An die ferne Geliebte Op.98 (1816)

Auf dem Hügel sitz’ich –

Wo die Berge so blau –

Leichte Segler in den Höhen –

Diese Wolken in den Höhen –

Es kehret der Maien –

Nimm sie hin denn, diese Lieder

Beethoven’s An die ferne Geliebte is not only the first song cycle by a major composer but also one of the greatest of its kind. It was immensely influential, of course, not least with Schubert but above all with Schumann, who not only found inspiration in it for his own song cycles but also felt so close to it that he absorbed a melodic phrase from it (“Nimm sie hin denn, diese Lieder”) into the intimate musical language he shared with Clara.

Strangely, however, few of the cycles that followed in the wake of An die ferne Geliebte are constructed with such thorough concern for unity and continuity. Neither Schubert nor Schumann for example linked the songs in such a way that there is no break from beginning to end. In the Beethoven cycle the piano effects the changes of key and tempo between the songs which, moreover, are presented not only in a logical sequence of tonalities but also in a gradually quicker sequence. At the same time, while the structure of each song is basically strophic, Beethoven takes risks, not infrequently changing the tempo within the individual song and, most surprisingly of all, restricting the voice to a monotone for six lines in the middle of Wo die Berge so blau. The wonderfully effective allusion at the end of the last song to the beginning of the first was not, on the other hand, an inspiration Beethoven’s followers failed to emulate.