Schubert songs from 1825

 Day 20

Schubert songs from 1825

Im Abendrot (1)

Der Einsame (2)

Die junge Nonne (3)

Lied Der Anne Lyle (4)

Gesang der Norna (5)

Des Sängers Habe (6)

Auf der Bruck (7)

Im Walde (8)

Der blinde Knabe (9)

Totengräbers Heimweh (10)

 

Christine Brewer (1)

Richard Jackson (2) (6)

Margaret Price (3) (9)

Marie McLaughlin (4) (5)

Peter Schreier (7) (8)

Christopher Maltman (10)

Graham Johnson

How does one get to grips with the vast corpus of Schubert songs? Depending on how you count variants and fragments there are well over 600 of them. John Reed in his Schubert Song Companion comes to a total of 631 but readily accepts that there will never be a single definitive answer.

I know the song cycles and most of the famous songs but much of the rest is completely unknown to me. I indulged in purchasing the box set of the complete Schubert songs issued by Hyperion a few years ago and sometimes I think that it is staring at me, challenging me to tackle each and every song. One day (or should say year) I might tackle this.

The Hyperion Schubert set was originally issued as a separate recitals with songs from various periods, but the reissue has them organised in date order. This meant that for this project I was able to sample a group from the same year. I chose 1825, 200 years ago, and listened to 10 songs. 

What astonishing variety there is in this music. From the almost domestic ambience of the first song through to the near-Wagnerian intensity of no 3 - the only song in this group that I remember hearing before. As ever the piano parts a delight. Schubert has a way of making even the most simply harmonic support to the melody come to life and there are lots of little touches in these songs that bring a smile - such as the chirping of the cricket in no 2. The harmonic range in these songs is quite extraordinary. Again even in the simplest diatonic songs there are touches of chromatic inflections which take you by surprise. 

The last of these 10 songs left the greatest impression on me. It starts of in that quite heavy ‘plodding’ way we know from the late song cycles as the gravedigger goes about his daily task but as he contemplates his own death and wonders who will bury him the mood changes into something very introspective and almost transcendental - the music hangs in the air and takes us in all sorts of directions. A piece like this really makes you wonder what on earth Schubert matured music might have been like had he lived into his old age - after all he was only 15 years younger than Wagner. It is one of the great imponderables of music.

I’m sure that later in this project I will return to Schubert’s songs and take another dip into that big box of CDs. How lucky we are that Graham Johnson was there to partner all of these singers and to write such inspiring commentary on the songs. The box set includes all of the translations but there is not room for the commentary - but the notes to the individual songs can be found on line. Johnson did publish expanded versions of his notes in a massive three volume companion to the Schubert songs. It is unfortunately out of print and second hand copies command very high prices.