Liederkreis, Op. 24 (Schumann)

Last updated
Liederkreis
Song cycle by Robert Schumann
EnglishRound of Songs
Opus 24
Textpoems by Heinrich Heine
LanguageGerman
Composed1840 (1840)
Published1840 (1840)
Movementsnine
Scoring
  • voice
  • piano

Liederkreis, Op. 24, is a song cycle for voice and piano composed by Robert Schumann on nine poems by Heinrich Heine. The cycle was composed and published in 1840.

Contents

This song cycle was one of the earlier products of Schumann’s Liederjahr (Year of Song), referring to his nearly exclusive devotion to song composition from 1840-1841, immediately after his marriage to Clara Wieck. A letter from Schumann to his wife likely places the date of composition in February. [1] This places the cycle shortly before other well-known song cycles and collections such as Myrthen , Liederkreis, Op.39, Frauenliebe und -leben and Dichterliebe .

Songs

I. "Morgens steh' ich auf und frage" — The narrator speaks of his daily hope for his beloved to come to him, and his nightly disappointment when she does not. In D major.

II. "Es treibt mich hin" — The narrator is driven hither and thither in excitement about seeing his beloved, but the hours go too slowly for him. In B minor.

III. "Ich wandelte unter den Bäumen" — The grieving narrator wanders in the woods and finds that the birds already know the word that brings back his sorrow: they heard it from a pretty young woman. In B major.

IV. "Lieb' Liebchen" — The narrator compares his own heartbeat to a carpenter making a coffin; he wishes the pounding would stop so that he can sleep. In E minor.

V. "Schöne Wiege meiner Leiden" — The narrator bids farewell to the town in which he first saw his beloved and laments that he ever met her, as he would then never have become so miserable as he is now. In E major.

VI. "Warte, warte, wilder Schiffmann" — The narrator tells a boatman that he will come to the harbor to leave both Europe and his beloved. He compares the latter to Eve, who brought evil upon mankind. In E major.

VII. "Berg und Burgen schaun herunter" — The narrator is in a boat on the Rhine, which he describes as beautiful but also harboring death within it, like his beloved. In A major.

VIII. "Anfangs wollt' ich fast verzagen" — The narrator remembers how he used to think he could never bear his sorrow. Although he has done so, he does not want to be asked how. In D minor.

IX. "Mit Myrten und Rosen" — The narrator speaks of his wish to bury his book of songs, now that the songs lie cold and dead. But he also hopes that one day the spirit of love will rejuvenate them and that his beloved will see the book and the songs will speak to her. In D major.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Heinrich Heine</span> German poet, writer and literary critic (1797–1856)

Christian Johann Heinrich Heine was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of Lieder by composers such as Robert Schumann and Franz Schubert. Heine's later verse and prose are distinguished by their satirical wit and irony. He is considered a member of the Young Germany movement. His radical political views led to many of his works being banned by German authorities—which, however, only added to his fame. He spent the last 25 years of his life as an expatriate in Paris.

This article is about music-related events in 1840.

A song cycle is a group, or cycle, of individually complete songs designed to be performed in sequence, as a unit.

<i>Frauen-Liebe und Leben</i> Cycle of poems by Adelbert von Chamisso

Frauen-Liebe und Leben is a cycle of poems by Adelbert von Chamisso, written in 1830. They describe the course of a woman's love for her man, from her point of view, from first meeting through marriage to his death, and after. Selections were set to music as a song-cycle by masters of German Lied, namely Carl Loewe (1836), Franz Lachner (c1839), and Robert Schumann (1840). The setting by Schumann is now the most widely known.

<i>Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen</i> Song cycle by Gustav Mahler

Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen is a song cycle by Gustav Mahler on his own texts. The cycle of four lieder for medium voice was written around 1884–85 in the wake of Mahler's unhappy love for soprano Johanna Richter, whom he met as the conductor of the opera house in Kassel, Germany, and orchestrated and revised in the 1890s.

<i>Die schöne Müllerin</i> Song cycle by Franz Schubert

Die schöne Müllerin, is a song cycle by Franz Schubert from 1823 based on 20 poems by Wilhelm Müller. It is the first of Schubert's two seminal cycles , and a pinnacle of Lied repertoire.

<i>Schwanengesang</i> Collection of songs written by Franz Schubert

Schwanengesang (Swan Song), D 957, is a collection of 14 songs written by Franz Schubert at the end of his life and published posthumously:

  1. Liebesbotschaft (text: Ludwig Rellstab)
  2. Kriegers Ahnung (Rellstab)
  3. Frühlingssehnsucht (Rellstab)
  4. Ständchen (Rellstab)
  5. Aufenthalt (Rellstab)
  6. In der Ferne (Rellstab)
  7. Abschied (Rellstab)
  8. Der Atlas (Heinrich Heine)
  9. Ihr Bild (Heine)
  10. Das Fischermädchen (Heine)
  11. Die Stadt (Heine)
  12. Am Meer (Heine)
  13. Der Doppelgänger (Heine)
  14. Die Taubenpost (alternative: D 965a) (Johann Gabriel Seidl)

"Der Doppelgänger" is one of the six songs from Franz Schubert's Schwanengesang that sets words by Heinrich Heine for piano and tenor voice. It was written in 1828, the year of Schubert's death.

<i>An die ferne Geliebte</i>

An die ferne Geliebte, Op. 98, is a composition by Ludwig van Beethoven written in April 1816, setting poetry by Alois Jeitteles.

<i>Dichterliebe</i> Song cycle composed by Robert Schumann

Dichterliebe, A Poet's Love, is the best-known song cycle by Robert Schumann. The texts for its 16 songs come from the Lyrisches Intermezzo by Heinrich Heine, written in 1822–23 and published as part of Heine's Das Buch der Lieder. Along with the song cycles of Franz Schubert, Schumann's form the core of the genre in musical literature.

<i>Liederkreis</i>, Op. 39 (Schumann) Song cycle composed by Robert Schumann

Liederkreis, Op. 39, is a song cycle composed by Robert Schumann. Its poetry is taken from Joseph von Eichendorff's collection entitled Intermezzo. Schumann wrote two cycles of this name – the other being his Opus 24, to texts by Heinrich Heine – so this work is also known as the Eichendorff Liederkreis. Schumann wrote, "The voice alone cannot reproduce everything or produce every effect; together with the expression of the whole the finer details of the poem should also be emphasized; and all is well so long as the vocal line is not sacrificed." Liederkreis, Op. 39, is regarded as one of the great song cycles of the 19th century, capturing, in essence, the Romantic experience of landscape. Schumann wrote it starting in May 1840, the year in which he wrote such a large number of lieder that it is known as his "year of song" or Liederjahr.

Die Lotosblume is a poem written by Heinrich Heine, and published in his Buch der Lieder. Set to music by Robert Schumann in 1840, this Lied is part of Schumann's Myrthen collection (op. 25 no. 7)) and Six Songs for Männerchor. It is written in the key of F Major, and set in 6
4 time. The piece speaks of the blooming of a lotus flower, who hides from the sun and only reveals herself at night to her lover, the moon. Due to circumstances at the time, the lyrics were intended to have a double meaning.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Johann Vesque von Püttlingen</span> Austrian lawyer and diplomat

Johann Vesque von Püttlingen, born J. Vesque de Puttelange, was an Austrian lawyer, diplomat, author, composer and singer. His full name and title in German was Johann Vesque, Freiherr von Püttlingen.

<i>Lied</i> Art song in the classical music tradition

In the Western classical music tradition, Lied is a term for setting poetry to classical music to create a piece of polyphonic music. The term is used for any kind of song in contemporary German and Dutch, but among English and French speakers, lied is often used interchangeably with "art song" to encompass works that the tradition has inspired in other languages as well. The poems that have been made into lieder often center on pastoral themes or themes of romantic love.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wilhelm Hill</span> German musician

Johann Wilhelm Hill was a German pianist and composer.

Wilhelm Killmayer, a German composer, wrote several song cycles, which form a substantial part of his compositions. The earliest cycle dates from 1953, the last was completed in 2008. He set poems by German romantic writers such as Friedrich Hölderlin and Joseph von Eichendorff, but was also inspired by French, Greek and Spanish poems, and by texts from the 20th-century poets Georg Trakl and Peter Härtling. He used mostly piano to accompany a singer, but also added percussion or other instruments, and scored some cycles in a version for voice and orchestra. His Hölderlin-Lieder, setting poems from the author's late period, were performed at major festivals and recorded.

Joachim Draheim is a German musicologist, music teacher and classical pianist.

<i>Myrthen</i> 1840 song cycle by Robert Schumann

Myrthen (Myrtles), Op. 25, is a song cycle composed in the spring of 1840 by Robert Schumann. Its 26 Lieder were written as a wedding gift for his fiancée, Clara Wieck, and presented to her on the eve of their wedding which took place on 12 September that year. The cycle was published that same month, with a dedication to Clara, in four books by Kistner in Leipzig where the couple lived.

References

  1. ↑ Turchin, Barbara (Spring 1985). "Schumann's Song Cycles: The Cycle within the Song". 19th-Century Music. 8 (3): 231–244. doi:10.1525/ncm.1985.8.3.02a00050. ISSN   0148-2076. JSTOR   746514.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.