We know Franz Schubert as a very prolific composer who unfortunately didn’t live to 32. The author of hundreds of vocal works, 7 symphonies, operas, chamber music and piano compositions is now perhaps one of the most-performed composers, especially when it comes to his chamber music legacy. The other day I ran into the picture below and decided to track the meaning of the dream in Schubert’s works. What would the famous Austrian composer dream of?
It turned out that the DREAM was something more than just the night’s idle pastime. We can meet the notion in at least four compositions by Schubert, both better-known like “Spring Dream” from the cycle Winterreise and the lied for voice and piano “Night and Dreams”, as well as lesser-popular compositions like the secular chorus “Life is a Dream” or the lied “The Dream”.
It is a frequent thing for musicians and composer to use the dream as a musical metaphor, I understand. However, I was surprised to find out about the existence of another work by Schubert that is not music. In 1822, he wrote a tale. It was a short story “My Dream” that, however, told a lot about the musical genius. Franz Schubert was known as a very vivid person, cheerful and open to people. But as the analysis of “My Dream” shows, he had a skeleton hidden deep in the cupboard. In the tale, composer speaks about his fears, about a dream where he had to leave his beloved homeland and forcefully stay far away from it for a certain time without the opportunity to come back. The story does have a happy ending as he makes it back home, happy and delighted. According to the specialists, this work of art brought to light some of the composer’s hidden fears and inner turmoil. He was, in fact, a very lonely person torn by anxiety and despair on the inside. And of that was masterfully masked by the outer outgoing behavior.
Of course, my little research may seem quite superficial but I’m convinced that dreaming did play a special role for the great composer, which got reflected in the nature of his music works in particular. Now on listening to things like Night and Dream, I envision a very different image in my mind...
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| Schubert's After-Dinner Dream |
It is a frequent thing for musicians and composer to use the dream as a musical metaphor, I understand. However, I was surprised to find out about the existence of another work by Schubert that is not music. In 1822, he wrote a tale. It was a short story “My Dream” that, however, told a lot about the musical genius. Franz Schubert was known as a very vivid person, cheerful and open to people. But as the analysis of “My Dream” shows, he had a skeleton hidden deep in the cupboard. In the tale, composer speaks about his fears, about a dream where he had to leave his beloved homeland and forcefully stay far away from it for a certain time without the opportunity to come back. The story does have a happy ending as he makes it back home, happy and delighted. According to the specialists, this work of art brought to light some of the composer’s hidden fears and inner turmoil. He was, in fact, a very lonely person torn by anxiety and despair on the inside. And of that was masterfully masked by the outer outgoing behavior.
Of course, my little research may seem quite superficial but I’m convinced that dreaming did play a special role for the great composer, which got reflected in the nature of his music works in particular. Now on listening to things like Night and Dream, I envision a very different image in my mind...
