Literary Musicians I: Robert Schumann. April 19, 2018

Transcription

1 Literary Musicians I: Robert Schumann April 19, 2018

2 The public sphere The press; specialized journals and dailies for the general public. Enlightenment values, basically; reason, aristocracy of merit 1798 Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung ( Universal music news ) ETA Hoffman s most famous articles Schumann s early articles, before founding Neue Zeitschrift Berlioz in Journal des debats, founded 1789 Schumann founds Neue Zeitschrift für Musik ( New music journal ), in 1833

3 Philistinism Contradictions in Romanticism; see Lizst s writings on Field cf. his active courtship of a new consumer class. Contractions in the life of Schumann Hence the Davidsbundt?

4 Davidsbund (from Taruskin) The cast of characters included, in the first place, Florestan and Eusebius, Schumann s alter egos. The former, named after Beethoven s imprisoned freedom-fighter, represented his embattled innerliches Ich, his inmost I, a concept associated with German romanticism from its Beethovenian beginning. Eusebius, named after an early church historian later adjudged a heretic (as Schumann must have known), represented Schumann s gentler, more moderate nature in contrast and occasional opposition to the more choleric Florestan. Also, there is Meister Raro most likely a figure for Friedrich Wieck.

5 Davidsbund Taruskin continues: Thus we have a virtual Freudian trinity: the rash and reckless Florestan (id), the milder, more sociable Eusebius (ego), and the reproving Raro (superego). As Freud constantly maintained, his psychoanalytic theory was strongly prefigured in romantic literature, and here is a choice bit of evidence.

6 Music as literature? A type of criticism that exalts a given work to the status of the absolute, and insinuates a degree of intellectual and spiritual content equal to more traditional intellecutal pursuits. Contra Kant.

7 Schumann on Schubert What a diary is to others, in which they set down their momentary feelings, etc., music paper really was to Schubert, to which he entrusted his every mood, and his whole soul, musical through-and-through, wrote notes where others use words. (Quoted in Taruskin)

8 Schumann s criticism philistinism, poisonous flowers Davidsbund Personae Public performance of subjective experience Above all, Schumann encouraged his readers to look for more than sensory stimulation in music, but rather seek in it the same mental and spiritual delight they sought in literature. (Taruskin)

9 Schumann reviews Les Huegenots in 1837 Meyerbeer s success in our musically healthy Germany is enough to make one question one s own sanity. Every measure is a work of calculation, every measure gives you something to talk about. Astonish or titillate is his slogan, and he can accomplish it even with the mob. How internationally shallow it all is, and how purposefully superficial

10 Schumann reviews Symphony Fantastique, 1835 Be his art the flaming sword, then let these words be its protective scabbard. In Berlioz the old lust for destruction is doubly awakened, and he lays aobut him with a titan s fists. Try to change something, or to correct it, as any practiced harmonist can do, and see how dull it seems in comparison. As to the difficult question of how far instrumental music should go in the representation of thoughts and occurrences, I think many listeners are too apprehensive.

11 Schumann, Dichterliebe, 1840 Year of song long deferred year of conjugal union 16 settings from Heine s Lyrisches Intermezzo Im wunderschonen Monat Mai (no. 1) Aus meinen Thränen Ich grolle nicht (no 7)

12 Im wunderschonen Monat Mai Im wunderschönen Monat Mai, Als alle Knospen sprangen, Da ist in meinem Herzen Die Liebe aufgegangen. Im wunderschönen Monat Mai, Als alle Vögel sangen, Da hab ich ihr gestanden Mein Sehnen und Verlangen. In the beautiful month of may when all the buds burst open, in my heart love has risen In the beautiful month of may when all the birds sang I confessed to her my yearnings and desires

13 Taruskin waxes poetic on Monat Mai In its refusal to settle the matter of keys, the entire song thus prolongs a single unconsummated harmonic gesture expressed most dramatically by the piano s forever-oscillating, never-cadencing ritornello that finds its objective correlative (its fixed semantic counterpart) on the literary plane. That final line, my longing and desire, has the last word in a profoundly musical sense, made palpable by the very last note in the song a B that in context functions as an unresolved, unconsummated seventh. After it dies away the air veritably tingles with the longing and desire it has created/symbolized/embodied.

14 Ich grolle nicht Ich grolle nicht, und wenn das Herz auch bricht, ewig verlor nes Lieb! Ich grolle nicht. Wie du auch strahlst in Diamantenpracht, es fällt kein Strahl in deines Herzens Nacht, das weiß ich längst. Ich grolle nicht, und wenn das Herz auch bricht. Ich sah dich ja im Traume, und sah die Nacht in deines Herzens Raume, und sah die Schlang, die dir am Herzen frißt, ich sah, mein Lieb, wie sehr du elend bist. Ich grolle nicht. I bear no grudge, even as my heart is breaking, eternally lost love! I bear no grudge. Even though you shine in diamond splendor, there falls no light into your heart s night, that I ve known for a long time. I bear no grudge, even as my heart is breaking. I saw you, truly, in my dreams, and saw the night in your heart s cavity, and saw the serpent that feeds on your heart, I saw, my love, how very miserable you are. I bear no grudge.

15 Carnaval, Op 9 recording 1. Preamble 2. Pierrot 3. Arlequin 4. Valse noble 5. Eusebius 6. Florestan 7. Coquette 8. Replique 9. Papillons 10. ASCH-SCHA 11. Chiarina 12. Chopin 13. Estrella 14. Reconnaissance 15. Pantalon et Colombine 16. Valse allemand 17. Paganini 18. Aveu 19. Promenade 20. Pause 21. Marche des Davidsbundler

16 Irony in Carnaval Poetic self-consciousness Abrupt, fragmenting shifts in tone use of language in the score german! I.e. presence of authorial voice. Quotation Papillons appears in Florestan, Promenade appears in Davidsbundlertanze Cliche (Commedia) Florestan, On the Comic in Music Heinz Dill, Romantic Irony in the Works of Schumann, Musical Quarterly, 73/2 (1989)

17 Hector Berlioz, Son of a small-town doctor At age 12, falls in love with Estelle Duboeuf. By day I hid myself in the the maize fields...like a wounded bird, mute, suffering. Jealousy plagued me, pale companion of all true lovers. Identification with literary precedent (Florian s Estelle and Nemorin), infatuation at first sight, hopeless longing for an unattainable person. Studies at Paris Conservatoire, where his works are received with incomprehension Symphony Fantastique Idee fixe is actually stolen (self-borrowed) from his cantata, Herminie (1828) Oct 3, 1833 marries Harriet Smithson. End of story?

18 Symphony Fantastique and Program I the composer s intention has been to develop, insofar as they contain musical possibilities, various situations in the life of an artist. A footnote to a later edition: The aim of this program is by no means to copy faithfully what the composer has tried to present in orchestral terms, as some people seem to think; on the contrary, it is precisely in order to fill in the gaps which the use of musical language unavoidably leaves in the development of dramatic thought, that the composer has had to avail himself of written prose to explain and justify the outline of the symphony. He knows very well that music can the place of neither word nor picture; he has never had the absurd intention of expression abstractions or moral qualities, but rather passions and feelings. Nor has he had the even stranger idea of painting mountains: he has only wished to reproduce the melodic style nad forms that characterize the singing of some of the people who live among them.

19 Symphony Fantastique and Program II When, for example, in the Scene in the Country, he tried to render the rumbling of distant thunder in the midst of a peaceful atmosphere, it is by no means for the puerile pleasure of imitating this majestic sound, but rather to make silence more perceptible, and thus to increase the impression of uneasy sadness and painful isolation that he wants to produce on his audience. (quoted in Edward T. Cone, Fantastic Symphony, p. 29)

20 Second Program If necessary, one can even dispense with distributing the program, keeping only the titles of the five movements. The symphony by itself (the author hopes) can afford musical interest independent of any dramatic purpose

21 Berlioz, Symphony Fantastique 91 musician minimum (wanted 220!) Five movements graffiti on the dies irae

22 Berlioz, Symphony Fantastique, V: analysis from Cone V: C major-minor of the first mov. Clearly related to first mov. Upbeat section prepares entrance of tonic Theme in I major, parodied idee fix in clarinet. Interlude Repetition of theme in III in clarinet and piccolo Dies irae, eventually in fugal treatment Bass drum takes over where melody should have ended (G), ending the dies irae Ending in major, but still Ab and Eb creep in here and there.

23 Mendelssohn, Midsummer Night s Dream Overture Recording Plot...? Themes that represent characters/images in the play. 17 yrs later, he wrote true incidental music for the play: we know what themes mean in the Overture. But he doesn t follow the plot; Overture is in sonata form, follow conventional tonal plan.