Downs and ups: Farewell to Jodoigne, farewell to Bever

Well, a journey is not all plain sailing, if you'll forgive the mixed metaphor. Both our venues in Belgium, Bever and Jodoigne, have gone belly up, owing to lack of funds. We have fond memories of seven recitals in he beautiful Chapelle Notre Dame du Marché in Jodoigne, with its glorious acoustic and period piano built by Claude Kelecom. Memorable moments, for myself at least, were 'Erlkönig' and the mighty 'Lodas Gespenst'. For that, my thanks to the Centre Culturel.

Losing Bever is a heavy blow indeed, for it was in the delightful 'Rosario', a little cultural oasis in the Pajottenland, that Schubertreise started, thanks to the vision and courage of Johan Vriens. Small audience numbers tolled the death knell in the end, but not before we reached the halfway mark with recital eighteen.

Schubert and rhetoric

While the best Schubert songs tend to be those with an obsessional musical idea driving forward the central argument (Die Junge Nonne, Der Zwerg, Auf dem Wasser zu singen), a significant number of the lesser known ones employ recitative, notably the ballads, those lengthy, discursive 'drawing-room operas' rarely performed today. The best of them, like Der Taucher and Lodas Gespenst were experiments in the dramatic cantata style so successfully used by Haydn in Ariadne auf Naxos, a form which Schubert persistently believed in (his fine setting of Kenner's awful poem Der Liedler was very popular, so much so that he had it published). Recitative is of course something we associate with Italian opera seria and German and English oratorio, where — in the right hands — it can propel the action forward most effectively. It goes without saying that a singer needs to call on all her power of rhetoric to do justice to the work in question, which is one reason that some performers shy away from monumental rhetorical masterpieces such as Prometheus. Where Schubert differs from opera seria is that he combines elements of art song lyricism with recitative, notably in Der Taucher and Prometheus, to great effect. Der Taucher is a unified whole, despite the surface sectionality of the composition (and in this Schubert is helped by Schiller's fine poem). Schubert was lucky enough to have studied with Salieri, himself a great admirer of Gluck, which goes a long way to explain the countless felicitous italianate touches in his songs.

All this by way of saying that Schubert was a frustrated opera composer. It may come as a surprise to learn that he composed around twenty stage works, although not all them were completed. Usually hampered by poor libretti, it is claimed that Schubert did not have an innate feeling for stage drama, which is certainly true of Fierrabras, for instance, although it contains much fine music. The songs of course often spill over with internal drama, usually of the individual variety (Gretchen am Spinnrade), occasionally a dialogue (Der Zwerg); but opera demands above all the ability to adroitly manipulate characters on stage. When I perform Der Zwerg I am not playing the title role, I am reciting the poem.

Pawn-broken and uncatalogued

Preparations for Schubertreise XX in Dublin on April 23rd next are in full swing. Yet another lengthy ballad, this time a setting of Schiller's virtuoso "Die Bürgschaft', 'The Bond'. A tale of loyalty and persistence in the face of incredible odds, it elicits some of Schubert's best cinematic effects, and shows him mastering the balance between recitative and melody proper. Remember that he is just eighteen in 1815 — what accomplished voice-leading and grasp of harmony! Schubert's reaction to the complex rhyme scheme deserves attention too: abbaacc is unusual, to say the least. Here's a sample of Schiller's quirky verse, replete with charmingly odd syntax, a Schiller hallmark:

Und er kommt zum Freunde: "Der König gebeut,

Dass ich am Kreuz mit dem Leben

Bezahle das frevelnde Streben,

Doch will er mir gönnen drei Tage Zeit,

Bis ich die Schwester dem Gatten gefreit,

So bleibe du dem König zum Pfande,

Bis ich komme zu lösen die Bande."

Goethe was slightly irritated that the hero, after braving a river in full spate, should shortly after suffer from thirst, but hey — it's poetry. Schubert presents us with musical prose, which, like all of his ballads, can hardly be considered a song at all. Nine months later he began work on an opera of the same name, but it remained unfinished, like many of Schubert's stage works, although many of the set pieces from the song found their way into the opera.

Most of the remaining songs in the programme are short. We hear the two versions of "Das Mädchen aus dem Fremde", and two versions of "Abends unter der Linde", composed on consecutive days; "Der Rattenfänger", which is cheap and cheerful, but not a patch on the Wolf version; "Wonne der Wehmut", epigrammatic as only the Goethe settings can be, and "Winterlied" (D deest), which enjoys the dubious reputation of having no Deutsch* (or catalogue) number. Now, this needs some explaining. The meaning of 'deest' is this: From the Latin deesse meaning to be missing; placed after a catalogue abbreviation to indicate that this particular work does not appear in it. The plural, desunt, is used when referring to several works. So far so good. "Winterlied' does not appear in the Deutsch catalogue because it was originally composed in 1815 as a trio for two tenors and one bass, probably for a composition class with Salieri, but in 1820 Schubert made an arrangement for solo voice and piano, leaving the upper voice unchanged. It was probably intended as an album leaf for an unknown recipient. So it ain't Deest after all.

*Otto Deutsch, Austrian musicologist and archivist, who catalogued all of Schuberts works in chronological order.

The longest song, and other trumpery* matters

At 25 minutes 'Adelwold und Emma', a tale of knightly derring-do, is Schubert's longest song, and forms the backbone to our next recital in Dublin on January 15th 2016. There are passages of great beauty, whirling passage work for the piano, and gripping recitatives, enough I think to hold one's interest, even if John Reed snootily writes that 'performances are unlikely, to say the least.' Michel and I have come to the conclusion that the songs that are the most fun to perform, while not necessarily among his best, are these lengthy, sprawling ballads, particularly those inspired by Ossian. This is the blurb I wrote for the NCH flyer:

Schubertreise XI, Sunday January 15th 2017 at 3pm

Adelwold und Emma, D 211

Die Laube, D 214

Kolmas Klage, D 217

Grablied, D 218

Das Finden, D 219

Der Abend, D 221

Lieb Minna, D 222

Idens Nachtgesang, D 227

Von Ida, D 228

Die Täuschung, D 230

Das Sehnen, D 231

Geist der Liebe, D 223

Tischlied, D 234

Adelwold und Emma enjoys the dubious reputation of being Schubert's longest song, and while not one of his best, there is plenty to enjoy in this gothic tale of betrayed confidence, stubborn chivalry, burning castle, imperilled maiden and tearful reconciliation — with music to match. Die Laube bears a strong resemblance to the beautiful Erster Verlust, and deserves to be better known. Kolmas Klage is one of the better of the Ossian settings; Grablied is a hymnlike tribute to the poet Theodor Körner, who fell in battle against Napoleon, while Das Finden is a celebration of innocence with an ethnic tinge. Der Abend shows Schubert meddling with the poet's intentions, when he changes the name of the castle from the original Arkona to Temora, to fit in with his Ossian phase. Lieb Minna is pervaded by a tone of sweet melancholy; Idens Nachtgesang displays heartfelt emotion in classical garb, while Von Ida (in Kosegarten's original Von Agnes, changed by Schubert to Von Ida for singing purposes) is written in three-part counterpoint. Die Täuschung is described by Schubert scholar John Reed as being 'sweetly tuneful, and grateful to the hands and voice, attractive music for domestic consumption but little more.' In Das Sehnen the elegant, almost cheerful character of the music belies the grief of Kosegarten's poetry; In Geist der Liebe we witness a rumpty-tum cheerfulness that cannot hide the banality of the verse, and in Tischlied we are confronted with a drinking song for one person — a contradiction in terms of course, albeit a rousing one.'

"And we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye: at the last — Trump."

A nerdy memorization technique

Those of you in the loop will not have failed to notice that there has been no recital activity of any kind since our last performance in Dublin in May of this year. That will all change, starting in January 2017. Having reached halfway house I felt the need of a rest, and for the first time in five years I enjoyed a whole Schubert-free month during the summer. The hectic pace demanded by performing the complete songs in three different venues is also a thing of the past, since barring miracles the two venues in Belgium cannot assure the completion of the cycle, drawing in their horns and proposing just one recital a year*. Dublin remains the last bastion...

Some time ago I hit on a novel method for memorizing large chunks of poetry, and I'm happy to share it with you. Be warned, it will attract odd looks on public transport. It consists on 'ghost' writing out each line of the text separately three times, with nothing more than your fingernail (you can of course use pen and paper if you wish.) In a four-line stanza, my technique would look this:

Line one x 3

Line two x 3

Lines one and two x 1

Line three x 3

Lines one, two and three x 1

Line four x 3

Lines one-four x 1.

When you feel you have satisfactorily made a mental image of the poem, try reciting it (from memory), three times. Constant recitation of the text is in my opinion the key to good song interpretation. My advice to young vocal students would be to learn how to speak before singing. I strongly recommend that you then let your work settle, coming back to it a few days later. When you feel you can recite the whole poem from memory with reasonable fluency, turn to the music. Painstaking!

* Whereas previously the pattern was as follows:

Bever, recitals I-XXXVI

Jodoigne, recitals I-XXXVI

Dublin, recitals I-XXXVI, in other words three series running simultaneously over a period of ten years, we have now decided (in Belgium) to conflate the two series, adding other venues as we see fit.

As clear as mud, as the actress said to the bishop. Note by note

I was asked by a good friend the other day whether, when keying in the notes of a twenty-page song to a Finale file (« Leichenfantasie »), it wouldn't be quicker to hook up my computer to the (hideous) synthesizer upstairs via a midi programme and play the damn thing. Apparently it's much quicker, although you need to be on the alert for enharmonic shenanigans, to say nothing of having to re-write polyphonic passages. But speed ain't of the essence: I like to to get down on my back and tinker with the engine before reassembling the parts. Not that I have to key in every song (small mercies)*, but it's actually a good way to learn a song. After all, Bach copied out reams of Vivaldi.

Postcript to the above: transposing a song down makes certain passages singable, but also creates new problems: if a song has a wide tessitura, the singer will often find herself coping with passages that are uncomfortably low. I guess this is one of the reasons that Schubert's first songs are rarely performed.

Almost finished memorizing the text of "Leichenfantasie, one of Schubert's longest. It may come as a surprise to learn that many of his songs were conceived as drawing-room operas, following on from the idea of the secular cantata so successfully demonstrated by Haydn in "Ariadne auf Naxos". It has to be said though that not all of Schubert's essays in this particular art form are masterpieces. "Der Taucher" is well worth a whirl, but I have my doubts about the half hour long "Adelwold und Emma".

*Actually I do. Since the death of the editor-in-chief of the Bärenreiter Schubert Ausgabe for the songs, Walther Dürr, Bärenreiter has been dragging its heels when it comes to the publication of the songs in versions for high, medium and low voice, meaning a backlog of three or more years. Consequently, in recent months I have been forced to transpose virtually all of the remaining songs. But it's not all bad news: I can if I wish make  my own edition, transposing certain passages in the accompaniments up an octave if necessary, thus avoiding muddy textures.

Conor Biggs and Michel Stas Conor Biggs' Schubertreise diary, day four

Today is a kind of fallow day, tomorrow being a performance day. I like to speak to my audiences, so I will need to cobble together a few words in French about the songs. I usually write down what I want to say, but since I speak ad lib., much of what i write it is discarded. (This was a performance in Jodoigne. Ed.)

I also need to ge shopping. Sounds banal, but what one eats, and when, plays a crucial rôle in performing well. A drop in blood sugar when facing a hefty song can be disastrous. Since the recital in Jodoigne — a repeat of Schubertreise XIV last Sunday in Bever — begins at 5pm, Michel and I will hold a top-and-tail rehearsal at 3pm, leaving me with a clear hour to assemble my thoughts before the concert. What time I get up, when I begin my warm-up, when to eat, what to pack for a pre-concert meal: all are details which need to be thought about, preferably not on the day itself! Nowadays I let pretty much anything down the hatch, though I avoid alcohol before a performance. Nuts are a no-no, and I'm also wary of apples just before going on: small pieces can lodge between the teeth and come loose during crucial moments!

Fallow day, again

The day before a recital? That condemned man feeling again. Time to take stock, not sing a note, tweak my site, look forward to adding more Schubert songs to my repertoire list. Meanwhile my wife Myriam has been working hard on the publicity for the next concert, in Jodoigne, recycling Jente Boone's wonderful photo-montage (see photos page). I stood on that tree trunk for a couple of hours, gazing at non-existent skyscrapers.

The gargantuan "Leichenfantasie" is done and dusted, as well as the humorous "Totengräberlied". The recital is dominated once again by differing versions of the same song. So, for instance, we get to hear the two versions of "Thekla" and "Geistes-Gruss" as well as the three versions of "Der Jüngling am Bache" — and this song is particularly interesting, since the first version is a cheerful through-composed affair with a lot of surface charm, the second a strophic setting in the minor key,while the third, also strophic, and also in the minor key, is a kind of amalgam of the two previous versions. Despite the fact that the note of optimism struck in the last verse of the poem is only done justice to in the first setting, the third version pips it to the post in terms of manipulation of thematic material (heavens, how hard it is to write satisfactorily about good music! No problem when it comes to the weaker stuff...)

Our recital concludes with the time-bound "Die Befreier Europas in Paris', a nine-verse affair which we have cut down to two. Schubert's enthusiasm for Napoleon's defeat in Paris in 1814 is understandable, particularly in the light of the war-induced plummeting value of Austrian currency and the subsequent impact this had on his scholarship to the Stadskonvikt, but the verses, reminding us that Paris had been "liberated", sit uncomfortably with our 20th century historical conditioning. To Schubert and his contemporaries of course the jackboots were firmly on the feet of French troops, but today that conviction rings hollow. In addition the fawning verses themselves, by his schoolfriend Mikan, are positively cringe-worthy. That having been said, the fourteen-year old Schubert manages to scrape together some half decent ideas, but it's obvious that this sort of song can only find its place in a performance of the complete Lieder.

Conor Biggs' Schubertreise diary, day three

Yesterday was devoted to memorizing the text of Leichenfantasie, a formidable hurdle comprising nine chunky verses. Schiller's verse is sometimes dense and difficult to memorize. This, Schubert's third song, is somewhat less accomplished than his first, Hagars Klage, leading me to wonder if the dates of composition are not erroneous.

Leichenfantasie is also uncomfortably high — a feature of the early songs being the unusual demands they place on the singer's range. Transposition over and above that proposed by the Bärenreiter edition is called for, so there's nothing for it but to laboriously key in the whole song on Finale — all 400 plus bars!

This morning saw us rehearsing for Schubertreise XIV on Claude Kelecom's 1810 Walther fortepiano in Noduwez, near Jodoigne. What a joy to hear a piano whose sound would have been recognized by Schubert! Conor Biggs' Schubertreise diary, day two

Thursday, December 11th, Jodoigne

So how do I go about revising the programme? I have one rehearsal with Michel. The rest of the time I will spend reciting the poetry, since I firmly believe in rhetoric-driven interpretations. Conor Biggs' Schubertreise diary, day one

I thought it might be interesting to see how I construct a programme from day one. Each recital lasts about an hour, is sung from memory and takes three months to prepare.

Monday, December 8th. I generally start researching the programme for the following recital the day after the première of the preceding one. Yesterday for example saw the performance of Schubertreise XIV in Bever, a programme which included Schubert's first (remarkably good) song, "Hagars Klage", as well as dozens of settings of poetry by Friedrich von Matthisson, one of the staple poets of Schubert's early years.

Although I have a reasonably good internal ear — by which I mean I can hear pretty much all of the harmonies of Schubert's songs by looking at the score — I think I might be able to speed up the process by recording the voice part and the accompaniment and play them back on my iPod dock in the kitchen while chopping onions (I never listen to other interpretations until I have thoroughly studied the song). Pretty rough and ready it is too, but it gives me a good idea of the sound world I'll be trying to create in my head while studying the score on my way into work with the Flemish Radio Choir in Brussels. We'll see.

There are a number of songs that are familiar to me, but not the dreaded "Leichenfantasie", one of Schubert's first, long and difficult to boot. That and memorizing the first couple of verses of Schiller's lugubrious mastodon bring the day to a close.

Common sense/upcoming programme

When I began the Schubertreise series in Bever, my idea was to follow the Bärenreiter edition more or less as the thirteen volumes appeared, which is to say volumes one to four (the songs Schubert had published or intended publishing), followed by the remaining songs in chronological order, with the exception of Die Schöne Müllerin, a perfect curtain-raiser, and ending with Winterreise, indisputably his masterpiece. But with the launching of two further series in Jodoigne and Dublin respectively, I found myself preparing two, sometimes three programmes simultaneously, too taxing by far. Starting with the next recital in Jodoigne, I intend performing the same programme concurrently in the three venues, while respecting the numbering system I have been using. Thus "Schubertreise III" in Jodoigne on September 18th is actually the programme I am preparing for Bever on October 5th, the real "Schubertreise XIII". Ceci n'est pas une pipe. You still get to hear all the songs, of course!

This is as good an opportunity as any to announce this programme, which deals exclusively with songs that exist in different versions, based on the same poem. By this I don't mean minor variants (as happened sometimes when Schubert wrote out a song from memory for a friend), but songs that are significantly different from each other. In most cases the final version was the one that he had published, but not necessarily the best. It is fascinating to compare the two versions of "Wer sich der Einsamkeit ergibt", the second of the "Gesänge des Harfners" cycle. The first is beautiful in its own way, polished and poignant, but the second is a masterpiece, a true communion between voice and piano. For Mignon's song "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" there are no less than five versions. All are good — I'm not even convinced that the one he chose for publication is the best. Very confusingly the title of the fifth version is "Lied der Mignon", number 4 of the Gesänge aus "Wilhelm Meister", and the confusion is compounded by the different titles given to "Mignon I" and "Mignon II".

In the case of "Des Mädchens Klage", the first version is one of the first songs he wrote, in 1811 at the age of fourteen. It is good enough, with here and there problems with the part-writing and occasional clumsiness in the word setting, hiccups that you would expect to find in a student effort. The later two settings are both very fine, with very little to choose between them. "Sehnsucht "(Schiller: "Ach, aus dieses Tales Gründen") exists in two versions, the first a very early song, demonstrating the beneficial influence of Salieri on Schubert's song style, the second a mature masterpiece. Schubert recycles material from the end of the first song very effectively, something which he didn't do very often, as far as I am aware.

Why did Schubert not destroy these versions? Had he an eye on possible publication? We know that Brahms destroyed much if not all of his juvenilia. It says much for Schubert's self-confidence... or maybe he never got around to it. But the fact that he recycled material from his early setting of Schiller's "Sehnsucht" after a gap of twelve years suggests that his attitude was something of the hoarder: keep it, you never know when it might come in useful. (My attic bears vivid testimony to this philosophy.)

Programme for Schubertreise XIII

Jägers Abendlied, D 215 (erste Bearbeitung)

Jâgers Abendlied, D 368, op 3/4 (zweite Bearbeitung)

Harfenspieler, D 325 (erste Bearbeitung)

Gesänge des Harfners, "Wer sich der einsamkeit ergibt", D 478, op. 12/1 (zweite Bearb.)

Gesang des Harfners (no Deutsch number), zweite Bearbeitung

Gesänge des Harfners, "Wer nie sein Brot mit Tränen ass", D 478, op. 12/2 (zweite Bearb.)

Sehnsucht ("Ach, aus dieses Tales Gründen"), D 52 (erste Bearbeitung)

Sehnsucht, D 636, op. 39 (zweite Bearbeitung, dritte Fassung)

Des Mädchens Klage, D 6 (erste Bearbeitung)

Des Mädchens Klage, D 191, op. 58/3 (zweite Bearbeitung, zweite Fassung)

Des Mädchens Klage, D 389 (dritte Bearbeitung)

Sehnsucht,"Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt", D 310 (erste Bearbeitung, erste Fassung)

Sehnsucht, D 310 (erste Bearbeitung, zweite Fassung)

Sehnsucht, D 359 (Zweite Bearbeitung)

Sehnsucht, D 481 (dritte Bearbeitung)

Gesänge aus "Wilhelm Meister", D 887/4 (Lied der Mignon)

Mignon I, D 726 (erste Bearbeitung)

Gesänge aus "Wilhelm Meister, D 887/2: Heiss mich nicht reden (zweite Bearbeitung)

Mignon II, D 727 (zweite Bearbeitung)

Gesänge aus "Wilhelm Meister", D 887/3 (dritte Bearbeitung)

Note: Bearbeitung means arrangement, Fassung means setting or version.

Master the music, or the music will master you: memorizing all those songs

Indeed — how does one memorize 577 songs? Many years ago I came across a book entitled "How to conquer stage fright" written a long time ago (I expect it's out of print). One of it's main tenets was the idea that you could memorize a piece of music without actually singing or playing it, by way of preliminary visualization. I applied that principal to the organ repertoire I was then studying, with phenomenal results. Of course I felt nervous before the performance (an internal exam in the Hochschule in Freiburg), but while playing I was able to listen, really listen, in a way I could not when using a score. And that white-hot concentration on the matter in hand banishes nerves, as far as I'm concerned.

When it comes to vocal music (I no longer play the organ), my method is as follows: I first of all memorize the poem in question mentally, returning to it day after day, adding line after line, verse after verse.* Then I recite it until I feel I could "perform" it in public. Only then do I turn to the music, applying the same "layering" procedure", until I can mentally perform the entire piece. (Here a good knowledge of harmony is indispensable.) Once that can be done securely, I record the accompaniment, and begin to sing, phrase to phrase, (never too much in one day) and once that process is complete I let the song lie for a certain time, rather as one would let cheese ripen in a cellar. The final stage is the fun part: working with Michel Stas. In general we rehearse 8 to 10 times before a performance: first a read-through, then each song in detail, then one or two dry-runs.

All of this is extremely labour-intensive — each recital programme takes three months to prepare. I know that many musicians with busy opera schedules would cavil at this, but I can only say for myself that I feel completely free to express myself and serve the music. Master the music, or the music will master you. It works for me.

How it looked on the page

One of the perks in using the Bärenreiter Urtext edition of the Schubert songs is that the poetry set by Schubert is printed as Schubert himself would have encountered it. This may seem obvious, but the fact is that some sources, if they print the poetry separately at all, tamper with the intended layout for the purposes of saving space. Consider two versions of the opening verses of Leitner's poem "Des Fischers Liebesglück":

Des Fischers Liebesglück

Dort blinket

Durch Weiden

Und winket

Ein Schimmer

Blassstrahlig

Vom Zimmer

Der Holden mir zu.

Es gaukelt

Wie Irrlicht

Und schaukelt

Sich leise

Sein Abglanz

Im Kreise des schwankenden Sees.

The layout is as Leitner intended. The charm lies largely in the visual impact: three syllables per line, five in the last. Now compare the following version, available on a site devoted to song texts by thousands of poets:

Des Fischers Liebesglück

Dort blinket durch Weiden

Und winket ein Schimmer

Blassstrahlig Vom Zimmer

Der Holden mir zu.

Es gaukelt wie Irrlicht

Und schaukelt sich leise

Sein Abglanz im Kreise

Des schwankenden Sees.

Perfectly logical, but the delicate verse structure is completely destroyed. This editorial sleight of hand is all too common and leads to incorrect outlay in recital programmes and CD booklets the world over. Singers would do well to consult — in the case of German poetry — "Die deutsche GedichteBibliothek, https://gedichte.xbib.de/gedicht_Leitner.htm

Or use the Bärenreiter Urtext...

Schubert's sometimes cavalier approach to setting poetry (repetition of lines, changing of words, omission of verses etc. will form the subject of a future blog.

Schubert's poets

Schubert set texts by no less than one hundred and eighteen poets, including one poem he wrote himself. Goethe (74), Schiller (44) and Mayrhofer (47) were his staples, and he returned to these poets time after time (Mayrhofer was for a period a close friend). Others played an important rôle for a time, and were then forgotten: Kosegarten, Matthisson and Hölty come to mind. Some were friends, like Bruchmann, Senn and (in the last years of his life) Eduard von Bauernfeld, who was the only one brave enough to visit the typhus-ridden Schubert on his deathbed.

Having a poet friend is handy, but Schubert's thirst for new texts could lead him to make settings of artistically dubious works such as Jozef Kenner's Der Liedler, the only song in the whole Lieder repertoire to feature a werewolf. (As a caveat I should point out that precisely that song and the poem that inspired it were immensely popular at the time). Many of Schubert's most popular, even greatest songs were settings of comparative non-entities, for instance the (confusingly named) Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart, who provided the texts for Die Forelle, or Friedrich Leopold, Graf zu Stolberg-Stolberg, who wrote poetry every bit as clumsy as his name --  but those listening to Schubert's setting of Auf dem Wasser zu singen are not likely to complain. (Incidentally, the better the poetry the more easy it is to memorize, in my opinion. Auf dem Wasser zu singen I find a real challenge in the memory stakes, as I do Die junge Nonne, feeble indeed as verse but a candidate for his best song.

Quite a few settings are translations of foreign poets: Shakespeare, Scott, Pope, Ossian (the wily James MacPherson and his bardic "discoveries", rumbled by Dr. Johnson), Petrarch and Metastasio. The texts in English were all translated into German, by Herder among others, the Shakespeare settings by his friend Eduard von Bauernfeld, editor of the Vienna "Shakespeare Ausgabe" of 1825, and himself the author of Der Vater mit dem Kind, a personal favourite. The Italian settings, with the exception of Petrarch, were composed to the original Italian texts, although in the case of the best of the Italian songs, the "Drei Gesänge für Bass-Stimme" Schubert provided German words. Salieri, Schubert's composition teacher, encouraged the young composer to write in Italian, which among other things might explain the italianate, proto-bel canto style one finds in many of the lyrical settings such as "Heimliches Lieben" or passages in "Die abgeblühte Linde", not to mention the searingly beautiful cantilena in "Ellens dritter Gesang" (Ave Maria): both Schubert and Salieri greatly admired Gluck, Finally, there are a no less than eighteen settings of Anonymous (some of which have recently been attributed). Some of them may well have been penned by Schubert himself.

Fortepianos and Schubertreise

For the series of thirty five recitals in Jodoigne (Belgium) Michel Stas and I are very fortunate in having a variety of period instruments at our disposal, provided by local piano maker Claude Kelecom. To date we have used a copy of a Walter instrument (1807) and an instrument attributed to Johann Schantz, made some time in the early 1820s.

It is fascinating to enter into the sound world of Schubert, quite literally — these were the sonorities that he grew up with (it is worthwhile reminding ourselves that he would have found the sonority of a modern Steinway instrument quite strange). What are these differences?

• A shorter keyboard, with smaller keys. For the clunky-fingered among us that takes getting used to.
• A much more transparant bass register: there is far less steel used in a period instrument, and the tension on the strings is considerably less than in a modern counterpart)
• A weak, thin-sounding treble register (which would explain the octave doublings in piano literature of the period)
• A sound which dies away far more quickly than on a modern instrument (Barenboim's recording of Betthoven's Pathétique sonata in which he plays the opening Grave extremely slowly would not have been possible on a period instrument)
• An una corda ('soft pedal') radically different from its milder modern cousin: a true change in colour. Schubert rarely calls for its use, but when he does, writing "Mit Verschiebung" at the beginning of Suleika I, the effect is startling
• Knee-operated pedals (!) The system we know today was not in use at the time that Walter's instrument was built. A real-nonplusser for Michel Stas, who however copes very well with the challenge!
• A tuning system strange to our modern ears. We are used to the tyranny of the modern equal- temperament system of tuning, in which each semitone is exactly the same distance from its neighbour. In older tuning systems, certain keys sounded out of tune, since to tune thirds and fifths accurately in say C major would mean that A flat major would sound slightly wonky. Personally I find it lends charm to music of this period, and, more importantly, the colours attributed to different keys make real sense. It is nonsense, as far as I am concerned, to talk of E flat major having a different colour than C major on a modern instrument: the only difference is geographical. (NB I have never come across a modern instrument not tuned to equal-temperament, and my suggestion to the National Concert Hall in Dublin that they retune the Steinway grand used in our series there met with a refusal (for practical reasons, which I understand.) Paul Wade kindly tunes that piano down from 442hz to 440hz. Every little helps.