![]() ![]() The time signature of the piece is in compound duple time (six-eight time), which provides the 12 semiquaver notes in the treble clef of each bar. The musical concept of duration in Schubert’s lyrical drama Gretchen am Spinnrade depicts the story of Gretchen at the spinning wheel brilliantly.įirst of all, the tempo ‘Allegro non troppo’ (fast & lively but not too much) that starts at the beginning of the song is carried on throughout most of the piece. As she obsesses over kissing her lover in these three bars, she looses control and the accompaniment pattern of the semiquavers stop, suggesting that she has also stopped the wheel, while she strains for the highest note so far, on the words “and ah, his kiss” stopping on a diminished-seventh chord in bar 68. This creates the image of Gretchen leading the spinning wheel round and round with her hands whilst she sings and voices her most inner desires, as her mind moves along with the rhythm of her hands.Ī dramatic moment in the piece occurs in bars 66-68 (excerpt show to the right), where the harmony moves from G minor, A-flat minor and then to B-flat major. The illustration of the spinning wheel comes from the continuous sixteenth note pattern in the treble clef of the piano, with the semiquavers moving up and down by third, fourth and semitone intervals and the repeated rhythmic pattern in the left hand suggests the motion of the treadle. Quick harmonic changes occur often in the piano and voice melodies to display the agitation of Gretchen just like the lyrics do. This is evident in the tonality of the piece as well as the modulations to and from several different keys, as each key change is a symbol and exploration of her feelings.įor example, the tonic of the piece is D minor and thus the beginning of the piece from bar 1 to 6 is in D minor, and then in bar 7, the melody quickly changes into C major with some elements of C minor, as shown in the excerpt below: This tension between D minor and C major/minor is a reflection of the restlessness of Gretchen’s inner feelings. The melody line in the treble clef of the piano vastly imitates the spinning of the wheel whilst the harmony of the piano accompaniment also expresses the cycle of Gretchen’s thoughts and the intensity or her romantic and sad feelings. This song shows that at 17, Schubert could be considered a mature and original composer. It shows the special qualities that mark out Schubert as a songwriter and as a programmatic composer through the ability to illustrate poetically in his music, something non-musical (the spinning of the wheel) and to link with this expression of the words, so that the wheel itself seems to display the expression of Gretchen’s unhappiness. In this particular scene Gretchen is at her spinning wheel, a device for spinning thread or yarn, and she is troubled by her feelings for Faust – a man who she just met. The German lied, said to be a masterpiece, was set to a selection of text from Johann Wolfgang Goethe’s drama Faust. ![]() Gretchen am Spinnrade translated to English is ‘Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel’ and it was written in 1814 when Schubert was just 17, written for piano and a female soprano voice. Through the use of melody, duration and dynamics, Schubert successfully expresses the ideas and narratives of each lied. Two of Schubert’s works that provide evidence that he was a programmatic composer, are the lieder Gretchen am Spinnrade and Erlkonig. ![]() Schubert wrote his lieder compositions to be sung by one voice, accompanied by the fortepiano, where the piano has an equal role to the voice. ![]() Majority of Schubert’s compositions are named programmatic music as the pieces express an extra-musical idea, narrative or pictorial image by a piece of literature added to a piece of instrumental music and how his music responds to the German words. Schubert’s lieder were often performed in gatherings in front of his friends, called ‘Schubertaids’, who supported him all throughout his short career as a composer, one of whom was the famous singer J. He then studied to become a teacher but later decided to devote himself to composing music. He then moved on to conducting and writing for his school orchestra, a perfect way of learning how to be a composer. At the age of nine he began to study with a local organists, Michael Holzer, and two years later was accepted as a chorister in the Court Chapel of Vienna. His father was a schoolmaster, and he taught his young son to play the violin, and then Franz’s older brother gave him piano lessons. ![]()
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