Three Schubert Lieder

Sei mir gegrüsst

Auf dem Wasser zu singen

Auftenthalt

Though no virtuoso himself and composer of little virtuoso music, Schubert was a great source of inspiration to Liszt. That much would be clear from the song arrangements alone - dozens of them, including the whole of Schwanengesang and much of Die Winterreise - which are clearly not virtuoso exploitations but expressions of admiration and affection in Liszt’s own terms.

Liszt’s version of Gretchen am Spinnrade, which was published with Erlkönig among his earliest Schubert song arrangments in 1838, is a particularly persuasive example. True, it is more than a modest integration of voice and piano accompaniment, but the accumulation of colour as Gretchen’s erotic ardour increases - the application first of right-hand octaves to the melodic line and then the addition of thirds and sixths at the climax - is by no means alien to the passionate spirit of the song.

Schubert’s accompaniment to Erlkönig is already highly dramatic. While elaborating that aspect of the song, Liszt also contrives to characterise the three protagonists - on their first appearance the father is firmly setin the left hand, the son also in the left but nervously crossed over the right, the Erlkönig in eerily arpeggiated chords high in the right hand - in such a way as make clear and miraculously emotive distinctions between them.

Sei mir gegrüsst

Auf dem Wasser zu singenBarcarole

Auftenthalt

Du bist die Ruh

Though no virtuoso himself and composer of little virtuoso music, Schubert was a great source of inspiration to Liszt. That much would be clear from the song arrangements alone - dozens of them, including the whole of Schwanengesang and much of Die Winterreise - which are clearly not cynical virtuoso exploitations but expressions of admiration and affection in Liszt’s own terms.

Liszt’s version of Sie mir gegrüsst, which was published - with Auf dem Wasser zu singen, Du bist die Ruh and nine others - in his first volume of Schubert song arrangments in 1838, is a characteristic example. Until half-way through Liszt does little more than replicate the original accompaniment while integrating the vocal line in the tenor register between the left and right hands. When the melody is taken by the right hand he still retains Schubert’s harmonies but enriches them with octaves. Thirds and sixths and extravagantly expressive figurations.

Auf dem Wasser zu singen follows the same pattern except that this time the transformation from Schubert to Liszt is made more gradually as the piece evolves from song arrangement to tone poem boasting a coda six times longer and ten times more dramatic than than the original. Du bist die Ruh dispenses not only with Schubert’s introduction but also with his restraint in keeping the dynamic level down to pianissimo in all but a few bars. But if, in this instance, Liszt noisily betrays the spirit of the song he certainly produces a most colourful piece of piano music, its effect heightened as in the Schubert original by the occasional bar of silence.

Though written at much the same time as the others,Liszt’s Aufenthalt arrangement was first published in a collection devoted to the fourteen songs ofSchwanengesang. He saw so much potential in Schubert’s original here that he wrote virtually two versions, one even more difficult and even more sensational than the other. Even so, where there is an opportunity for intimacy - as at the point half-way through where he drops the prevailing triplet figuration and has the melody emerge in quietly expressive octaves - he most effectively, if only briefly, takes it.

Sei mir gegrüsst

Auf dem Wasser zu singen

Du bist die Ruh

Aufenthalt

Though no virtuoso himself and composer of little virtuoso music, Schubert was a great source of inspiration to Liszt. That much would be clear from the song arrangements alone - dozens of them, including the whole of Schwanengesang and much of Die Winterreise - which are clearly not virtuoso exploitations of innocent victims but expressions of admiration and affection in Liszt’s own terms.

His version of Sie mir gegrüsst, which was published - with Auf dem Wasser zu singen, Du bist die Ruh and nine others - in his first volume of Schubert song arrangments in 1838, is a characteristic example. Until half-way through Liszt does little more than replicate the original accompaniment while integrating the vocal line in the tenor register between the left and right hands. When the melody is taken up by the right hand he still retains Schubert’s harmonies but enriches them with octaves, thirds and sixths and extravagantly expressive figurations.

Auf dem Wasser zu singen follows the same pattern except that this time the transformation from Schubert to Liszt is made more gradually as the piece evolves from a song arrangement to a tone poem boasting a coda six times longer and ten times more dramatic than than the original. Du bist die Ruh dispenses not only with Schubert’s introduction but also with his restraint in keeping the dynamic level down to pianissimo in all but a few bars. But if, in this instance, Liszt noisily threatens the spirit of the song he certainly produces a most colourful piece of piano music, its effect heightened as in the Schubert original by the occasional bar of silence.

Though written at much the same time as the others, Liszt’s Aufenthalt arrangement was first published in a collection devoted to the fourteen songs ofSchwanengesang. He saw so much potential in Schubert’s original here that he wrote virtually two versions, one even more difficult and even more sensational than the other. Even so, where there is an opportunity for intimacy - as at the point half-way through where he drops the prevailing triplet figuration and has the melody emerge in quietly expressive octaves - he most effectively, if only briefly, takes it.