in A minor and György Ligeti's 1982 Trio.

Trios with clarinet include masterpieces by Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms and Bartok; many more works are listed in the articles Clarinet-violin-piano trio, Clarinet-viola-piano trio and Clarinet-cello-piano trio.

Playing piano trios

Piano trios, or works for piano trio, are considered chamber music. Since they involve three musicians who, in most works, contribute more or less equally to the music, the process of collaboration is frequently mentioned as being as important as other parts of musical preparation. The pianist must complement, rather than overwhelm, the other players, and the string players must understand when they have a melodic or harmonic role to play.

Among the piano trios, works by Haydn and Mozart are considered the best starting point for pianists new to chamber music.

Example piano trios, extant and defunct

Among the best known of such groups are or have been:

Altenberg Trio (Austria)

Maria Baptist Trio (Berlin, Germany)

Istomin-Stern-Rose Trio, consisting of Eugene Istomin, Isaac Stern and Leonard Rose. (United States)

One consisting of Alfred Cortot, Jacques Thibaud and Pablo Casals, earlier in the 20th century

The Beaux Arts Trio (United States), whose commitment to using the same players in every concert pioneered a new generation of similarly committed groups; defunct

Trio di Trieste (Italy) defunct

The "Ax-Kim-Ma" trio, consisting of Emanuel Ax, Young Uck Kim, and Yo-Yo Ma (United States)

Eroica Trio (United States)

Ahn Trio (United States/Korea)

Trio Fontenay (Germany)

Suk Trio (Czech Republic)

The Florestan Trio (United Kingdom)

The Greenwich Trio (United Kingdom)

The Oberlin Trio (United States)

The Alma Trio (United States)

Trio Wanderer (France)

Haydn Trio Eisenstadt (Austria)

Bamberg Trio (Germany)

Manhattan Piano Trio (United States)

Spirale Piano Trio (Belgium)

Xonor Trio (United States)

Famous works for piano trio

Anton Arensky's Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor

Ludwig van Beethoven's trios, especially Piano Trio No. 7 in B-flat major "Archduke", Op. 97

Johannes Brahms's Piano Trio No. 1 in B major, Op. 8 and No. 2 in C major, Op. 87

Ernest Chausson's Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 3

Frédéric Chopin's Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 8

Antonín Dvořák's Piano Trio No. 4 in E minor ("Dumky"), Op. 90

Gabriel Fauré's piano trio

Felix Mendelssohn's two piano trios

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's piano trios, particularly K502, K542 and K548

Sergei Rachmaninoff's Elegiac Trios No. 1 in G minor and No. 2 in D minor

Maurice Ravel's Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello

Camille Saint-Saëns's Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor

Franz Schubert's Piano Trio No. 2 (Schubert)

Robert Schumann's Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor

Dmitri Shostakovich's Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor

Bedřich Smetana's Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Piano Trio, Op. 50

See also

Piano

Violin

Violoncello

Piano trio repertoire

Triple concerto for violin, cello, and piano

violin-viola-piano trio

Clarinet-violin-piano trio

Clarinet-viola-piano trio

Clarinet-cello-piano trio

Piano quartet

Piano quintet

Piano sextet

Jazz trio

Notes

References

Parakilas, James (1999) ''Piano roles : three hundred years of life with the piano''. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Rosen, Charles (1997) ''The Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven''. New York: Norton. Chapter VI.2 covers the trios in detail.

Wheelock, Gretchen (1999) "The classical repertory revisited: instruments, players, and styles," in Parakilas (1999), pp. 109–131.

Category:Piano * Category:Chamber music Category:Musical groups Category:Violins 3 Category:Classical music trios

cs:Klavírní trio de:Klaviertrio es:Trío con piano eo:Pianotrio fr:Trio avec piano nl:Pianotrio ja:ピアノ三重奏曲 no:Pianotrio pt:Trio para piano ru:Фортепианное трио simple:Piano trio sk:Klavírne trio (teleso) sv:Pianotrio

Clara Schumann (''née'' Clara Josephine Wieck; 13 September 1819 – 20 May 1896) was a German musician and composer, considered one of the most distinguished pianists of the Romantic era. She exerted her influence over a 61-year concert career, changing the format and repertoire of the piano recital and the tastes of the listening public. Her husband was the composer Robert Schumann. She and her husband encouraged Johannes Brahms, and she was the first pianist to give public performances of some of Brahms' works, notably the Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel.

Early life

Clara Josephine Wieck was born in Leipzig on 13 September 1819 to Friedrich and Marianne Wieck (''née'' Tromlitz). Her parents divorced when she was four years old; Clara was raised by her father. In March 1828, at the age of eight, the young Clara Wieck performed at the Leipzig home of Dr. Ernst Carus, director of a mental hospital at Colditz Castle, and met another gifted young pianist invited to the musical evening named Robert Schumann, nine years older than she. Schumann admired Clara's playing so much that he asked permission from his mother to discontinue his studies of the law, which had never interested him much, and take music lessons with Clara's father, Friedrich Wieck. While taking lessons, he took rooms in the Wieck household, staying about a year.

In 1830, at the age of eleven, Clara left on a concert tour to Paris via other European cities, accompanied by her father. She gave her first solo concert at the Leipzig Gewandhaus. In Weimar, she performed a bravura piece by Henri Herz for Goethe, who presented her with a medal with his portrait and a written note saying, "For the gifted artist Clara Wieck." During that tour, Niccolò Paganini was in Paris, and he offered to appear with her. However, her Paris recital was poorly attended as many people had fled the city due to an outbreak of cholera.

At the age of 18, Clara Wieck performed a series of recitals in Vienna from December 1837 to April 1838. Austria's leading dramatic poet, Franz Grillparzer, wrote a poem entitled "Clara Wieck and Beethoven" after hearing Wieck perform the ''Appassionata'' Sonata during one of these recitals. Wieck performed to sell-out crowds and laudatory critical reviews; Benedict Randhartinger, a friend of Franz Schubert, gave Wieck an autograph copy of Schubert's ''Erlkönig'', inscribing it "To the celebrated artist, Clara Wieck." Frédéric Chopin described her playing to Franz Liszt, who came to hear one of Wieck's concerts and subsequently "praised her extravagantly in a letter that was published in the Parisian ''Revue et Gazette Musicale'' and later, in translation, in the Leipzig journal ''Neue Zeitschrift für Musik''." On 15 March, Wieck was named a ''Königliche und Kaiserliche Kammervirtuosin'' ("Royal and Imperial Chamber Virtuoso"), Austria's highest musical honor.

In her early years her repertoire, selected by her father, was showy and popular, in the style common to the time, with works by Kalkbrenner, Henselt, Thalberg, Herz, Pixis, Czerny, and her own compositions. As she matured, however, becoming more established and planning her own programs, she began to play works by the new Romantic composers, such as Chopin, Mendelssohn and, of course, Robert Schumann, as well as the great, less showy, more "difficult" composers of the past, such as Scarlatti, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert. She also frequently appeared in chamber music recitals of works by Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Brahms.

Marriage

Robert Schumann had been attracted to Clara since she was fifteen. By the time she was seventeen, Schumann was in love with her. The next year (1837), Schumann asked her father Friedrich for Clara's hand in marriage, but he refused.

During the next year (Clara's nineteenth), Friedrich did everything he ever could to prevent her from marrying Schumann, forcing the lovers to take him to court. During this period Schumann, inspired by his love for Wieck, wrote many of his most famous lieder. They eventually married on September 12, 1840. She continued to perform and compose after the marriage even as she raised seven children, an eighth child having died in infancy. In the various tours on which she accompanied her husband, she extended her own reputation beyond Germany, and her efforts to promote his works gradually made his work accepted throughout Europe.

In 1853, Johannes Brahms, aged twenty, met Clara and Robert in Düsseldorf and immediately impressed both of them with his talent. Brahms became a lifelong friend to Clara, sustaining her through the illness of Robert, asking for her advice about new compositions, even caring for her young children while she went on tour. They remained good friends up until Clara's death; however, there is no historic evidence that their relationship was ever more than just friendship.

Later career

Clara Schumann's reputation brought her into contact with the leading musicians of the day, including Mendelssohn, Chopin, and Liszt. She also met violinist Joseph Joachim who became one of her frequent performance partners. Clara Schumann often took charge of the finances and general household affairs due to Robert's mental instability. Part of her responsibility included making money, which she did by giving concerts, although she continued to play throughout her life not only for the income, but because she was a concert artist by training and by nature. Robert, while admiring her talent, wanted a traditional wife to bear children and make a happy home, which in his eyes and the eyes of society were in direct conflict with the life of a performer. Furthermore, while she loved touring, Robert hated it.

After Robert's death (July 29, 1856), Clara devoted herself principally to the interpretation of his works. But when she first visited England in 1856 largely through the good offices of William Sterndale Bennett, the English composer and friend of her late husband, the critics received Robert's music with a chorus of disapproval. She returned to London in 1865 and continued her visits annually, with the exception of four seasons, until 1882. She also appeared there each year from 1885 to 1888.

She played a particular role in restoring Brahms's D minor concerto to the general repertory; it had fallen out of favour after its premiere, and was only rehabilitated in the 1870s, thanks mainly to the efforts of Clara Schumann and Brahms himself.

She was initially interested in the works of Liszt, but later developed an outright hostility to him. She ceased to play any of his works; she suppressed her husband's dedication to Liszt of his ''Fantasie in C major'' when she published Schumann's complete works; and she refused to attend a Beethoven centenary festival in Vienna in 1870 when she heard that Liszt and Richard Wagner would be participating.

She was particularly scathing of Wagner. Of ''Tannhäuser'', she said that he "wears himself out in atrocities"; she described ''Lohengrin'' as "horrible"; and she wrote that ''Tristan und Isolde'' was "the most repugnant thing I have ever seen or heard in all my life".

In 1878 she was appointed teacher of the piano at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt am Main, a post she held until 1892, and in which she contributed greatly to the improvement of modern piano playing technique.

She held Anton Bruckner, whose 7th Symphony she heard in 1885, in very low esteem. She wrote to Brahms, describing it as "a horrible piece". But she was more impressed with Richard Strauss's early Symphony in F minor in 1887.

Clara Schumann played her last public concert in Frankfurt on March 12, 1891. The last work she played was Brahms's ''Variations on a Theme by Haydn'', in the piano-duet version.

She suffered a stroke on March 26, 1896, dying on May 20, at age 76. She is buried at Bonn's ''Alter Friedhof'' (Old Cemetery) with her husband.

She was portrayed onscreen by Katharine Hepburn in the 1947 film ''Song of Love'', in which Paul Henreid played Robert Schumann and Robert Walker starred as a young Johannes Brahms.

Legacy

Although for many years after her death Clara Schumann was not widely recognized as a composer, as a pianist she made an impression which lasts until today. She was one of the first pianists to perform from memory, making that the standard for concertizing. Trained by her father to play by ear and to memorize, she gave public performances from memory as early as age thirteen, a fact noted as something exceptional by her reviewers.

She was also instrumental in changing the kind of programs expected of concert pianists. In her early career, before her marriage to Robert, she played what was then customary, mainly bravura pieces designed to showcase the artist's technique, often in the form of arrangements or variations on popular themes from operas, written by virtuosos such as Thalberg, Herz, or Henselt. And, as it was also customary to play one's own compositions, she included at least one of her own works in every program, works such as her Variations on a Theme by Bellini (Op. 8) and her popular Scherzo (Op. 10). However, after settling into married life, probably under the influence of Robert, her performances focused almost exclusively on more serious music by Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Chopin, and Schumann.

Clara Schumann's influence has reached us as well through her teaching, which emphasized a singing tone and expression, with technique entirely subordinated to the intentions of the composer. One of her students, Mathilde Verne, carried her teaching to England where she taught, among others, Solomon; while another of her students, Carl Friedberg, carried the tradition to the Juilliard School in America, where his students included Malcolm Frager and Bruce Hungerford.

And, of course, Clara was instrumental in getting the works of Robert Schumann recognized, appreciated and added to the repertoire. She promoted him tirelessly, beginning when his music was unknown or disliked, when the only other important figure in music to play Schumann occasionally was Liszt, and continuing until the end of her long career.

Character

Clara Schumann was the main breadwinner for her family through giving concerts and teaching, and she did most of the work of organizing her own concert tours. She refused to accept charity when a group of musicians offered to put on a benefit concert for her. In addition to raising her own large family, when one of her children became incapacitated, she took on responsibility for raising her grandchildren. During the May Uprising in Dresden in 1849, she famously walked into the city through the front lines, defying a pack of armed men who confronted her, rescued her children, then walked back out of the city through the dangerous areas again.

Her family life was punctuated by tragedy. Four of her eight children and her husband predeceased her, and her husband and one of her sons ended their lives in insane asylums. Her first son Emil died in 1847, aged only one. Her husband Robert had a mental collapse, attempted suicide in 1854, and was committed to an insane asylum for the last two years of his life. In 1872 her daughter Julie died, leaving two small children. In 1879, her son Felix, aged 25, died. Her son Ludwig suffered from mental illness, like his father, and, in her words, had to be "buried alive" in an institution. Her son Ferdinand died at the age of 43 and she was required to raise his children. She herself became deaf in later life and she often needed a wheelchair.

Clara's portrait is also used on a front of a 100DM bill.

Music of Clara Schumann

As part of the broad musical education given her by her father, Clara Wieck learned to compose, and from childhood to middle age she produced a good body of work. At age fourteen she wrote her piano concerto, with some help from Robert Schumann, and performed it at age sixteen at the Leipzig Gewandhaus with Mendelssohn conducting.

As she grew older, however, she lost confidence in herself as a composer, writing, "I once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not desire to compose — there has never yet been one able to do it. Should I expect to be the one?" In fact, Wieck-Schumann composed nothing after the age of thirty-six.

Today her compositions are increasingly performed and recorded. Her works include songs, piano pieces, a piano concerto, a piano trio, choral pieces, and three Romances for violin and piano. Inspired by her husband's birthday, the three Romances were composed in 1853 and dedicated to Joseph Joachim, who performed them for George V of Hanover. He declared them a "marvellous, heavenly pleasure."

Wieck-Schumann was the authoritative editor of her husband's works for the publishing firm of Breitkopf & Härtel.

Quotations

"Clara has composed a series of small pieces, which show a musical and tender ingenuity such as she has never attained before. But to have children, and a husband who is always living in the realm of imagination, does not go together with composing. She cannot work at it regularly, and I am often disturbed to think how many profound ideas are lost because she cannot work them out."

"Composing gives me great pleasure...there is nothing that surpasses the joy of creation, if only because through it one wins hours of self-forgetfulness, when one lives in a world of sound."

Works

Clara Schumann's published works are listed below by date of publication. Twenty-five additional unpublished or lost works may be found in Reich, Nancy B., ''Clara Schumann, The Artist and The Woman'', appendix.

1831· ''Quatre Polonaises pour le pianoforte'', Op. 1.

1832· ''9 Caprices en forme de valse pour le piano'', Op. 2. Dedicated to Madame Henriette Foerster, née Weicke.

1833· ''Romance variée pour le piano'', Op. 3 (C major). Dedicated to Monsieur Robert Schumann.

1834· ''Walzer fűr Gesang und Klavier.'' Song with text by Johann Peter Lyser. Published in collection ''Lyser's Liedersammlung''.

1835· ''Valses romantiques pour le piano'', Op. 4. Dedicated to Madame Emma Eggers née Garlichs. The Valses were orchestrated but none of the instrumental parts survive.

1835· ''Quatre pieces caractéristiques'', Op. 5 (1. ''Le Sabbat''; 2. ''Caprice à la Boléro''; 3. ''Romance'': 4. ''Ballet des Revenants''). Dedicated to Mademoiselle Sophie Kaskel.

1836· ''6 Soirées musicales'', Op. 6 (1. Toccatina in A minor; 2. Nocturne in F Major; 3. Mazurka in G minor; 4. Ballade in D minor; 5. Mazurka in G major; 6. Polonaise in A minor). Dedicated to Madame Henriette Voigt.

1836· Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 7: ''Premier concert pour le piano-forte avec accompagnement d'orchestre (ou de quintour)''. (1 Allegro maestoso; 2 Romanze. Andante non troppo con grazia; 3 Finale. Allegro non troppo; allegro molto). Dedicated to Monsieur Louis Spohr. A draft exists of the last movement, orchestrated by Robert Schumann and in Schumann's hand.

1837· ''Variations de concert pour le pianoforte, sur la Cavatine du Pirate, de Bellini'', Op. 8. Dedicated to Monsieur Adolph Henselt.

1838· Impromptu in G major. ''Souvenir de Vienne''.

1839· Scherzo No. 1 in D minor, Op. 10.

1840· ''Trois Romances pour le pianoforte'', Op. 11 (1. E-flat minor, Andante; 2. G minor. Andante; 3. A major, Moderato). Dedicated to Monsieur Robert Schumann.

1841· ''Am Strande''. Song with text by Robert Burns. Published in ''Neue Zeitung für Musik'', July 1841.

1841· 3 songs: ''Zwőlf Gedichte aus F. Rűckert's Liebesfrűling fűr Gesang und pianoforte von Robert und Clara Schumann'', Op. 12: 2. ''Er ist gekommen in Sturm und Regen''; 4. ''Liebst du um Schönheit''; 11. ''Warum willst du and’re Fragen?'' (these were published as part of Robert Schumann's ''Gedichte aus ''Liebesfrühling'', Op. 37)

1841· ''Die gute Nacht, die ich dir sage''.

1842· Piano Sonata in G minor (1. Allegro; 2. Adagio con espressione e ben legato; 3. Scherzo; Trio; 4 Rondo).

1843· 6 songs: ''Sechs lieder mit begleitung des pianoforte'', Op. 13: 1. ''Ihr Bildnis. Ich stand in dunklen Träumen''; 2. ''Sie liebten sich beide''; 3. ''Liebeszauber''; 4. ''Der Mond kommt still gegangen''; 5. ''Ich hab’in deinem Auge''; 6. ''Die stille Lotusblume''. Dedicated to Queen Caroline Amalie of Denmark.

1843· ''O weh des Scheidens, das er tat''.

1844· Impromptu in E major (published in ''Album du gaulois'', 1885).

1845· Scherzo No. 2 in C minor, Op. 14: ''Deuxième scherzo pour le pianoforte'', Op. 14. Dedicated to Madame Tutein née Siboni.

1845· ''Quatre pièces fugitives'', Op. 15 (1. F major, Larghetto; 2. A minor, In poco agitato; 3. D major, Andante espressivo; 4. G major, Scherzo). Dedicated to Marie Wieck. Scherzo originally composed for unpublished Sonatine.

1845· 3 Preludes and Fugues: ''III Praeludien und fugen für das pianoforte'', Op. 16: (1. B flat major; 2. B flat major; 3. D minor).

1847· Piano Trio in G minor: ''Trio fur pianoforte, violine und violoncello'', Op. 17: (1. Allegro moderato; 2. Scherzo. Tempo di menuetto; 3. Andante; 4. Allegretto). Some emendations on autograph seem to be by Robert Schumann.

1848· ''Mein Stern ("O du mein Stern")''. Song with text by Friederike Serre.

1854· Variations on a Theme of Robert Schumann: ''Variationen für das pianoforte über ein thema von Robert Schumann'', Op. 20. Dedicated to Robert Schumann.

1855· ''Drei romanzen für pianoforte'', Op. 21. Dedicated to Johannes Brahms.

1855· ''Drei romanzen für pianoforte und violine'', Op. 22. Dedicated to Joseph Joachim.

1855· ''Sechs lieder aus jucunde von Hermann Rollet'', Op. 23 (1. ''Was weinst du, Blümein?''; 2. An einem lichten Morgen''; 3. Geheimes Flüstern''; 4. Auf einem grünem Hügel''; 5. Das ist ein tag''; 6. O lust, O lust''. Dedicated to Livia Frege.

1885· ''Impromptu''. Published in ''Album du Galois''.

1870· ''Cadenzas (2) for Beethoven Piano Concerto in G Major, op. 58''.

1870· ''Cadenzas for Beethoven Piano Concerto in C Minor, op. 37''.

1891· ''Cadenzas (2) for Mozart Piano Concerto in D Minor (K. 466)''.

1977· ''Romanze für Clavier''. Published in Clara Schumann, ''Romantische Klaviermusik'', vol. 2.

Notes

References

Boyd, Melinda. "Gendered Voices: The 'Liebesfrüling' Lieder of Robert and Clara Schumann." ''19th-Century Music'' 23 (Autumn 1999): 145–162.

Gould, John. "What Did They Play? The Changing Repertoire of the Piano Recital from the Beginnings to 1980." ''The Musical Times'' 146 (Winter 2005): 61–76.

Hall, George. "Schumann, Clara (Josephine)." ''The Oxford Companion to Music'' [n.d.]. Accessed through Grove Music Online on 30 June 2009.

Kopiez, Reinhard, Andreas C. Lehmann and Janina Klassen. "Clara Schumann's collection of playbills: A historiometric analysis of life-span development, mobility, and repertoire canonization." ''Poetics'', Volume 37, Issue 1, February 2009: 50–73.

Litzmann, Berthold. ''Clara Schumann: An Artist's Life''. New York: Da Capo Press, 1979. ISBN 0306795825.

Burstein, L. Poundie. "Their Paths, Her Ways: Comparison of Text Settings by Clara Schumann and Other Composers." ''Women and Music — A Journal of Gender and Culture'' 6 (2002): 11ff. Accessed through the International Index to Music Periodicals on 29 June 2009.

Rattalino, Piero. ''Schumann. Robert & Clara''. Varese: Zecchini Editore, 2002. ISBN 8887203148.

Reich, Nancy B. "Clara Schumann." In ''Women Making Music: The Western Art Tradition, 1150–1950''. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1986. ISBN 025201246.

Reich, Nancy B. ''Clara Schumann, The Artist and The Woman''. Revised edition. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2001. ISBN 0801486378.

Reich, Susanna. ''Clara Schumann: Piano Virtuoso''. 1999. Reprint. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2005. ISBN 0618551603.

External links

Kreusch-sheet-music.net - Free Scores by Clara Schumann

Complete works of Clara Schumann-Wieck.

Goldenwattle.net - Play about Clara Schumann

Clara Schumann: Impromptu op.9 "Soirée de Vienne"

March in Es dur, for piano duet, Clara Schumann's last work in Youtube.com

Scherzo Nr.2 Op.14 Youtube.com

Clara Category:German classical pianists Category:German composers Category:Romantic composers Category:Women classical composers Category:Child classical musicians Category:Honorary Members of the Royal Philharmonic Society Category:Music from Leipzig Category:People from Leipzig Category:People from the Kingdom of Saxony Category:19th-century German people Category:Deaths from stroke Category:1896 deaths Category:1819 births

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Franz Peter Schubert (; January 31, 1797 – November 19, 1828) was an Austrian composer.

Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies (including the famous "Unfinished Symphony"), liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music. Appreciation of his music during his lifetime was limited, but interest in Schubert's work increased dramatically in the decades following his death at the age of 31. Franz Liszt, Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms and Felix Mendelssohn, among others, discovered and championed his works in the 19th Century. Today, Schubert is admired as one of the leading exponents of the early Romantic era in music and he remains one of the most frequently performed composers.

Biography

Early life and education

Schubert was born in Himmelpfortgrund (now a part of Alsergrund), Vienna on January 31, 1797. His father, Franz Theodor Schubert, the son of a Moravian peasant, was a parish schoolmaster; his mother, Elisabeth Vietz, was the daughter of a Silesian master locksmith, and had also been a housemaid for a Viennese family prior to her marriage. Of Franz Theodor's fourteen children (one illegitimate child was born in 1783), nine died in infancy; five survived. Their father was a well-known teacher, and his school in Lichtental, a part of Vienna's 9th district, was well attended. He was not a musician of fame or with formal training, but he taught his son some elements of music.

At the age of five, Schubert began receiving regular instruction from his father and a year later was enrolled at his father's school. His formal musical education also began around the same time. His father continued to teach him the basics of the violin, and his brother Ignaz gave him piano lessons. At 7, Schubert began receiving lessons from Michael Holzer, the local church organist and choirmaster. Holzer's lessons seem to have mainly consisted of conversations and expressions of admiration and the boy gained more from his acquaintance with a friendly joiner's apprentice who used to take him to a neighboring pianoforte warehouse where he had the opportunity to practice on better instruments. He also played the viola in the family string quartet, with brothers Ferdinand and Ignaz on violin and his father on the cello. Schubert wrote many of his early string quartets for this ensemble.

Schubert first came to the attention of Antonio Salieri, then Vienna's leading musical authority, in 1804, when his vocal talent was recognized. In October 1808, he became a pupil at the Stadtkonvikt (Imperial seminary) through a choir scholarship. At the Stadtkonvikt, Schubert was introduced to the overtures and symphonies of Mozart. His exposure to these pieces and various lighter compositions, combined with his occasional visits to the opera set the foundation for his greater musical knowledge. One important musical influence came from the songs of Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg, who was an important Lied composer of the time, which, his friend Joseph von Spaun reported, he "wanted to modernize". Schubert's friendship with Spaun began at the Stadtkonvikt and endured through his lifetime. In those early days, the more well-to-do Spaun furnished the impoverished Schubert with manuscript paper.

Meanwhile, his genius began to show in his compositions. Schubert was occasionally permitted to lead the Stadtkonvikt's orchestra, and Salieri decided to begin training him privately in musical composition and theory in these years. It was the first germ of that amateur orchestra for which, in later years, many of his compositions were written. During the remainder of his stay at the Stadtkonvikt he wrote a good deal of chamber music, several songs, some miscellaneous pieces for the pianoforte and, among his more ambitious efforts, a ''Kyrie'' (D. 31) and ''Salve Regina'' (D. 27), an octet for wind instruments (D. 72/72a, said to commemorate the 1812 death of his mother), a cantata for guitar and male voices (D. 110, in honor of his father's birthday in 1813), and his first symphony (D. 82).

Teacher at his father's school

At the end of 1813, he left the Stadtkonvikt, and returned home for studies at the Normalhauptschule to train as a teacher. In 1814, he entered his father's school as teacher of the youngest students. For over two years, the young man endured the drudgery of the work, which he performed with very indifferent success. There were, however, other interests to compensate. He continued to receive private lessons in composition from Salieri, who did more for Schubert’s musical training than any of his other teachers. Salieri and Schubert would part ways in 1817.

In 1814, Schubert met a young soprano named Therese Grob, the daughter of a local silk manufacturer. Several of his songs (''Salve Regina'' and ''Tantum Ergo'') were composed for her voice, and she also performed in the premiere of his first Mass (D. 105) in September 1814. Schubert intended to marry Grob, but was hindered by the harsh marriage consent law of 1815, which required the ability to show the means to support a family. In November 1816, after failing to gain a position at Laibach, Schubert sent Grob's brother Heinrich a collection of songs, which were retained by her family into the 20th century.

One of Schubert's most prolific years was 1815. He composed over 20,000 bars of music, more than half of which was for orchestra, including nine church works, a symphony, and about 140 Lieder. In that year, he was also introduced to Anselm Hüttenbrenner and Franz von Schober, who would become his lifelong friends. Another friend, Johann Mayrhofer, was introduced to him by Spaun in 1814. Some scholars, such as Maynard Solomon, have suggested that Schubert was erotically attracted to men, a thesis that has at times been heatedly debated.

Supported by friends

Significant changes happened in 1816. Schober, a student of good family and some means, invited Schubert to room with him at his mother's house. The proposal was particularly opportune, for Schubert had just made the unsuccessful application for the post of Kapellmeister at Laibach, and he had also decided not to resume teaching duties at his father's school. By the end of the year, he became a guest in Schober's lodgings. For a time, he attempted to increase the household resources by giving music lessons, but they were soon abandoned, and he devoted himself to composition. "I compose every morning, and when one piece is done, I begin another." During this year, he focused on orchestral and choral works, although he also continued to write Lieder. Much of this work was unpublished, but manuscripts and copies circulated among friends and admirers.

In early 1817, Schober introduced Schubert to Johann Michael Vogl, a prominent baritone twenty years Schubert's senior. Vogl, for whom Schubert went on to write a great many songs, became one of Schubert's main proponents in Viennese musical circles. He also met Joseph Hüttenbrenner (brother to Anselm), who also played a role in promoting Schubert's music. These, and an increasing circle of friends and musicians, became responsible for promoting, collecting, and, after his death, preserving, his work.

In late 1817, Schubert's father gained a new position at a school in Rossau (not far from Lichtental). Schubert rejoined his father and reluctantly took up teaching duties there. In early 1818, he was rejected for membership in the prestigious Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, something that might have furthered his musical career. However, he began to gain more notice in the press, and the first public performance of a secular work, an overture performed in February 1818, received praise from the press in Vienna and abroad.

Schubert spent the summer of 1818 as music teacher to the family of Count Johann Karl Esterházy at their château in Zseliz (then in Hungary, now in Slovakia). His duties were relatively light (teaching piano and singing to the two daughters, Marie and Karoline), and the pay was relatively good. As a result, he happily continued to compose during this time. It may have been at this time that he wrote one of his now world-famous compositions, the Marche militaire No. 1 in D major. Marie and Karoline both being his piano students, and the original score of "Marche Militaire" being a piano duet, lend credence to this view. On his return from Zseliz, he took up residence with his friend Mayrhofer. The respite at Zseliz led to a succession of compositions for piano duet.

The tight circle of friends that Schubert surrounded himself with was dealt a blow in early 1820. Schubert and four of his friends were arrested by the Austrian secret police, who were suspicious of any type of student gatherings. One of Schubert's friends, Johann Senn, was put on trial, imprisoned for over a year, and then permanently banned from Vienna. The other four, including Schubert, were "severely reprimanded", in part for "inveighing against [officials] with insulting and opprobrious language". While Schubert never saw Senn again, he did set some of his poems, "Selige Welt" and "Schwanengesang", to music. The incident may have played a role in a falling-out with Mayrhofer, with whom he was living at the time.

He was nicknamed "Schwämmerl" by his friends, which Gibbs describes as translating "Tubby" or "Little Mushroom". "Schwammerl" is Austrian (and other) dialect for mushroom; the umlaut makes it a diminutive.

Musical maturity

The compositions of 1819 and 1820 show a marked advance in development and maturity of style. The unfinished oratorio "Lazarus" (D. 689) was begun in February; later followed, amid a number of smaller works, by the 23rd Psalm (D. 706), the ''Gesang der Geister'' (D. 705/714), the ''Quartettsatz'' in C minor (D. 703), and the "Wanderer Fantasy" for piano (D. 760). Of most notable interest is the staging in 1820 of two of Schubert's operas: ''Die Zwillingsbrüder'' (D. 647) appeared at the Theater am Kärntnertor on June 14, and ''Die Zauberharfe'' (D. 644) appeared at the Theater an der Wien on August 21. Hitherto, his larger compositions (apart from his masses) had been restricted to the amateur orchestra at the Gundelhof, a society which grew out of the quartet-parties at his home. Now he began to assume a more prominent position, addressing a wider public. Publishers, however, remained distant, with Anton Diabelli hesitantly agreeing to print some of his works on commission. The first seven opus numbers (all songs) appeared on these terms; then the commission ceased, and he began to receive the meager pittances which were all that the great publishing houses ever accorded to him. The situation improved somewhat in March 1821 when Vogl sang "Der Erlkönig" at a concert that was extremely well received. That month, he composed a variation on a waltz by Anton Diabelli (D. 718), being one of the fifty composers who contributed to ''Vaterländischer Künstlerverein''. , D. 960]] (composed in 1828) |description|played by Randolph Hokanson |filename=Schubert - Piano Sonatas - 5 Moderato.ogg|title=1. Molto moderato|description=|format=Ogg |filename2=Schubert - Piano Sonatas - 6 Andante.ogg|title2=2. Andante sostenuto|description2=|format2=Ogg |filename3=Schubert - Piano Sonatas - 7 Scherzo.ogg|title3=3. Scherzo. Allegro vivace con delicatezza|description3=|format3=Ogg |filename4=Schubert - Piano Sonatas - 8 Allegro.ogg|title4=4. Allegro, ma non troppo|description4=Performed by Randolph Hokanson|format4=Ogg }} The production of the two operas turned Schubert's attention more firmly than ever in the direction of the stage, where, for a variety of reasons, he was almost completely unsuccessful. In 1822, ''Alfonso und Estrella'' was refused, partly owing to its libretto. ''Fierrabras'' (D. 796) was rejected in the fall of 1823, but this was largely due to the popularity of Rossini and the Italian operatic style, and the failure of Carl Maria von Weber's ''Euryanthe''. ''Die Verschworenen'' (''The Conspirators'', D. 787) was prohibited by the censor (apparently on the grounds of its title), and ''Rosamunde'' (D. 797) was withdrawn after two nights, owing to the poor quality of the play for which Schubert had written incidental music. Of these works, the two former are written on a scale which would make their performances exceedingly difficult (''Fierrabras'', for instance, contains over 1,000 pages of manuscript score), but ''Die Verschworenen'' is a bright attractive comedy, and ''Rosamunde'' contains some of the most charming music that Schubert ever composed. In 1822, he made the acquaintance of both Weber and Beethoven, but little came of it in either case. Beethoven is said to have acknowledged the younger man's gifts on a few occasions, but some of this is likely legend and in any case he could not have known the real scope of Schubert's music – especially not the instrumental works – as so little of it was printed or performed in the composer's lifetime. On his deathbed, Beethoven is said to have looked into some of the younger man's works and exclaimed, "Truly, the spark of divine genius resides in this Schubert!" but what would have come of it if he had recovered we can never know.

In the autumn of 1822, Schubert embarked suddenly on a work which more decisively than almost any other in those years showed his maturing personal vision, the "Unfinished Symphony" in B minor. The reason he left it unfinished after two movements and sketches some way into a third remains an enigma, and it is also remarkable that he didn't mention it to any of his friends even though, as Brian Newbould notes, he must have felt thrilled by what he was achieving here.

Last years and masterworks

In 1823 Schubert, in addition to ''Fierrabras'', also wrote his first song cycle, ''Die schöne Müllerin'' (D. 795), setting poems by Wilhelm Müller. This series, together with the later cycle "Winterreise" (D. 911, also setting texts of Müller in 1827) is widely considered one of the pinnacles of Lieder. He also composed the song ''Du bist die Ruh'' ("You are stillness/peace") D. 776 during this year. Also in that year, symptoms of syphilis first appeared.

In the spring of 1824 he wrote the Octet in F (D. 803), "A Sketch for a Grand Symphony"; and in the summer went back to Zseliz. There he became attracted to Hungarian musical idiom, and wrote the ''Divertissement à la hongroise'' (D. 818) for piano duet and the String Quartet in A minor (D. 804).

It has been said that he held a hopeless passion for his pupil, the Countess Karoline Eszterházy, but the only work he dedicated to her was his Fantasie in F minor (D. 940) for piano duet. His friend Bauernfeld penned the following verse, which appears to reference Schubert's unrequited sentiments:

In love with a Countess of youthful grace, —A pupil of Galt's; in desperate case Young Schubert surrenders himself to another, And fain would avoid such affectionate pother

Despite his preoccupation with the stage, and later with his official duties, he found time during these years for a significant amount of composition. He completed the ''Mass in A flat'' (fr) (D. 678) and, in 1822, began the "Unfinished Symphony" (Symphony No. 8 in B minor, D. 759). Why the symphony was "unfinished" has been debated endlessly without resolution. In 1824, he wrote the variations for flute and piano on "Trockne Blumen", from the cycle ''Die schöne Müllerin'', and several string quartets. He also wrote the Arpeggione Sonata (D. 821), at a time when there was a minor craze over that instrument.

The setbacks of previous years were compensated for by the prosperity and happiness of 1825. Publication had been moving more rapidly; the stress of poverty was for a time lightened; and in the summer he had a pleasant holiday in Upper Austria, where he was welcomed with enthusiasm. It was during this tour that he produced his "''Songs from Sir Walter Scott''". This cycle contains ''Ellens dritter Gesang'' (D. 839), a setting of Adam Storck's German translation of Scott's hymn from ''The Lady of the Lake'', which is widely, though mistakenly, referred to as "Schubert's ''Ave Maria''". It opens with the greeting ''Ave Maria'', which recurs in the refrain; the entire Scott/Storck text in Schubert's song is frequently substituted with the complete Latin text of the traditional Ave Maria prayer. In 1825, Schubert also wrote the Piano Sonata in A minor (Op. 42, D. 845), and began the "Great" C major Symphony (Symphony No. 9, D. 944), which was completed the following year.

From 1826 to 1828, Schubert resided continuously in Vienna, except for a brief visit to Graz in 1827. The history of his life during these three years was relatively uneventful, and is little more than a record of his compositions. In 1826, he dedicated a symphony (D. 944, that later came to be known as the "Great") to the ''Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde'' and received an honorarium in return. In the spring of 1828, he gave, for the first and only time in his career, a public concert of his own works, which was very well received. The compositions themselves are a sufficient biography. The String Quartet in D minor (D. 810), with the variations on "Death and the Maiden", was written during the winter of 1825–1826, and first played on January 25, 1826. Later in the year came the String Quartet in G major, (D. 887, Op. 161), the "Rondeau brillant" for piano and violin (D. 895, Op. 70), and the Piano Sonata in G (D. 894, Op. 78) (first published under the title "Fantasia in G"). To these should be added the three Shakespearian songs, of which "''Hark! Hark! the Lark''" (D. 889) and "''An Sylvia''" (D. 891) were allegedly written on the same day, the former at a tavern where he broke his afternoon's walk, the latter on his return to his lodging in the evening.

In 1827, Schubert wrote the song cycle ''Winterreise'' (D. 911), a colossal peak of the art of art song ("remarkable" was the way it was described at the ''Schubertiades''), the ''Fantasia'' for piano and violin in C (D. 934), the Impromptus for piano, and the two piano trios (the first in B flat (D. 898), and the second in E flat, D. 929); in 1828 the ''Mirjams Siegesgesang'' (''Song of Miriam'', D. 942) on a text by Franz Grillparzer, the Mass in E-flat (D. 950), the ''Tantum Ergo'' (D. 962) in the same key, the String Quintet in C (D. 956), the second ''Benedictus'' to the Mass in C, the last three piano sonatas, and the collection of songs published posthumously as ''Schwanengesang'' ("Swan-song", D. 957). This collection, while not a true song cycle, retains a unity of style amongst the individual songs, touching depths of tragedy and of the morbidly supernatural which had rarely been plumbed by any composer in the century preceding it. Six of these are set to words by Heinrich Heine, whose ''Buch der Lieder'' appeared in the autumn. The Symphony No. 9 (D. 944) is dated 1828, but Schubert scholars believe that this symphony was largely written in 1825–1826 (being referred to while he was on holiday at Gastein in 1825 – that work, once considered lost, now is generally seen as an early stage of his C major symphony) and was revised for prospective performance in 1828. This was a fairly unusual practice for Schubert, for whom publication, let alone performance, was rarely contemplated for most of his larger-scale works during his lifetime. In the last weeks of his life, he began to sketch three movements for a new Symphony in D (D. 936A).

D. 935 No. 3|description = This Impromptu is a theme and variations based on a theme from Rosamunde. Performed by Randolph Hokanson.|pos=left|format = Ogg}} The works of his last two years reveal a composer increasingly meditating on the darker side of the human psyche and human relationships, and with a deeper sense of spiritual awareness and conception of the 'beyond'. He reaches extraordinary depths in several chillingly dark songs of this period, especially in the larger cycles. For example, the song ''Der Doppelgänger'' reaching an extraordinary climax, conveying madness at the realization of rejection and imminent death – a stark and visionary picture in sound and words that had been prefigured a year before by "Der Leiermann" (The Hurdy-Gurdy Man) at the end of ''Winterreise'' – and yet the composer is able to touch repose and communion with the infinite in the almost timeless ebb and flow of the String Quintet and his last three piano sonatas, moving between joyful, vibrant poetry and remote introspection. Even in large-scale works he was sometimes using increasingly sparse textures; Newbould compares his writing in the fragmentary Tenth Symphony (D.936A), probably the work of his very last two months) with Mahler's use of folksong-like harmonics and bare soundscapes. Schubert expressed the wish, were he to survive his final illness, to further develop his knowledge of harmony and counterpoint, and had actually made appointments for lessons with the counterpoint master Simon Sechter.

Final illness and death

In the midst of this creative activity, his health deteriorated. The cause of his death was officially diagnosed as typhoid fever, though other theories have been proposed, including the tertiary stage of syphilis. By the late 1820s Schubert's health was failing and he confided to some friends that he feared that he was near death. In the late summer of 1828, the composer saw court physician Ernst Rinna, who may have confirmed Schubert's suspicions that he was ill beyond cure and likely to die soon. Some of his symptoms matched those of mercury poisoning (mercury was then a common treatment for syphilis, again suggesting that Schubert suffered from it). At the beginning of November he again fell ill, experiencing headaches, fever, swollen joints, and vomiting. He was generally unable to retain solid food and his condition worsened. Schubert died in Vienna, at age 31, on November 19, 1828, at the apartment of his brother Ferdinand. The last musical work he had wished to hear was Beethoven's String Quartet No.14 in C sharp minor, Op. 131; his friend, violinist Karl Holz, who was present at the gathering, 5 days before Schubert's death, commented: "The King of Harmony has sent the King of Song a friendly bidding to the crossing". It was next to Beethoven, whom he had admired all his life, that Schubert was buried by his own request, in the village cemetery of Währing.

In 1872, a memorial to Franz Schubert was erected in Vienna's Stadtpark. In 1888, both Schubert's and Beethoven's graves were moved to the Zentralfriedhof, where they can now be found next to those of Johann Strauss II and Johannes Brahms. The cemetery in Währing was converted into a park in 1925, called the Schubert Park, and his former grave site was marked by a bust.

Music

Schubert wrote almost 1000 works in a remarkably short career. The largest number (over 600) of these are songs. He wrote seven complete symphonies, as well as the two movements of the "Unfinished" Symphony, a complete sketch (with partial orchestration) of a ninth, and arguable fragments of a 10th. There is a large body of music for solo piano, including 21 complete sonatas and many short dances, and a relatively large set of works for piano duet. There are nearly 30 chamber works, including some fragmentary works. His choral output includes six masses. He completed only half of his eighteen operatic projects, and composed no concertos.

Style and reception

In July 1947 the twentieth-century composer Ernst Krenek discussed Schubert's style, abashedly admitting that he at first "shared the wide-spread opinion that Schubert was a lucky inventor of pleasing tunes ... lacking the dramatic power and searching intelligence which distinguished such 'real' masters as Bach or Beethoven". Krenek wrote that he reached a completely different assessment after close study of Schubert's songs at the urging of friend and fellow composer Eduard Erdmann. Krenek pointed to the piano sonatas as giving "ample evidence that [Schubert] was much more than an easy-going tune-smith who did not know, and did not care, about the craft of composition." Each sonata then in print, according to Krenek, exhibited "a great wealth of technical finesse" and revealed Schubert as "far from satisfied with pouring his charming ideas into conventional molds; on the contrary he was a thinking artist with a keen appetite for experimentation."

That "appetite for experimentation" manifests itself repeatedly in Schubert's output in a wide variety of forms and genres, including opera, liturgical music, chamber and solo piano music, and symphonic works. Perhaps most familiarly, his adventurousness manifests itself as a notably original sense of modulation, as in the second movement of the String Quintet, where he modulates from C major, through E major, to reach the tonic key of C major. It also appears in unusual choices of instrumentation, as in the Arpeggione Sonata or the unconventional scoring of the Trout Quintet. If it not infrequently led Schubert up blind alleys, resulting in fragmentary works, it also enabled him to create music unlike anything that had come before, such as his two song cycles of unprecedented scope.

While he was clearly influenced by the Classical sonata forms of Beethoven and Mozart (his early works, among them notably the 5th Symphony, are particularly Mozartean), his formal structures and his developments tend to give the impression more of melodic development than of harmonic drama. This combination of Classical form and long-breathed Romantic melody sometimes lends them a discursive style: his 9th Symphony was described by Robert Schumann as running to "heavenly lengths". His harmonic innovations include movements in which the first section ends in the key of the subdominant rather than the dominant (as in the last movement of the Trout Quintet). Schubert's practice here was a forerunner of the common Romantic technique of relaxing, rather than raising, tension in the middle of a movement, with final resolution postponed to the very end.

It was in the genre of the Lied, however, that Schubert made his most indelible mark. Plantinga remarks, "In his more than six hundred Lieder he explored and expanded the potentialities of the genre as no composer before him." Prior to Schubert's influence, Lieder tended toward a strophic, syllabic treatment of text, evoking the folksong qualities burgeoned by the stirrings of Romantic nationalism. Among Schubert's treatments of the poetry of Goethe, his settings of ''Gretchen am Spinnrade'' and ''Der Erlkönig'' are particularly striking for their dramatic content, forward-looking uses of harmony, and their use of eloquent pictorial keyboard figurations, such as the depiction of the spinning wheel and treadle in the piano in ''Gretchen'' and the furious and ceaseless gallop in ''Erlkönig''. Also of particular note are his two song cycles on the poems of Wilhelm Müller, Die schöne Müllerin and Winterreise, which helped to establish the genre and its potential for musical, poetic, and almost operatic dramatic narrative. The ''Theaterzeitung'', writing about ''Winterreise'' at the time, commented that it was a work that "none can sing or hear without being deeply moved". Antonín Dvořák wrote in 1894 that Schubert, whom he considered one of the truly great composers, was clearly influential on shorter works, especially Lieder and shorter piano works: "The tendency of the romantic school has been toward short forms, and although Weber helped to show the way, to Schubert belongs the chief credit of originating the short models of piano forte pieces which the romantic school has preferably cultivated. [...] Schubert created a new epoch with the Lied. [...] All other songwriters have followed in his footsteps."

Schubert's compositional style progressed rapidly throughout his short life. The loss of potential masterpieces caused by his early death at 31 was perhaps best expressed in the epitaph on his large tombstone written by the poet Franz Grillparzer, "Here music has buried a treasure, but even fairer hopes."

Schubert's chamber music continues to be popular. In a poll of classical music listeners announced in October 2008, the ABC in Australia found that Schubert's chamber works dominated the field, with the Trout Quintet coming first, followed by two of his other works.

The New York Times music critic, Anthony Tommasini, who ranked Schubert as the fourth greatest composer wrote, "Four? Schubert. You have to love the guy, who died at 31, ill, impoverished and neglected except by a circle of friends who were in awe of his genius. For his hundreds of songs alone – including the haunting cycle “Winterreise,” which will never release its tenacious hold on singers and audiences – Schubert is central to our concert life.... Schubert’s first few symphonies may be works in progress. But the “Unfinished” and especially the Ninth Symphony are astonishing. The Ninth paves the way for Bruckner and prefigures Mahler.".

Posthumous history of Schubert's music

Some of his smaller pieces were printed shortly after his death, but the manuscripts of many of the longer works, whose existence was not widely known, remained hidden in cabinets and file boxes of Schubert's family, friends, and publishers. Even some of Schubert's friends were unaware of the full scope of what he wrote, and for many years he was primarily recognized as the "prince of song", although there was recognition of some of his larger-scale efforts. In 1838 Robert Schumann, on a visit to Vienna, found the dusty manuscript of the C major symphony (the "Great", D. 944) and took it back to Leipzig, where it was performed by Felix Mendelssohn and celebrated in the Neue Zeitschrift. The most important step towards the recovery of the neglected works was the journey to Vienna which Sir George Grove (widely known for the ''Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'') and Arthur Sullivan made in the autumn of 1867. The travellers rescued from oblivion seven symphonies, the ''Rosamunde'' incidental music, some of the Masses and operas, some of the chamber works, and a vast quantity of miscellaneous pieces and songs. This led to more widespread public interest in Schubert's work.

From the 1830s through the 1870s, Franz Liszt transcribed and arranged a number of Schubert's works, particularly the songs. Liszt, who was a significant force in spreading Schubert's work after his death, said Schubert was "the most poetic musician who ever lived." Schubert's symphonies were of particular interest to Antonín Dvořák, with Hector Berlioz and Anton Bruckner acknowledging the influence of the "Great" Symphony.

In 1897, the publisher Breitkopf & Härtel released a critical edition of Schubert's works, under the general editing of Johannes Brahms, enabling a wider dissemination of his music. In the 20th century, composers such as Benjamin Britten, Richard Strauss, and George Crumb either championed or paid homage to Schubert in their work. Britten, an accomplished pianist, accompanied many of Schubert's Lieder and performed many piano solo and duet works.

Numbering of symphonies

Confusion arose quite early over the numbering of Schubert's symphonies, in particular the "Great" C Major Symphony. George Grove, who rediscovered many of Schubert's symphonies, assigned the following numbering after his 1867 visit to Vienna:

Number 7: E major D. 729 (completely sketched but not completely scored by Schubert, with multiple historic and modern completions)

Number 8: B minor ''Unfinished'' D. 759

Number 9: C major ''Great'' D. 944

Breitkopf & Härtel, when preparing the 1897 complete works publication, originally planned to only publish complete works (which would have given the ''Great'' number 7), with "fragments", including the ''Unfinished'' and the D. 729 sketch, receiving no number at all. When Johannes Brahms became general editor of that project, he assigned the following numbers:

Number 7: C major ''Great''

Number 8: B minor ''Unfinished''

no number: E major D. 729

Some of the disagreement continued into the 20th century. George Grove in his 1908 ''Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', assigned the ''Great'' as number 10, and the ''Unfinished'' as number 9. (It is unclear from his article which symphonies, fragmentary or otherwise, are numbers 7 and 8.) However, the ''Unfinished'' is now generally referred to as number 8 in the English-speaking world, with the ''Great'' at number 9. Number 10 is generally acknowledged to be the D. 936a fragment, for which a completion by Brian Newbould exists. The 1978 revision to the Deutsch catalog leaves D. 729 without a number (in spite of numerous completions), and assigns number 7 to the ''Unfinished'' and number 8 to the ''Great''. As a consequence, generally available scores for the later symphonies may be published using conflicting numbers.

Grove and Sullivan also suggested that there may have been a "lost" symphony. Immediately before Schubert's death, his friend Eduard von Bauernfeld recorded the existence of an additional symphony, dated 1828 (although this does not necessarily indicate the year of composition) named the "Letzte" or "Last" symphony. Brian Newbould believes that the "Last" symphony refers to a sketch in D major (D. 936A), identified by Ernst Hilmar in 1977, and which was realised by Newbould as the Tenth Symphony. The fragment was bound with other symphony fragments (D. 615 and D. 708a) that Schubert had apparently intended to combine.

Commemorations

In 1897, the 100th anniversary of Schubert's birth was marked in the musical world by festivals and performances dedicated to his music. In Vienna, there were ten days of concerts, and the Emperor Franz Joseph gave a speech recognizing Schubert as the creator of the art song, and one of Austria's favorite sons. Karlsruhe saw the first production of his opera ''Fierrabras''.

In 1928, Schubert week was held in Europe and the United States to mark the centenary of the composer's death. Works by Schubert were performed in churches, in concert halls, and on radio stations. A competition, with top prize money of $10,000 and sponsorship by the Columbia Phonograph Company, was held for "original symphonic works presented as an apotheosis of the lyrical genius of Schubert, and dedicated to his memory". The winning entry was Kurt Atterberg's sixth symphony.

In 1977, the German electronic band Kraftwerk recorded a tribute song called "Franz Schubert", which can be found on the album ''Trans-Europe Express''.

Catalogue

Since relatively few of his works were published in Schubert's lifetime, only a small number of them have opus numbers assigned, and, even in those cases, the sequence of the numbers does not give a good indication of the order of composition. In 1951, musicologist Otto Erich Deutsch published a "thematic catalogue" of Schubert's works that lists his compositions numerically by their composition date.

Catalogue by Deutsch number: D 1 to 500 – D 501 to 998

List of compositions by Franz Schubert – by musical genre

Wikipedia articles about Schubert's compositions

Notes

References

The first significant biography of Schubert. This edition is available at German Google Books. English translations and abridgements of this biography from the 1860s are available at Google Books. The second volume is notable in that it contains Sir George Grove's description of the trip to Vienna in which he recovered a number of Schubert's works. (roughly, volume 1 of Kreissle) (roughly, volume 2 of Kreissle)

Nineteenth and early 20th-century scholarship

Modern scholarship

Symphony numbers

The following citations illustrate the confusion around the numbering of Schubert's late symphonies. The B minor ''Unfinished'' Symphony is variously published as Number 7 and Number 8, in both German and English. All of these editions appeared to be in print (or at least somewhat readily available) in 2008. German-language publication of the ''Unfinished'' Symphony score as Number 7. English-language publication of the ''Unfinished'' Symphony score as Number 7. English-language publication of the ''Unfinished'' Symphony score as Number 8.

Further reading

Otto Erich Deutsch, working in the first half of the 20th century, was probably the preeminent scholar of Schubert's life and music. In addition to the catalog of Schubert's works, he collected and organized a great deal of material about Schubert, some of which is still in print.

Elizabeth Norman McKay and Brian Newbould have done a great deal of research on the life and music of Schubert in recent years, including scholarly journal articles and books. Newbould composed a completion of Schubert's fragmentary 10th symphony.

Additional readings (sources from German Wikipedia article):

Walther Dürr, Andreas Krause (ed.): ''Schubert-Handbuch''. Metzler, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-476-01418-5

Ernst Hilmar: ''Verzeichnis der Schubert-Handschriften in der Musiksammlung der Wiener Stadt- und Landesbibliothek''. Kassel u. a. 1978 (Catalogus Musicus 8).

Ernst Hilmar, Margret Jestremski (ed.): ''Schubert-Enzyklopädie''. 2 Bände. Hans Schneider, Tutzing 2004, ISBN 3-7952-1155-7

H.-J. Hinrichsen: ''Untersuchungen zur Entwicklung der Sonatenform in der Instrumentalmu­sik Franz Schuberts''. Tutzing 1994

Elizabeth Norman McKay: ''Franz Schubert's Music for the Theatre''. Foreword by Claudio Abbado. (Veröffentlichungen des IFSI, 5), Tutzing 1991

Christian Pollack (ed.): ''Franz Schubert: Bühnenwerke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe der Texte''. Tutzing 1988

Ernst Hilmar, Otto Brusatti (ed., mit einer Einleitung von Walter Obermaier): ''Franz Schubert. Ausstellung der Wiener Stadt- und Landesbibliothek zum 150. Todestag des Komponisten. Katalog''. Wien 1978.

Ernst Hilmar: ''Schubert''. Graz 1989

Till Gerrit Waidelich (ed., together with R. Hilmar-Voit, A. Mayer): ''Franz Schubert. Dokumente 1817–1830. Erster Band: Texte. Programme, Rezensionen, Anzeigen, Nekrologe, Musikbeilagen und andere gedruckte Quellen'' (Veröffentlichungen des IFSI, 10/1), Tutzing 1993

Ernst Hilmar (ed.): ''Franz Schubert. Dokumente 1801–1830. Erster Band. Addenda und Kommentar''. (Veröffentlichungen des IFSI, 10/2), Tutzing 2003

Ernst Hilmar (ed.): ''Schubert durch die Brille. Mitteilungen des Internationalen Franz Schubert Instituts''. Wien/Tutzing 1988–2003

Hans-Joachim Hinrichsen, Till Gerrit Waidelich (ed.): ''Schubert : Perspektiven'' Stuttgart 2001ff. (content since 2001)

External links

The Lied and Arts Song Texts Page

Catalogue of Works by Franz Schubert

Digital reproductions of score manuscripts and letters by Franz Schubert

Notes on Franz Schubert by pianist Bart Berman

The Schubert Institute (UK), detailed time-line, biography, work list and (flawed) family tree

The Schubert Society of the USA

The Franz Schubert Society of Victoria

Franz-Schubert-Institut in Baden bei Wien

Recordings and MIDI files

Schubertsongs.com – free Recordings of all works by Schubert for voice and piano (mp3)

Schubert cylinder recordings, from the Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara Library.

Sheet music

Kreusch-sheet-music.net Schubert's Piano Works

Shubertline.co.uk about 250 of Schubert's Songs (Schubertline edition)

Schubert's Sheet Music by Mutopia Project

Lieder sheet music

Category:1797 births Category:1828 deaths Category:People from Alsergrund * Category:19th-century Austrian people Category:19th-century composers Category:Austrian composers Category:Austrian expatriates in Hungary Category:Austrian people of Moravian German descent Category:Austrian people of Silesian German descent Category:Burials at the Zentralfriedhof Category:Child classical musicians Category:Classical era composers Category:House of Esterházy Category:Opera composers Category:Romantic composers Category:Viennese composers

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