Auf der Donau, Fischerweise

1823 must have been a very difficult year for the Viennese-born composer Franz Schubert (1797-1828). In terms of the illness (syphilis) which eventually took his life, 1823 marked the onset and a turning point in his own awareness of mortality. Yet it remained a very productive time for Schubert, including the completion of several significant piano compositions and songs. Late in the year he wrote his first song cycle, Die schöne Müllerin. A few months earlier, in June 1823, Schubert published three water-themed songs (opus 21) on texts by Johann Mayrhofer. Schubert’s friendship with Mayrhofer dates back to 1814, and, indeed, these three songs were actually composed in the spring of 1817. The set begins with “Auf der Donau” (On the Danube), a bleak rhapsody that ruminates on man’s inability to achieve anything of permanence. Mayrhofer sets out nostalgic visions of a glorious past; the images appear literally as “castles in the air” as one floats down the Danube. Despite the inviting start, all is doom and gloom within two lines. Schubert captures the chimerical tone through evaded cadences and minimal establishment of the opening key, E-flat major, which yields quickly to C-flat major. Remarkably, at least for 1817, Schubert never gets back to the home key once he leaves it. The third stanza is set to a varied reprise of the opening but in F-sharp minor, bringing the song to an utterly pessimistic and barren conclusion.
Almost a decade after composing “Auf der Donau”, Schubert set the text entitled “Fischerweise” (Fisherman’s Song) by F. X. von Schlechta. Unlike most of Schubert’s well-known songs, the message of this poem never strays from its initial cheery sentiments. Accordingly the composer favors a repetitive musical treatment, staying close to the major tonic key and generating motion in the rocking piano accompaniment. Schubert’s straight repetition draws attention to even the slightest variance, such as the rushed rhythm at “schlauer Wicht” (sly friend), which underscores the fellow’s spirited (though probably not earnest) denial of a maid’s attentions.

(c) Jason Stell