User:Henselalyssa/sandbox

"Auf dem Strom"
"Auf dem Strom" (On the river) Op. posth. 119 (D. 943) was composed by Franz Schubert for tenor, horn in E, and piano. The piece was premiered on March 26th, 1828 at a concert specifically programmed to purely to showcase Schubert's own compositions. The performers were Ludwig Titze (tenor), Josef Rudolf Lewy (horn) and the composer himself. The poetry for the piece is taken from Gedichte von Ludwig Rellstab and was published in the fall of 1827. A year after Schubert's death, Liedesdorf and Diabelli published the music with the composer's original instrumentation and additional arrangement using cello instead of horn. In modern performances, the voice part may be sung by a soprano.

Text and Translation
The original German text and multiple translations are available at: LiederNet

Poetry and Analysis
Rellstab sets the poem to five stanzas with eight lines each. Commonly this format of poetry would have musically resulted in a strophic form. Schubert, however, hones in on the content of the poem itself, creating a through composed piece. The beginning of stanzas I, III, and V has the narrator longing for love, land, and heaven respectfully. Yet by the fifth line of these stanzas, the narrator comes back to the reality of the river, as it pulls him further away from those objects. Stanzas II and IV do not follow this format; they instead consistently focus on the river and the separation of the narrator from the previous stanza's longing. Rufus Hallmark, in his article Schubert's "Auf dem Strom," illustrates exactly how plot development in Rellstab's poem lines coincides with Schubert's choice of keys. To begin the piece, Schubert selects E major. During the transition in the first stanza, the composer switches immediately to the relative minor of C# and this continues until the start of the third stanza where he returns to E. This pattern continues throughout the piece, with only one deviation during the third stanza to G major for brief moment. The movement between the tonic and the tonic's relative minor easily depict the Sehnsucht that Rellstab describes in the poem. The piano with consistent flowing material in 6/8 meter establishes the aural effect of the flowing river, carrying the narrator away. Also, Hallmark points out the specific use of horn obbligato part and the beautiful effect it gives: "The posthorn is an aural symbol of travel and so an appropriate obbligato instrument. Moreover, the horn interludes afford a real time-lapse between the stanzas, suggesting the passage of time implicit in the poem."

Homage to Beethoven
On March 26th, 1828, Schubert programmed the only concert documented to comprise solely his own works. It is most be noted that the concert was exactly one year after the death of Ludwig van Beethoven. Schubert, having been familiar with Beethoven's work, was influenced by the prolific composer. There is some debate as to whether Schubert intended for his portions of his music to be dedication to the late composter, including the piece "Auf dem Strom." Musically, there is evidence that this could be the case; the piece uses a quote from the funeral march in Third Symphony, referred to as Eroica Symphony. Schubert's quotation of this material can be found in the voice's second verse of Schubert's "Auf dem Strom." Along with the melody line for the voice, some of the piano's ostinato notes match that found in the symphony's second movement. For a complete diagram of this quotation, refer to Hallmark's article.

Lewy and the Horn
The musical circle in the early 1800s was a tight knit community of musicians, especially in Vienna. Schubert was familiar with the prestige of two brothers, Eduard Constantin Lewy and Josef Rudolf Lewy. Both were known as the early valved horn players. It must be noted that at this time a french horn with valves was relatively new, containing only two valves, and few had access to this model. In spring 1827, Schubert utilized the brothers in composing "Nachtgesang im Walde," written for men's quartet and four horns. In Eric Johnson's article for The Horn Call, he states "...while certainly not the first work ever written for the valved horn, Nachtgesang im Walde is probably the first work by a major composer to use the valved horn and is certainly remarkable among the works of Schubert."

Shortly there after, Schubert began composing "Auf dem Strom" with Josef's abilities in mind. The younger of the two brothers, Josef was known in particular for his flexibility with range and abilities in the upper register of the instrument. These abilities are easily featured in the horn's obbligato part, with a strictly more melodic line resembling a harmonic alto line to the voice's melody. In regards to the range of horn's melody, it is hard to discern whether or not Lewy would have used a valved instrument for this performance as both a natural and two valved horn. Due to this, one can assume that Schubert constructed this part to be playable by both versions of the instrument.