ROBERT SCHUMANN.
ROBERT SCHUMANN.
Born January 8, 1810, at Zwickau in Saxony.
Died July 29, 1856, at Endenich, near Bonn.
Schumann was the son of a bookseller and a confirmed music lover. The
boy showed marked talent for music, playing to some extent upon the
more usual instruments, and even getting together and conducting a
small orchestra of the school-boys. For this orchestra he very early
composed pieces. His father died when the boy was sixteen and had
nearly completed his gymnasium course, and in 1828 Schumann entered at
the University of Leipsic as a student of law. After a time he left
Leipsic in favor of Heidelberg, where some very celebrated lectures
were at that time being given; but at Heidelberg he practically wasted
his time, so far as the law studies were concerned, and devoted himself
entirely to music. As early as 1829 he made a short vacation journey
into Italy, and at Milan heard the famous violin virtuoso Paganini, and
then became wholly influenced for music. Schumann's mother was
extremely averse to his fitting himself for the musical profession, and
it was only with great difficulty that she was brought to consent.
Accordingly, his serious musical studies began in 1830, when he came
back again to Leipsic and became a music student with Frederick Wieck
and Heinrich Dorn. It was Wieck's daughter Clara who afterward became
Mme. Schumann.
[Illustration: Robert Schumann]
Schumann had a great determination to become a piano virtuoso, not so
much for the repetition of effects already standard as for the
invention of new ones. In this direction he devoted himself to
practice with such assiduity that he very soon reached a point where
his fingers could not keep up with his imagination. In the effort to
impart a greater individuality and strength to the fourth finger of the
right hand, he made some experiments which resulted in disabling his
finger for a while, and he never afterward regained the use of it to a
complete degree. Thus his career as virtuoso was cut short, but the
studies he made and the playing he was afterward able to do resulted in
very singular and productive discoveries of musical effects possible to
the piano, so that it is not too much to say that the piano playing of
the present time is more indebted to Schumann than perhaps to any other
master in the history of the instrument.
He began his creative career by the arrangement of a collection of
Paganini's studies, in which he sought to reproduce upon the pianoforte
some of the effects of the famous Paganini caprices for the violin. He
made two collections of these, about four years apart, and prefaced the
first book with many observations in regard to the methods of practice
and innovations of technic. Almost simultaneously with this he began
seriously as a composer upon his own account, and, quite
characteristically, as a composer of short pieces. The Papillons, opus
2, or "Scenes at a Ball," consist of short pieces of from two to six
lines in length, and among them are many of great beauty. Another of
these early works is the so-called "Dances of the Davidsbündler against
the Philistines." These consist of eighteen short pieces without
individual titles. Already, by the time when the composition of this
work was undertaken in 1835, Schumann had commenced to write as a
musical literary man under two pseudonyms--Florestan and Eusebius, the
one representing the sentimental and tender side, and the other the
impassioned and vigorously moved. The different numbers in the
"Davidsbündler Dances" are signed with one or the other of these
initials, and sometimes with both. The name "Davidsbündler Dances" was
in allusion to the term Philistine, which, in the German university
towns, signified the old fogies, the conservative element, who take
things as they find them and want nothing changed. Schumann belonged
to the new party, who wanted about everything changed.
Two or three years later a second work of very similar import, called
the "Carnaval," was produced, consisting of thirty-one short pieces,
each bearing a characteristic title. This work is of a very
extraordinary character. The moods of the pieces are extremely
individual and marked, and the range of pianoforte expression covered
by them is as great as can be found in the compositions of any master
for the instrument. Another characteristic set of pieces at this time
was the "Fantasy Pieces," opus 12, each of which had its own title;
also the "Kreisleriana," a series of queer sayings after the manner of
one Kreisler, an eccentric old musician in a novel popular at that
time. There are also what he called "Novelettes," a series of eight
somewhat elaborate pianoforte pieces.
In 1834 Schumann, in connection with two other young men, founded the
"Neue Zeitschrift für Musik" as an organ of musical progress. He
remained editor of this for ten years, writing there a great variety of
articles, and in 1844 resigned the editor's chair to Brendel and
removed to Düsseldorf. It was from Düsseldorf that he wrote his famous
article about the newly-risen star of Johannes Brahms.
In 1840 he succeeded in overcoming Wieck's objections to a marriage
with the young Clara, who was then a very distinguished piano virtuoso,
and in the same year he received a doctorate from the University of
Jena. In 1839 and 1840 he composed a very large number of songs--viz.,
one hundred in all. In 1841 his first symphony was played at the
Gewandhaus in Leipsic, and in 1843, upon the founding of the Leipsic
Conservatory by Mendelssohn, Schumann was appointed teacher of playing
from score. As he was practically no teacher at all, and found the
duties irksome, he soon resigned this position and lived for a while at
Dresden, and made a number of concert tours to various foreign
countries with his wife, his own works forming generally a part of the
program. It is told of one of these journeys that at some court or
other where they were graciously received, the amiable prince, after
complimenting the brilliant young pianist upon the solidity of her
work, continued, "And is your husband also musical?" At that time Mr.
Schumann was the husband of Clara Wieck, rather than Clara Wieck the
wife of Robert Schumann.
Early in 1851 Schumann's mind began to show signs of giving way, and in
1853 he was removed to a retreat for the insane, where he died in 1856.
Schumann's compositions comprise four rather large volumes of piano
works, four symphonies for grand orchestra, and a number of chamber
works of different kinds, of which the quintet for piano and strings is
perhaps the most successful; about 100 songs, one opera, several
cantatas, a series of music pieces for "Faust," to be played in
connection with the drama, etc.
In his lifetime his piano music had very slight recognition from any
quarter, its novelties both in the subject-matter of the music and in
the manner of treating the piano making it practically impossible for
piano players at that day, and it was only about the time of Schumann's
death that his piano music began to attract attention upon a
considerable scale. Schumann's Symphony in B-flat had a great success
under Mendelssohn's direction in Leipsic in 1841, but it was played in
very few other places for a number of years, although it was an
extremely bright and interesting production. When William Mason was in
Leipsic in 1850 he sent home a score and parts to the orchestra in
Boston. They held two rehearsals of this symphony and then laid it
upon the shelf in the belief that the composer must have been crazy,
and it was only five or six years later that they mustered up nerve to
produce the work and were astonished to find that it pleased the
hearers.
The universal currency of Schumann's piano music can not be said to
have made much progress until the appearance of Rubinstein. In the
early days of Schumann's productivity he composed his enormously
difficult and beautiful "Fantasie," opus 17, and dedicated it to Liszt.
Accordingly, not to be outdone in politeness, Liszt introduced some of
Schumann's pieces in his programs once or twice, but the effect of them
upon the audience was so much less than that of his own music or of the
Chopin pieces which at that time he was very fond of playing, that he
discontinued further efforts to aid Schumann's cause, although he wrote
him very polite and encouraging letters. The first real Schumann
player was Rubinstein, who had the qualities of tone and of
emotionality which Schumann's music imperatively required; and since
Rubinstein, Schumann's music has entered more and more into the
world-current of piano music, until at the present time it occupies a
position inferior to none other.
Of a composer so varied in his capacities, so original, so influential
upon the later course of development in his art, and so interesting in
every way, it is not possible from a single program--no matter how
carefully selected the works may be--to gain a complete idea. The most
that can be done is to give a glimpse of the man, to bring out a few of
his moods, and to observe the more salient features of his style. The
following list of selections has been influenced by the same idea as
that underlying all the previous programs of this series--namely: A
preference for selections of moderate difficulty, both for performer
and hearer; and a representation of what might be called the more
elementary characteristics of his art.
PROGRAM.
Kinderscenen. Opus 15.
"From Strange Lands and People."
"A Curious Story."
"Playing Tag."
"Happy Enough."
"Traumerei."
Album for the Young. Opus 68.
"The Jolly Farmer."
"A Little Romance."
Papillons. Opus 2.
Polonaise in D major.
Songs.
"The Hat of Green."
"The Wanderer's Song."
Forest Scenes. Opus 82.
"Entrance to the Forest."
"The Wayside Inn."
"Prophetic Bird."
"Farewell to the Forest."
Songs.
"Moonlight."
"He, the Noblest."
Night-piece in F. Opus 23. No. 4.
Novelette in F. Opus 21. No. 1.
Songs.
"Thou Ring Upon My Finger."
"The Spring Night."
Fantasy Pieces. Opus 12.
"In the Evening."
"Soaring."
"Why?"
"Whims."
"End of the Song."
The foregoing selections, as will be noticed, are all for piano and
voice; I have thought it better to confine them to these easily
accessible sources than to attempt to cover more ground. In a later
program more difficult piano selections will be given. All the
instrumental selections in this list are in the volume of "Selections
from the Works of Robert Schumann," edited by the present writer and
published by the publishers of "Music." All the songs are in the
collection of Schumann songs published by Boosey and Company.
I have written so many times upon the works and characteristics of
Schumann that it would, perhaps, suffice to refer the student to a few
of those places, such as "A Popular History of Music," pages 464 to
477. Also in the first volume of "How to Understand Music" there is
something to the point, and at various other places in the course of
the work, as will be found by looking up the references to Schumann's
music given in the index. At the beginning of the collection of
Schumann pieces, above mentioned, is an essay upon Schumann and his
works which will be found suggestive. One of the best single articles
I have seen is Mr. W. H. Hadow's essay upon "Schumann and the Romantic
Movement in Germany," which occupies pages 149 to 231 in the first
volume of his "Studies in Modern Music." In spite of these I shall add
a few observations in the present pages, since it is a peculiarity of
the works of any great writer that they grow upon the appreciation, and
while their shortcomings and limitations of whatever kind become more
apparent as the student grows in years and clearness of thought, the
beauties and originalities also press more and more upon our notice,
and perhaps, in the case of creative artists of the first order, come
out into even greater luxuriance than we at first realized. Such, at
least, I find in my own case since my first introduction to the works
of Schumann, which practically began with my acquaintance with Dr.
Mason at South Bend, Indiana, in the summer of 1870. Before that I had
heard but very few of the Schumann works, and these had not been well
done and so had failed of making an impression. I was much surprised
when Dr. Mason told me that one could not properly understand Beethoven
without knowing Schumann. And it was like opening a new world when I
began with the Novelette in E, the Fantasy Pieces, opus 12, and the
Romance in F-sharp, opus 28.
The most distinguishing quality of the Schumann music, and the one
which perhaps demarcates it from other music most strikingly, is its
hearty quality, its spontaneity, its headlong driving speed. Another
quality almost or quite equally notable is its conciseness. Schumann
is above all the poet of the short, the clear, the well-defined. In
parallel line with this is his habit of employing fanciful designations
for his short pieces, generally poetical titles suggesting a mood or a
scene. Examples of this latter peculiarity occur in the present
program. The titles were perhaps always put on after the piece had
been composed. It is not known with certainty whether Schumann had the
idea of the title in his mind in composing the piece. In most cases it
serves merely as a suggestion to the player of a proper standpoint for
conceiving the work.
Another peculiarity of Schumann's writing is the close unity of each
little piece or movement. He develops his period or his two periods
out of a single motive or a motive and a counter-theme, and the leading
idea is repeated several times. When the first idea gives place to a
second idea, this proves to be something totally unlike the idea which
it follows, making with it a strong contrast. In the clearness of his
moods and their contrast is one source of the vigor of impression which
the Schumann music has made and is making upon the musical world.
The first number in the present program contains five pieces from the
set called "Scenes from Childhood," written in 1837, when the composer
was in the very thick of his somewhat diversified course of true love
and had advanced seven years along the pathway of a composer.
Following the "Träumerei" are two popular selections from the "Album
for the Young," written some ten years later--the "Jolly Farmer" and
the "Little Romance." This program number closes with the Polonaise in
D, from the "Papillons," written in 1832. It is a very brilliant and
original piece, full of delightful pianoforte effect.
In the second series of instrumental numbers are included four of the
beautiful cycle, "Forest Scenes." Each of these is like a little
sonnet--brief, picturesque, and individual. In the first we have the
vague and shadowy effect of the entrance into the forest, the
shimmering leaves, the sunlight and shade, and whatever fanciful
explanation one likes of the imaginative tone-sonnet of the author. In
the "Wayside Inn" the thematic style of Schumann is well illustrated,
and also the variety of effect possible to be obtained from a very
small amount of musical material. The reference to the title is not
very apparent, since the speed of the piece and its quick and forcible
character deprive it of the reposeful "Stimmung" one would anticipate
from the title assigned. I do not know the true explanation of the
"Prophetic Bird." It is a most lovely little bit, and is now so well
known in the concert-room as not to need further discussion.
The "Farewell to the Forest" is one of the most delightful songs
without words in the whole Schumann category. Its melody is musical
and new, and the changing rhythms, the occasional coming out of a
middle voice, and the general effect of the whole are alike interesting
and absorbing.
In the next instrumental number we come upon another mood of Schumann,
or rather upon two of them. The "Night-piece" is of a lyric quality
enjoyable by every one. Nearly all young players object to the speed
which Schumann has marked, and many play it much more slowly; this,
however, is not warranted, since in the nature of the case Schumann
must have known what he intended, and when we have made an allowance
for the undue slowness of his metronome at given tempi, we are still
not warranted in making this slower than eighty for quarters. To take
it still more slowly is to change the character of all the latter part
of the piece. If well played it is sufficiently reposeful in the form
in which we now have it. In the second part there is some delightful
imitative work between the motive in the treble and its answer in the
tenor.
With the Novelette in F, opus 21, we come into the domain of what we
might call the higher Schumann, for in these works and in those which
follow upon this list greater demands are made upon the player, and the
music itself is deeper, stronger, more original, and therein more
satisfactory. The novelette consists of two main parts. First comes a
march-like movement, in which certain very strong chords with
occasional triplet octaves in the bass impart a singularly driving and
forceful character to the music. After the double bar at the beginning
of the fifth measure a new motive appears, which sets in operation a
series of sequences, and this period ends in D-flat.
The next period begins in the same manner, but the modulation is
differently conducted, and the period now ends in the key of A. Now
comes in what he calls the trio, a lovely lyric melody in the key of F.
This is developed to quite a length, after which the main theme of the
novelette returns, and the period ends in the key of F. Now ensues a
curious sort of intermezzo, in the key of D-flat, where one voice
starts out with a little melodic subject and another takes it up and
imitates it, and this in turn is followed by another, quite in the
manner of fugue, only that here the motive itself is very short and the
imitations follow so fast, one after another, that only the beginning
of each is to be made out. For the rest, it is a question of mystery.
When he has carried this as far as he cares, the first subject returns;
and after this again the trio, but now in the key of A major. At the
end of this, again the original subject, and so finally the end. The
most notable features of this novelette are its vigor, the different
forms in which the subjects return, and the persistence of the two main
ideas--the march and the lyric trio--which form the substance of it.
The mystic and fugue-like interlude is merely an interlude. It perhaps
represents one of those moments when the mind is too full for clear
utterance--a condition more celebrated in fiction than desirable in
reality.
The Fantasy Pieces, opus 12, are among the most happy of the smaller
works of this composer. Their general character is sufficiently
indicated by their titles. "In the Evening" represents one of those
mystic moods suitable to twilight. "Soaring" has also been translated
"Excelsior," which perhaps more truly represents its spirit. "Why?" is
a question, just like the word; nevertheless this has become the
greatest favorite of all the smaller Schumann pieces. "Whims" also is
well named, since in this quickly moving little piece one mood follows
another irrepressibly; among them are some which are highly poetic.
Last of all, "The End of the Song"--a very vigorous and strongly marked
movement which appeals to every one.
The Schumann songs are so remarkable as to demand separate treatment.
Those upon the present list are so placed because they represent in a
general way the more noticeable moods of Schumann in this form of art.
They can be sung high or low, as the singer's voice requires, but they
are more satisfactory if sung by a soprano voice, I think.
The first upon the list is the merry and arch little "Hat of Green,"
which with folk-tone sweetness and simplicity brings out a situation as
old as the world and as new as the morning. The musical treatment is
very clever and interesting.
The "Wanderer's Song" is characteristically German, representing the
song of the young student as he sets out upon his student career as
traveler, for seeing strange lands; or the emigrant who leaves his land
to find a better home, but never one so well loved as his own native
country. It is full of heart and courage until the middle part, where
the intermezzo in the key of E major tells of softer feelings--of
longing and homesickness.
"Moonlight," again, represents the peculiarly mystic and dreamy side of
the Schumann nature, and there are few songs in the whole world so
sweet and so beautiful as this; but it needs a pure, clear, and very
true soprano voice, controlled with musical feeling. Thus interpreted
it is indeed a dream.
The next two songs upon the list are out of the famous cycle called
"Woman's Love and Life"--the poems of no great depth, but the subjects
of lasting and universal application and interest. "He, the Noblest"
gives a very spirited and sensitive musical setting to the woman's
opinion of the loved one; words and music bring to expression one of
the most ideal moments of woman's life. The next, "Thou Ring Upon My
Finger," tells its own story, but here, again, the music is well worth
while for its own sake. It is interesting as an instrumental piece
without the aid of the voice. Few songs as musical have been written.
The last upon the list, "Spring Night," while out of another
cycle,--the so-called "Liederkreis,"--is nevertheless of quite similar
excellence to the preceding.
All need to be sung with abandon, and above all with sentiment, poetry,
and flexible rhythm, yet always with abounding musical life. To sing
such songs well is to be an artist.