Drama in the Music of Franz Schubert ed. by Joe Davies and James William Sobaskie

Abstract

Reviewed by: Drama in the Music of Franz Schubert ed. by Joe Davies and James William Sobaskie Marie Sumner Lott Drama in the Music of Franz Schubert. Edited by Joe Davies and James William Sobaskie. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell, 2019. [xxix, 348 p. ISBN 9781783273652 (hardcover), $99; ISBN 9781787444393 (e-book), price varies.] Music examples, figures, tables, bibliography, index. Schubert studies have flourished in the past decade and taken an exciting turn toward reevaluating this composer’s contributions to musical culture, embracing the many ways in which he and his works opened new, distinctive avenues for musical expression and romanticism. In addition to important single-author works by Susan Wollenberg (Schubert’s Fingerprints: Studies in the Instrumental Works [Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2011]), John Gingerich (Schubert’s Beethoven Project [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014]), and Lisa Feurzeig (Schubert’s Lieder and the Philosophy of Early German Romanticism [Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2014]), several important essay collections and special issues of journals have also taken on the task of “reexamining” Schubert since 2001 (including Schubert and His World, ed. Christopher H. Gibbs and Morton Solvik [Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014]; Rethinking Schubert, ed. Lorraine Byrne Bodley and Julian Horton [New York: Oxford University Press, 2016]; and Schubert’s Late Music: History, Theory, Style, ed. Lorraine Byrne Bodley and Julian Horton [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016]). Finally, Nineteenth-Century Music Review published a special issue, “Schubert Familiar and Unfamiliar: New Perspectives,” in 2008 and a follow-up, “Schubert Familiar and Unfamiliar: Continuing Conversations,” in 2016. As editors James Sobaskie and Joe Davies note in their preface to Drama in the Music of Franz Schubert, this reexamination has often involved a remarkable [End Page 75] collegiality, bringing together performers, cultural historians, and music theorists to provide new insights into music that fascinates and delights listeners and scholars alike. The book features a veritable “who’s who” of influential writers with, on average, twenty to thirty years of experience in Schubert studies. The volume offers a fresh understanding of the concept of musical drama with thorough, engaging discussions of individual works, and it provides an appealing introduction to the major concerns of Schubert studies in the twenty-first century. The collegiality of the Schubertian community is on display throughout the book, which is filled with intertextual references that provide common threads when reading continuously from one chapter to the next. I had the charming impression of listening in on a group of accomplished scholars and musicians as they discussed music and ideas in great detail and with a catching enthusiasm. The warm dedication of the volume to Susan Wollenberg (who also contributed a brilliant essay on the lied “Adelwold und Emma,” D. 211) further emphasizes the familial quality of this collection. The book starts from the premise that traditional notions of musical “drama” based in theatrical effectiveness—particularly in relation to operatic works and their reception—do little to explain the effect of Schubert’s music on listeners, both in the modern day and in his own time. Whereas Schubert’s operatic ambitions were largely unsuccessful by the usual measures (performances, critical reactions, engagements for future works), his musical style in both texted and untexted works has always resonated in a personal way with listeners and performers. Thus, by decoupling “drama” from the theatrical stage, the contributors to this volume have opened the term to new considerations. As Laura Tunbridge notes in her introduction, the volume asks, “What did drama mean for Schubert? What does drama in Schubert mean now?” (p. 1). The answers presented here illuminate how Schubert’s music conveys tension and resolution, conflict and reconciliation, and the ebb and flow of human emotion. The thirteen essays are grouped into three sections. Part 1 deals with stage and sacred works, part 2 concerns lieder, and part 3 considers instrumental music, which in this case means string chamber music and solo piano works. Although many readers will probably encounter these essays one at a time as they seek out analysis of particular works, reading the essays of an entire “part” together gives a richer understanding of the individual components. For example, part 1 opens with a study by Lorraine Byrne Bodley on Schubert’s 1815...