Recapitulatory Compressions in Some Texted and Instrumental Works by Schubert

Abstract

The thematic organization of musical reprises and recapitulations has not received as much attention as that of expositions. One reason for this is the assumption that recapitulations are simply retracings of thematic paths already plotted in the exposition, with their tonal profiles adjusted to remain in the tonic. The present article seeks to complexify this view by devoting analytic and interpretive attention to a handful of refrains, reprises, and recapitulations that feature deletions of some of their referential thematic material. My primary claims are, first, that such recapitulatory compressions afford feelings of temporal and perspectival distortion (such as “too soon” or “too close” or “too large”) to listeners and to virtual protagonists, and second, that they work in concert with aspects of the presented content of the movements at hand—text, topic, mode, and so on—to project complex and multifaceted musical narratives. Examples come from poetry, song, and instrumental music and include Goethe's “Erster Verlust” and Schubert's setting of it (D. 226); Müller's “Täuschung” and “Die Nebensonnen” and Schubert's settings of them (D. 911); and Schubert's Allegro in A minor for Four hands, “Lebensstürme,” D. 947.