Mark Padmore Tenor Kristian Bezuidenhout...

Fortepiano by R.J. Regier, Freeport, MaineAlice Tully Hall, Starr TheaterAdrienne Arsht Stage

Please make certain all your electronicdevices are switched off.

These performances are made possible in part by the Josie Robertson Fund for Lincoln Center.

Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday Evenings, October 14, 15, and 17, 2015

The Schubert Cycles

Mark Padmore, TenorKristian Bezuidenhout, Fortepiano

Page 43The Lovely Mill MaidenWednesday Evening, October 14, at 7:30

Page 47Swan SongThursday Evening, October 15, at 7:30

Page 51Winter JourneySaturday Evening, October 17, at 7:30

These performances are also part of the Great Performers Art of the Song series.

WhiteLightFestival.org 39

10-14 Schubert.qxp_GP 10/2/15 11:58 AM

BNY Mellon is Lead Supporter of Great Performers.

Support for Great Performers is provided by Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser, The Florence GouldFoundation, Audrey Love Charitable Foundation,Great Performers Circle, Chairman’s Council, andFriends of Lincoln Center.

Public support is provided by the New York StateCouncil on the Arts.

Endowment support for Symphonic Masters is provided by the Leon Levy Fund.

Endowment support is also provided by UBS.

MetLife is the National Sponsor of Lincoln Center.

Artist Catering provided by Zabar’s and zabars.com

Fortepiano courtesy of The Juilliard School.

Mr. Padmore and Mr. Bezuidenhout will sign CDs inthe lobby immediately following each performance.

Upcoming White Light Festival Events:

Tuesday and Wednesday Evenings, October 20–21,at 7:30 in James Memorial Chapel, UnionTheological Seminary

Heretical Angels (U.S. premiere)Dialogos and KantaduriPost-performance discussion on October 20 withKatarina Livljanic and Ara Guzelimian

Sunday Afternoon, November 1, at 5:00 in Alice Tully Hall

PrayerChristine Brewer, SopranoPaul Jacobs, OrganWorks by HANDEL, BACH, PUCCINI, GOUNOD,and WIDOR; works for solo organ

Saturday Evening, November 14, at 7:30 in Alice Tully Hall

Last SoliloquyPaul Lewis, PianoALL-BEETHOVEN PROGRAMSonata No. 30 in E major, Op. 109Sonata No. 31 in A-flat major, Op. 110Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111

For tickets, call (212) 721-6500 or visitWhiteLightFestival.org. Call the Lincoln Center InfoRequest Line at (212) 875-5766 to learn about pro-gram cancellations or to request a White LightFestival brochure.

Visit WhiteLightFestival.org for full festivallistings.

Join the conversation: #LCWhiteLight

We would like to remind you that the sound of coughing and rustling paper might distract the performers and your fellow audience members.

In consideration of the performing artists and members of the audience, those who must leavebefore the end of the performance are asked to do so between pieces. The taking of photographsand the use of recording equipment are not allowed in the building.

40


Overview: The Schubert CyclesBy Susan Youens

The song cycle—a group of songs held together by unifying texts, mood, poetic form, ormusical procedures—became one of the foremost genres of the 19th century, withBeethoven the first composer to use the word Liederkreis (song cycle) to designate hisonly work of this kind: An die ferne Geliebte, Op. 98 (1816). In Beethoven’s unique con-ception, paired with Schubert’s Swan Song in the middle of this series of Schubert’s com-plete song cycles, six not-quite-independent songs are connected by “corridors” in thepiano; the work is truly a cycle, a circular design in which we return at the end to a trans-formed version of the first song. It was inevitable that Schubert, who at age 14announced his intent to “modernize the song composition of our day” and who idolizedBeethoven, would be interested in this fledgling genre.

In the early 1820s Schubert came across the poetic anthology Seventy-Seven Poemsfrom the Posthumous Papers of a Wandering Horn-Player (a tongue-in-cheek jab atRomanticism’s favorite themes) by his Prussian contemporary Wilhelm Müller. The col-lection begins with Die schöne Müllerin (The Lovely Mill Maiden), which tells the antiquestory of a miller maid wooed by a sensitive young mill-apprentice in love for the first time.When his rival wins the girl, the despairing lad drowns himself in the brook that has beenhis confidant from the start. From this archetypal tale of youth undone by its first brushwith tragedy in love, Schubert in 1823 created some of his most heart-rending music.

After Schubert died in November 1828, the Viennese publisher Tobias Haslinger boughtfrom the composer’s brother seven songs on poems by the Berlin writer Ludwig Rellstaband six songs on poems by Heinrich Heine, one of Germany’s greatest poets. To thesetwo groups, Haslinger added the last song Schubert ever wrote (“Die Taubenpost”), andpublished all 14 as Schwanen-Gesang (Swan Song). The Rellstab poems, intended forBeethoven, become rich, extended songs in Schubert’s hands; the Heine songs are aglimpse into the future of 19th-century music; and “Die Taubenpost” (Pigeon-post) is thesummation of Schubert’s songwriting art. Schwanengesang is not a cycle in the samesense as the Müller-Schubert masterpieces, but it is a swan song: a late and final outpour-ing before death and a guarantee of immortality for its creator.

In the wake of Die schöne Müllerin, it is only to be expected that Schubert would respondto new poetic works by Müller, and in 1827, he set another monodrama from Vol. 2 ofMüller’s Horn-Player anthologies to music; he would correct the proofs for the secondhalf of Winterreise on his deathbed. In this song cycle, a man has lost his beloved to awealthier suitor and leaves her town on a journey into the wintry landscape of his soul.The only “plot” consists of his changing states of melancholy, despair, alienation, self-analysis, and longing for death. From the wanderer’s bleak insistence on self-understand-ing comes one of Western music’s most profound works. Although the songs ofSchwanengesang were composed after it, Winterreise comes last in this series because,quite simply, nothing can follow it.

—Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc.



42

Schubert and Samuel BeckettBy Catherine Laws

Next month the White Light Festival presents three performances based on the writingsof Samuel Beckett, a lover of music for whom Schubert was, it seems, most significant.The two men shared certain preoccupations: lone figures journeying through barren land-scapes, ambiguous encounters along the way, the persistent desire for the comfort ofcompany in the face of ultimate isolation, and the hovering presence of death. InBeckett’s radio play All That Fall and the television play Nacht und Träume we hearSchubert’s actual music. The only sound in the beautiful, wordless Nacht und Träume isa wavering voice, humming and then singing a few bars of the Schubert lied from whichthe play takes its name. In All That Fall, a crackly recording of “Death and the Maiden”emanates from the “ruinous old house” of a “very old woman,” the music reinforcingthe themes of the play: birth, youth, and fertility versus sterility, physical decline, anddeath. In Schubert’s music, then, Beckett finds a Romantic counterpart to his own, verydifferent expression of the gap between the self and the world. We might even see thisas the core of a broader musicality developed in Beckett’s work.

Beckett loved music. He enjoyed playing the piano, was married to a professional pianist,and regularly attended concerts. His listening tastes were broad, but his great love was formusic of the late Classical and early Romantic periods. Beckett makes brief references toSchubert’s compositions in his early stories, and throughout his life retained a particularlove of lieder, sometimes singing them to his own accompaniment. He listened repeatedlyto Winterreise, especially, and references to winter journeys are found in Texts for Nothing2 and 12, and especially at the end of What Where (1983), commissioned for the AutumnFestival in Graz, where Winterreise was partly composed: “It is Winter./Without journey.”

Beckett’s writing, for both the stage and the page, has often been perceived as pushingtowards its own obliteration, ever closer to the silencing of the voice. His “characters”—though hardly that—with decaying, almost useless bodies, situated in barren environ-ments, steadily insist that there is nothing to say and no possibility of knowledge orunderstanding. But they never stop; the voices fizzle on with their increasingly broken,empty, repetitive, hopeless—and often very funny—attempts to tell stories. In theprocess, the language fragments and fissures even as it pours forth; whether truncatedand percussive or accumulative and spieling, the closer we get to exhaustion and silencethe more musical the impact of the language. This was important to Beckett: rehearsingFootfalls with Rose Hill, Beckett announced: “We are not doing this play realistically orpsychologically, we are doing it musically.”

Catherine Laws is a musicologist and pianist based in York, England. Much of herresearch focuses on the relationship between music, language, and meaning. Her book,Headaches Among the Overtones: Music in Beckett/Beckett in Music, appeared inDecember 2013 (Editions Rodopi).

—Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc





This performance is made possible in part by the Josie Robertson Fund for Lincoln Center.

Wednesday Evening, October 14, 2015, at 7:30

The Lovely Mill Maiden


SCHUBERT Die schöne Müllerin (1823) Das WandernWohin? Halt!Danksagung an den Bach Am FeierabendDer Neugierige Ungeduld MorgengrußDes Müllers Blumen TränenregenMein! PauseMit dem grünen Lautenbande Der JägerEifersucht und Stolz Die liebe FarbeDie böse Farbe Trockne BlumenDer Müller und der BachDes Baches Wiegenlied

This program is approximately 70 minutes long and will be performed without intermission. Please join the artists in the Alice Tully Hall lobby immediately followingthe performance for a White Light Lounge.


44

Synopsis of the Song TextsBy Susan Youens

Die schöne Müllerin

A miller lad leaves his place of employment, goes wandering in search of a new mill, andfinds one (“Das Wandern,” “Wohin?” and “Halt!”). He falls in love with the miller’s beau-tiful daughter (“Danksagung an den Bach,” “Am Feierabend,” “Der Neugierige,” and“Ungeduld”), and hopes for love’s realization (“Morgengruß,” “Des Müllers Blumen,” and“Tränenregen”). The lad’s love is briefly reciprocated—or he deludes himself that sheloves him back—and he wonders what will follow (“Mein!” and “Pause”).

Tragedy begins when the miller maid obliquely announces her infatuation with the hunterin “Mit dem grünen Lautenbande” and the lad explodes in jealous rage, fear, and despair(“Der Jäger,” “Eifersucht und Stolz,” “Die liebe Farbe,” and “Die böse Farbe”). The ladresolves to kill himself in the brook that has been his confidant throughout the cycle(“Trockne Blumen” and “Der Müller und der Bach”).

The lad bids the brook to keep singing to him as he dies, and in the final song, the brookdoes so (“Des Baches Wiegenlied”).

—Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts



Note on the ProgramBy Susan Youens

Die schöne Müllerin, D.795 (1823)FRANZ SCHUBERTBorn January 31, 1797, in ViennaDied November 19, 1828, in Vienna

Approximate length: 70 minutes

In late autumn 1816, the 23-year-old poetWilhelm Müller took part in a weekly artisticsalon at the home of the Berlin privy coun-cilor Friedrich August von Stägemann.Others in the group included the artistWilhelm Hensel, who would later marryFanny Mendelssohn; his sister Luise Hensel,with whom Müller was in love; the historianFriedrich Förster; and the daughter of thehousehold, Hedwig von Stägemann.Together, the young people created aLiederspiel (song-play) on the venerabletheme of the miller maid (Hedwig) wooedby a gardener (Luise Hensel in a “pantsrole”), a hunter (Wilhelm Hensel), a miller’sapprentice (Müller, predestined by hisname for the role), and a country squire(Förster). When the young Müller returnedto Germany from Rome in 1818, he refash-ioned the song-play as a monodrama, spo-ken or sung by a single character, and gaveit pride of place in his first poetic anthology:Seventy-Seven Poems from the Post -humous Papers of a Wandering Horn-Player (1821).

When Schubert discovered this work, itwas at the beginning of the end of his life:he discovered that he had contractedsyphilis in late 1822 or early 1823, and itwas in 1823 that he set to music thesepoems about a lad who dies in the after-math of erotic experience. “Imagine a manwhose health will never be right again…whose most brilliant hopes have perished…whom enthusiasm for all thingsbeautiful threatens to forsake,” Schubertwrote to a friend—this is the backdrop to Dieschöne Müllerin. The cycle was published

the following year (1824) as Op. 25 by theViennese firm of Sauer & Leidesdorf.Schubert dedicated the first edition to hisfriend, the Baron Carl von Schönstein, whohad a lyrical high baritone voice; we are toldthat in his later years, the aristocratic singerwould receive mail addressed to “Baronvon Schönstein, Journeyman Miller.” Dieschöne Müllerin did not immediately strikethe public fancy, and Schubert’s friendFranz Schober tried to comfort him, writ-ing, “And your miller songs have alsobrought no great acclaim? These houndshave no feelings or minds of their own, andthey blindly follow the noise and opinionsof others.” The “hounds” would soonatone for their initial neglect.

In these 20 songs, Schubert spans thegamut from the pseudo-folk-song sound of“Das Wandern” to the formal complexitiesof “Die böse Farbe,” from the diatonicstrains of “Mit dem grünen Lautenbande”to the radical harmonic language of“Pause,” from the hammered fury of “DerJäger” to the exquisite tenderness of theelegy at the end. Schubert was a genius atconverting poetic ideas, images, characters,and more into music, and a few exampleswill have to suffice. When the lad in“Ungeduld” harps on the same tune overand over and stays in the same key, we hearhis monomanaical fervor; he cannot sit still,however, and his impatience is evident inthrumming triplets and chromaticism.Youthful ardor and impatience are again evi-dent in “Morgengruß,” a serenade thatstarts with a preliminary bit of rehearsal: thepiano begins with a two-bar phrase to whichthe lad will subsequently sing, “Good morn-ing, fair maid of the mill.” He is too impa-tient to rehearse beyond the first phrase,however, and quickly concludes the intro-duction so that he can utter his thoughtsaloud. In “Die böse Farbe,” when themiller says that he would like “to make thegreen grass deathly pale [totenbleich] withmy weeping,” Schubert’s lad realizes a splitsecond after he sings “toten—” (deathly)


46

that he is actually contemplating his owndeath. The shock sends him reeling andthe music jolting upwards. In “TrockneBlumen,” the miller tries to convince himself that there is meaning in his death, that love will triumph in resur-rection. In Müller, that delusion diessomewhere in the space between thispoem and the one following, but Schubertmakes us hear false reassurance dyingaway in the piano postlude. In every bar of every song, there are similar marvels tobe found.

At the end, neither Müller nor Schubertallows tragedy to triumph. In Vienna,parish churches would ring the “Zügen -glöcklein,” or “passing bell,” when one oftheir parishioners was dying so that others

might pray for the person’s soul, andSchubert accordingly rings the passing bellin the outermost tones of the right-handpart as the book sings a lullaby to the dyinglad. A majestic spiritual vision unfolds atthe close: when the brook tells of the fullmoon rising into the heavens, dispellingthe mist symbolic of all that evades ourunderstanding in this life, it insists uponthe ultimate victory of harmony and beautyin the realm of the infinite.

Susan Youens is the J. W. Van GorkomProfessor of Music at the University ofNotre Dame and the author of eight bookson lieder.

—Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the

Performing Arts, Inc.






Thursday Evening, October 15, 2015, at 7:30

Swan Song


BEETHOVEN An die ferne Geliebte (1816) Auf dem Hügel sitz ich spähendWo die Berge so blauLeichte Segler in den HöhenDiese Wolken in den HöhenEs kehret der MaienNimm sie hin denn, diese Lieder

SCHUBERT Schwanengesang (1828) LiebesbotschaftKriegers AhnungFrühlingssehnsuchtStändchenAufenthaltIn der FerneAbschiedDer AtlasIhr BildDas FischermädchenDie StadtAm MeerDer DoppelgängerDie Taubenpost




An die ferne Geliebte, Op. 98 (1816)LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVENBorn December 16, 1770, in Bonn,Germany

Died March 26, 1827, in Vienna


The creation of Beethoven’s single songcycle, An die ferne Geliebte (To the distantbeloved), followed in the wake of multipledifficulties in the composer’s life, includingthe loss of the “Immortal Beloved” and acrisis about what new compositional pathto take in the wake of the “heroic” sym-phonies. A 20-year-old medical studentnamed Alois Jeitteles struck gold by send-ing Beethoven poems on two of the com-poser’s favorite themes: the sublimation oferotic desire into art and the power of songto make reunion with the distant belovedpossible. Each song culminates in a pianocorridor leading directly into the next seg-ment of this six-part song; the only trulyfinal cadence is the last one.

In the first song, “Auf dem Hügel sitz ichspähend” (I Sit on the Hill Peering), thesinger resolves to “sing songs” to tell thebeloved of his pain. After five statements ofa perfectly constructed melody, the pianofiguration varied each time, the “ending”metamorphoses into another key to initiatethe second song, “Wo die Berge so blau”(Where the Mountains So Blue). Beethovensignals the inwardness of these reflectionsby having the singer chant the secondstanza on a single pitch while the piano,enveloping the vocal line on either side,takes over the melody established in thefirst verse. For the third song, “LeichteSegler in den Höhen” (Light CloudsDrifting on High), the composer wittily con-verts birds flying amidst puffs of cloud intoseparated syllables of light, airy vocalmelody. When the birds descend to the

bare autumnal bushes and the singer bidsthem bear his lamentation to the beloved,Beethoven darkens the music and turns theseparated syllables into stylized gasps ofpain. But whenever sorrow intrudes, theprotagonist resolutely converts it into cele-brations of nature, love, joy, vitality, andsong in “Diese Wolken in den Höhen”(These Clouds in the Heights) and “Eskehret der Maien” (May Returns, theMeadow Blooms). With its lilting open inter-vals in the left-hand part, “Es kehret derMaien” is the essence of all things pastoral—until the end, when tears reappear. But this issorrow’s last foray: in the sublime sixth song,“Nimm sie hin denn, diese Lieder” (TakeThem, Then, These Songs), the protagonistis finally able to conquer his pain by biddingthe distant beloved to sing these verysongs. The pulsating chords—Beethoven’sstock gesture for cosmic aspects ofnature—and the tender lingering on thewords “und du singst” (and you will sing)tell of desire transformed by an act of ulti-mate metamorphosis into poetry and song.

Schwanengesang, D.957 (1828)FRANZ SCHUBERTBorn January 31, 1797, in ViennaDied November 19, 1828, in Vienna


Schwanengesang is a compilation of twodifferent sets of songs, with Schubert’slast song appended at the end. The Berlinmusic journalist/novelist/poet LudwigRellstab wrote in his memoirs that he hadsent poems to Beethoven in spring 1825,then recovered them from the composer’sestate, but Beethoven’s factotum AntonSchindler insisted that he gave Schubertthe poems after Beethoven’s death. Thestartlingly original poet Heinrich Heine’sgiant (88 poems) cycle Die Heimkehr (TheHomecoming) was published in both theReisebilder (Travel Images) of 1826 and theBuch der Lieder of 1827. According to thesinger Karl von Schönstein, the dedicatee

48



of Die schöne Müllerin, Schönstein askedto borrow Schubert’s copy of the Buch derLieder, and Schubert gave it to him, sayinghe had no more use for it. In his manu-script, Schubert wrote out the sevenRellstab and six Heine songs without anytitle page or numbering, the completedmanuscript dated August 1828. When thepublisher Tobias Haslinger bought thesongs from Schubert’s brother Ferdinand,he added the single song “DieTaubenpost,” composed in October 1828,for the posthumous collection entitled,appropriately, Swan Song.

In the first Rellstab song, “Liebesbot -schaft” (Tidings of Love)—Schubert’s finalessay in water music—the lover bids a littlebrook to convey greetings to the distantbeloved. One can hear his fervor in theunforgettable bounding leap upwards, bothebullient and desperate, at the end of thefirst and last stanzas. The beloved’sdreams in the first song give way in“Kriegers Ahnung” (Soldier’s Forebod ing)to a warrior’s nocturnal memories ofbygone dreams at his sweetheart’s breast;his noble gravity suggests high-bornknights of yore. Schubert contrasts thedark, columnar chords of the singer’sdeath-haunted present with the warm, fluidpassage in major mode that tells of a pastbeautified by love.

“Frühlingssehnsucht” (Spring Longing)begins with soft, thrumming excitement totell of springtime’s arrival, of rising sap andrising desire. This is a perpetual motionsong, but with pauses that tell of innerimpasse before the gently urgent motionresumes. In the famous “Ständchen”(Serenade), an ardent wooer—a bit of aroué—attempts to lure the maiden hedesires out of her bedchamber by night inorder “to make me happy.” Schubert fillshis song of seduction with vulnerability andambivalence; the exquisite melody is asmuch melancholy as it is ardent. When theimpassioned plea gives way to the piano

postlude, we realize that this was a sere-nade in vain.

In “Aufenthalt” (Resting Place), the rhyth-mic conflict throughout is an expression ofacute emotional distress: the singer com-pares his grief to surging river, roaring for-est, and immutable rock. The singer of theByronic anti-litany “In der Ferne” (FarAway) challenges all of nature and the cos-mos on the brink of self-destruction.Schubert found in this suicidal desperationthe stuff of massive musical maneuvers:the jolt of a semitone downwards at thewords “Mutterhaus Hassenden” would notbecome standard practice until Wagnerpost-1850, and the huge Neapolitan joltnear the end is a hallmark of Schubert’s har-monic language. From “Erlkönig” to“Abschied” (Farewell), horses ride throughSchubert’s songs, and this pianistic steedcarries the persona through a paradoxicallyhappy farewell—but the merry tone iswilled. In the E-flat major key ofBeethoven’s “Les Adieux” Piano Sonata,Op. 81a (in the song’s original tonality), thesinger bids a protracted farewell to a placehe clearly loves and does not want to leave.

On January 12, 1828, Schubert and hisfriends met to discuss the “travel ideas ofHeine,” perhaps the 1826 Reisebilder(Travel Images), which includes the giganticpoetic cycle Die Heimkehr (The Home-c oming). In 1827 Heine gathered togetherhis youthful poetry for publication as theBuch der Lieder (Book of Songs), a literarybestseller. Schubert chose only six poemsfrom Heine’s Homecoming, in which anewly corrosive, ironic voice appears on theliterary scene, but these six songs are aquantum leap into the future of music.

Heine’s Byronic Titan makes melodramaticmockery of immense misery in “DerAtlas” (Atlas). What gripped Schubert’simagination was the notion of beingchained to irrevocable horror and attempt-ing in vain to break free of it; he borrows


50

the circular figure in the bass fromBeethoven’s last piano sonata, Op. 111 inC minor, and chains his Atlas to it. Packingso much sound and fury into a small songis a challenge to all those who would den-igrate song composition as incapable ofambition on a Beethovenian scale.

The poet in “Ihr Bild” (Her Picture) staresat an image of the sweetheart, who hasleft him or died (Schubert thought it wasthe latter), and fancies that the imagecomes to life: this is the Narcissus mythmodernized. In this bleak song, shotthrough with echoes, the singer cannotreally believe his loss: it is the piano, madeof sterner stuff, that tells us at the end ofirrevocable grief.

In “Das Fischermädchen” (The Fisher -maiden), a buoyant, charming singer, confi-dent of his powers of attraction, woos alower-class girl with his pearls of poetry andsong. One can interpret this serenade eitheras sincerity or mockery, with Schubert hint-ing that the persona is not quite the geniushe proclaims himself to be. The ambiguitiesof song are on display here.

In classic horror-movie fashion, the per-sona of “Die Stadt” (The Town) stares atdarkness until, finally, daylight reveals—absence. For the first and third stanzas, wehear echoes of the Baroque, the rhythmicpatterns reminiscent of Handel or Rameau.In the introduction and second stanza, theinfamous “horror chord” of GermanRomantic opera comes out of nowhere,goes nowhere, and is repeated over andover. At song’s end, the single pitch C isisolated—a mystery with no answer.

“Am Meer” (By the Sea) tells of erotic cat-astrophe in which a couple makes love by

the seashore, she weeps symbolic tears,and he declares himself destroyed by theexperience. Schubert contrasts solemn,hymn-like stanzas in pure C major withquivering, tremulous, darker passages.Schubert’s final section is a battle to keepdarkness from wholly overwhelming thememory of past beauty.

In “Der Doppelgänger” (The Double), thesinger sees a spectral image of himselfhistrionically aping yet another earlier self.Schubert borrowed a Baroque fugue sub-ject and makes it modern for this scenarioof lost time, past time, repressed memo-ries, and the present. The climaxes in thissong are so shattering that JohannesBrahms could not forget them: he quotesthe singer’s last phrase in his own song“Herbstgefühl.”

Schubert’s last song, “Die Taubenpost”(Pigeon-post), is the most fitting ofepigraphs on his life and art. Here, hemakes tonal adventurism sound effortless,as in the sudden shift to another brightplace to suggest the rich contentment ofthe word “überreich,” the way“Sehnsucht” or “yearning” comes hometo the original key at the end, and thetouches of intensity that are more Schubertthan the author of the text, Johann GabrielSeidl, a determinedly optimistic poet. Butdarkness is never allowed to establish afoothold, whatever its faint traces here.






Saturday Evening, October 17, 2015, at 7:30

Post-performance discussion with Mark Padmore, Kristian Bezuidenhout, and Benjamin Sosland

Winter Journey

Mark Padmore, TenorKristian Bezuidenhout, FortepianoSCHUBERT Winterreise (1827)

Gute Nacht Die WetterfahneGefrorne TränenErstarrungDer LindenbaumWasserflutAuf dem FlusseRückblickIrrlichtRastFrühlingstraumEinsamkeitDie PostDer greise KopfDie KräheLetzte HoffnungIm DorfeDer stürmische MorgenTäuschungDer WegweiserDas WirtshausMutDie NebensonnenDer Leiermann






52

Synopsis of the Song TextsBy Susan Youens

Winterreise

An unnamed, unknown man—older than the youth of Die schöne Müllerin—resolves toleave his former sweetheart’s town. She or her parents or all three have rejected him fora wealthier man, and the rejection impels an inner journey into the soul (“Gute Nacht”).As he leaves by night, he bids her a tender, wistful farewell that she does not hear.

In “Die Wetterfahne,” he compares her heart to a weather vane spinning in the wind,wonders why his tears freeze on his face despite the heat of his grief (“GefrorneTränen”), and fears losing all memory of her should his frozen heart ever thaw(“Erstarrung”). He recalls the linden tree where they used to meet, a tree whose leavesnow whisper of death (“Der Lindenbaum”). He fancies that his tears will flow to thebeloved’s house (“Wasserflut”), carves the birth-and-death dates of their love in thefrozen river’s crust (“Auf dem Flusse”), and feels as if he is hounded out of her town bythe crows on the rooftops (“Rückblick”).

He follows a will-o’-the-wisp without caring how he will find a way out (“Irrlicht”). Soul-sick weariness (“Rast”) and the shattering disillusionment of awaking from dreams tocold reality (“Frühlingstraum”) are the next traumas along the way, leading to an uttersense of loneliness (“Einsamkeit”).

The post coach enlivens the cycle at mid-point (“Die Post”), as the wanderer wonderswhy his heart leaps when there is no prospect of a letter, of any communication fromanother human being. He broods increasingly on death and alienation from other humanbeings, with one outburst of stormy despair and a dance of delusion as he follows anotherwill-o’-the-wisp (“Der greise Kopf,” “Die Krähe,” “Letzte Hoffnung,” “Im Dorfe,” “Derstürmische Morgen,” and “Täuschung”).

In the crucial 20th song (“Der Wegweiser”), he sees in his mind the “road I must tread,by which no one has yet returned,” but Death turns him away from the cemetery there-after (“Das Wirtshaus”). Longing for death but unable to kill himself, he keeps goingsomehow, with delusory courage (“Mut”) and resigned sadness (“Die Nebensonnen”).At the end (“Der Leiermann”), he encounters a beggar-musician (a hallucination? his dou-ble?), beyond the bounds of society, unheard, grinding away at his music regardless, andasks if he might go with him. There is no answer.

—Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts




Winterreise, D.911 (1827)FRANZ SCHUBERTBorn January 31, 1797, in ViennaDied November 19, 1828, in Vienna


According to Schubert’s friend Franz vonSchober, Schubert discovered the poeticcycle Die Winterreise in Schober’slibrary—when and which textual source,he does not say. The poetry made its wayinto the world in three stages: the first 12poems in the periodical Urania for 1823,ten subsequent poems in another periodi-cal that same year, and finally the completepoetic cycle, with “Die Post” and“Täuschung” added, in Müller’s Poemsfrom the Posthumous Papers of aWandering Horn-Player, vol. 2: Songs ofLove and Life. We can tell from Schubert’sautograph manuscript, dated February1827, that the composer’s first source wasUrania, whose 12 poems he thought con-stituted a complete poetic cycle. When hediscovered the finished work, he set theremaining 12 poems in order as he foundthem (except for switching “Mut” and“Die Nebensonnen” around) and told hisfriends that these songs “have cost memore effort than any of my other songs.”

When Schubert set these poems to music,he was confronting his own probable fate.Enough was known in the 1820s aboutsyphilis for Schubert to realize that this dis-ease often led to dementia and paralysisbefore release in death. He might havewondered as he read “Der Leiermann”whether he too would be condemned tosuffer what the wanderer confronts: afuture with his creative faculties numbedand the capacity to create music restrictedto a single phrase, repeated mindlesslyover and over. The journey ends with aquestion for which there is no answer, only

the echoing silence following the dying-away drone of the hurdy-gurdy.

Before the journey begins, much hasalready happened to this character. In thefirst song, “Gute Nacht” (Good Night), hetells us that he came to this place astranger and departs still a stranger, unsuc-cessful once more in his quest for belong-ing. Before he leaves, he bids the sleepingsweetheart a tender farewell, made magi-cal by the shift from minor to major mode.The repeated notes/chords in the pianosymbolize the journey and return at signifi-cant points throughout the cycle.

The weathervane, changing direction witheach changing breeze, is a traditional sym-bol for infidelity. In “Die Wetterfahne”(The Weathervane), we hear both the wan-derer’s anger and the weathervanewhirling about in gusts of icy wind. Thetears that come as if from nowhere andfreeze on the wanderer’s face in“Gefrorne Tränen” (Frozen Tears) hintthat something deeper than love’s betrayalis at the heart of his psychological turmoil.“Erstarrung” (Numbness) exemplifies thetug-of-war between reason and emotion inthe first half of the cycle: he searches fran-tically for mementos of her because heknows that without them, her image willeventually vanish from his heart.

The linden tree in “Der Lindenbaum”(The Linden Tree) is where lovers inGerman literature traditionally have theirrendezvous. The rustling leaves seem as ifsaying to the wanderer, “Come to me andfind peace”—but the only way to be onewith nature is to die. The wanderer resistsand journeys onward.

In “Wasserflut” (Flood), he imaginesrivers of tears flowing all the way to herhouse, and in “Auf dem Flusse” (On theStream), he asks his heart whether livingtorrents flow beneath its frozen crust.Grief continually looks back at what is lost,


54

and that is what the wanderer does in“Rückblick” (Backward Glance). Twice,Müller invokes the will-o’-the-wisp, theghostly light in bogs, swamps, andmarshes. Here, it perhaps symbolizes thegirl who lured the wanderer into the emo-tional chasm through which he meandersaimlessly in “Irrlicht” (Will-o’-the-Wisp).

The wanderer pauses in his journey for thefirst time in “Rast” (Rest), but the trudgingfootsteps continue in his head. Finally fallingasleep in “Frühlingstraum” (Dream ofSpring), he dreams of springtime and recip-rocal love in strains of Mozartean delicacyand clarity, only to be twice awakened tocold reality. In the wake of this experience,he feels even more solitary than before in“Einsamkeit” (Loneliness).

“Die Post” (The Post) re-energizes thecycle midway, with its horn calls and clip-clopping horses’ hooves. But thereafter,the wanderer longs repeatedly for death; in“Der greise Kopf” (The Gray Head), hehopes that the frost on his hair means thathe has grown old overnight and will soondie, and in “Die Krähe” (The Crow), hehopes that the crow circling overhead is adeath omen. “Letzte Hoffnung” (LastHope) is filled with complex and disorient-ing rhythmic patterns that tell of anextremity of despair and of leaves that fallfrom the trees at random.

In the next song, “Im Dorfe” (In theVillage), the wanderer bitterly scorns otherpeople and their ability to dream and hope;we hear the rattling of dog chains and thevillagers’ snoring refracted through thesinger’s mockery. The next morning, hesees the image of his own heart in thestorm-tossed clouds and fiery dawn of“Der stürmische Morgen” (The StormyMorning), but the Lear-on-the-heath defi-ance is over almost before we can take inits violence.

For “Täuschung” (Illusion), Schubert bor-rows from his 1821–22 opera Alfonso und

Estrella, where this same music told of acloud-maiden who lured a hunter to followher until he tumbled to his death. The wan-derer knows that the will-o’-the-wisp hesees is an illusion, but he is so desperatethat he follows it anyway.

As he asks yet again why his journey is sodifficult, he sees a signpost in his mind—“Der Wegweiser” (The Signpost)—for theroad he must take, a road “by which noone has yet returned.” He does not saywhat it is: surely death, but we gather fromthe next song, “Das Wirtshaus” (The Inn),that it will take longer to die than the wan-derer would wish. When he stops at acemetery and begs for a room at the“inn,” he is turned away by the “pitilesstavern” Death.

The false courage he tries to assemble in“Mut” (Courage) quickly evaporates, fol-lowed by a song of profound resignation:“Die Nebensonnen” (The Mock Suns).The mysterious three suns could beMüller’s symbolic use of the atmosphericphenomenon known as parhelion, in whichsun refracted through ice crystals producesillusory images of the sun on either side.Here, the illusions symbolize the beloved’seyes, which vanished from his sight.

At the “end” of the cycle (not truly an end)in “Der Leiermann” (The Organ-Grinder),the wanderer sees a hurdy-gurdy player,grinding out music so elemental as to bedeprived of all possibility of transcen-dence. This is living death, and it is worseby far than physical extinction.





WhiteLightFestival.org 54C

vocalists, chamber ensembles, and recital-ists. One of the most significant music pre-sentation series in the world, GreatPerformers runs from October throughJune with offerings in Lincoln Center’sAvery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, WalterReade Theater, and other performancespaces around New York City. From sym-phonic masterworks, lieder recitals, andSunday morning coffee concerts to filmsand groundbreaking productions speciallycommissioned by Lincoln Center, GreatPerformers offers a rich spectrum of pro-gramming throughout the season.

Lincoln Center for the PerformingArts, Inc.Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts(LCPA) serves three primary roles: presenter

of artistic programming, national leader inarts and education and community rela-tions, and manager of the Lincoln Centercampus. A presenter of more than 3,000free and ticketed events, performances,tours, and educational activities annually,LCPA offers 15 programs, series, and festi-vals including American Songbook, GreatPerformers, Lincoln Center Festival, LincolnCenter Out of Doors, Midsummer NightSwing, the Mostly Mozart Festival, and theWhite Light Festival, as well as the EmmyAward–winning Live From Lincoln Center,which airs nationally on PBS. As manager ofthe Lincoln Center campus, LCPA providessupport and services for the Lincoln Centercomplex and the 11 resident organizations.In addition, LCPA led a $1.2 billion campusrenovation, completed in October 2012.

Lincoln Center Programming DepartmentJane Moss, Ehrenkranz Artistic DirectorHanako Yamaguchi, Director, Music ProgrammingJon Nakagawa, Director, Contemporary ProgrammingJill Sternheimer, Director, Public ProgrammingLisa Takemoto, Production ManagerCharles Cermele, Producer, Contemporary ProgrammingKate Monaghan, Associate Director, ProgrammingMauricio Lomelin, Producer, Contemporary ProgrammingJulia Lin, Associate ProducerRegina Grande, Assistant to the Artistic DirectorLuna Shyr, Programming Publications EditorMadeleine Oldfield, House Seat CoordinatorKathy Wang, House Program Intern

For the White Light FestivalMatt Frey, Lighting DesignJosh Benghiat, Lighting Design AssociateMegan Young, SupertitlesTatiana Stola, Company ManagerJenniffer Desimone, Production Coordinator


Mark Padmore Tenor Kristian Bezuidenhout...

Documents

Transcript of Mark Padmore Tenor Kristian Bezuidenhout...