Retracing a Winter's Journey (eBook)

Franz Schubert's "Winterreise"

Susan Youens (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2013
348 Seiten
Cornell University Press (Verlag)
978-0-8014-6827-8 (ISBN)

Infos

Youens addresses the different aspects of the Winterreise: its cultural milieu, the genesis of both the poetry and the music, Schubert's transformation of poetic cycle into music, the philosophical dimension of the work, and its musical structure.

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I like these songs better than all the rest, and someday you will too, Franz Schubert told the friends who were the first to hear his song cycle, Winterreise. These lieder have always found admiring audiences, but the poetry he chose to set them to has been widely regarded as weak and trivial. In Retracing a Winter's Journey, Susan Youens looks not only at Schubert's music but at the poetry, drawn from the works of Wilhelm Müller, who once wrote in his diary, "perhaps there is a kindred spirit somewhere who will hear the tunes behind the words and give them back to me!"

Youens maintains that Müller, in depicting the wanderings of the alienated lover, produced poetry that was simple but not simple-minded, poetry that embraced simplicity as part of its meaning. In her view, Müller used the ruder folk forms to give his verse greater immediacy, to convey more powerfully the wanderer's complex inner state. Youens addresses many different aspects of Winterreise: the cultural milieu to which it belonged, the genesis of both the poetry and the music, Schubert's transformation of poetic cycle into music, the philosophical dimension of the work, and its musical structure.

"I like these songs better than all the rest, and someday you will too," Franz Schubert told the friends who were the first to hear his song cycle Winterreise. These lieder have always found admiring audiences, but the poetry he chose to set them to has been widely regarded as weak and trivial. Susan Youens looks not only at Schubert's music but at the poetry, drawn from the works of Wilhelm Müller, who once wrote in his diary, "perhaps there is a kindred spirit somewhere who will hear the tunes behind the words and give them back to me!"

Youens maintains that Müller, in depicting the wanderings of the alienated lover, produced poetry that was simple but not simple-minded, poetry that embraced simplicity as part of its meaning. In her view, Müller used the ruder folk forms to give his verse greater immediacy, to convey more powerfully the wanderer's complex inner state. Youens addresses many different aspects of Winterreise: the cultural milieu to which it belonged, the genesis of both the poetry and the music, Schubert's transformation of poetic cycle into music, the philosophical dimension of the work, and its musical structure.

Autor

Susan Youens is J. W. Van Gorkom Professor of Music at the University of Notre Dame.

Inhalt

PrefacePart I. The Poet and the Composer1. Genesis and Sources
2. The Texts of Winterreise
3. The Music of WinterreisePart II. The Songs1. Gute Nacht
2. Die Wetterfahne
3. Gefror'ne Tränen
4. Erstarrung
5. Der Lindenbaum
6. Wasserflut
7. Auf dem Fluße
8. Rückblick
9. [Das] Irrlicht
10. Rast
11. Frühlingstraum
12. Einsamkeit
13. Die Post
14. Der greise Kopf
15. Die Krähe
16. Letzte Hoffnung
17. Im Dorfe
18. Der stürmische Morgen
19. Täuschung
20. Der Wegweiser
21. Das Wirtshaus
22. Mut
23. Die Nebensonnen
24. Der LeiermannPostludeAppendix. Ludwig Uhland's Wander-LiederSelected Bibliography
Index

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 15.1.2013
• Verlagsort: Ithaca
• Sprache: englisch
• Maße: 150 x 150 mm
• Themenwelt: Kunst / Musik / Theater ► Musik ► Klassik / Oper / Musical
• Themenwelt: Kunst / Musik / Theater ► Musik ► Musikgeschichte
• ISBN-10: 0-8014-6827-2 / 0801468272
• ISBN-13: 978-0-8014-6827-8 / 9780801468278