Classical Music | Tenor

Recorded on 08/11/2010, uploaded on 10/27/2011

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Robert Schumann composed two song cycles with the title Liederkreis, both in 1840, the year of his marriage to Clara and known as his magnificently prolific “Year of Song.” The first cycle was a collection of poems by Heinrich Heine composed near the beginning of the year and published as Schumann’s opus 24. The second, however, was crafted from selections from Josesh Eichendorff’s Intermezzo and published as his opus 39. Unlike Schumann’s other song cycles, opus 39 does not possess the usual musical connections between its constituents that one would normally expect to find. On the other hand, it does put on display Schumann’s growing talent as a composer of song. He, himself, described them as his “most Romantic music ever.” Within the songs, the piano is elevated to a position of equal importance with the voice, creating and amplifying through musical tones the Romantic world of Eichendorff’s poetry.

From Eichendorff’s poem Ich kann wohl manchmal singen (“Sometimes I can sing”), the ninth song of Schumann’s cycle, Wehmuth, is a melancholy song. The poet likens himself to a nightingale, which all that hear listen in wonder of the bird’s song but no one perceives the longing and sadness that lies within. Schumann’s setting is straightforward yet captures the hidden emotions of Eichendorff’s text. A simple arpeggiated E major chord is the only prelude given the voice. The vocal melody is lyrical and at first seems cut from a traditional cloth. Yet, it possesses an intense longing, drifting into an unsettled chromatic landscape in the second stanza. The piano accompaniment is likewise simple on its surface. It is constructed as a rich contrapuntal four-part harmonic accompaniment to the voice of which the top line hardly deviates from the vocal melody except at the cadences where it takes up the burden of carrying the melody until the voice resumes.       Joseph DuBose

The Steans Music Institute is the Ravinia Festival's professional studies program for young musicians.