this lively Singspiel, Schubert had embarked in something far more serious, a regular 3-act opera of the 'heroico-romantic' pattern—also with spoken dialogue—the scene laid in Spain, with Moors, knights, a king, a king's daughter, and all the usual furniture of these dreary compilations. The libretto of 'Fierabras,' by Josef Kupelwieser—enough of itself to justify all[1] Wagner's charges against the opera books of the old school—was commissioned by Barbaja for the Court-theatre. The book was passed by the Censure on July 21; but Schubert had by that time advanced far in his labours, and had in fact completed more than half of the piece. He began it, as his own date tells us, on May 25. Act I, filling 304 pages of large oblong paper,[2] was completely scored by the 31st of the month; Act 2, in 5 days more, by June 5; and the whole 3 acts, fully 1000 pages, and containing an overture and 23 numbers, were entirely out of hand by Oct. 2. And all for nothing! Schubert was not even kept long in suspense, for early in the following year he learnt that the work had been dismissed. The ground for its rejection was the badness of the libretto; but knowing Barbaja's character, and seeing that Kupelwieser was secretary to a rival house (the Josefstadt), it is difficult not to suspect that the commission had been given by the wily Italian, merely to facilitate the progress of some piece of business between the two establishments.
It is, as Liszt has remarked, extraordinary that Schubert, who was brought up from his youth on the finest poetry, should have unhesitatingly accepted the absurd and impracticable librettos which he did, and which have kept in oblivion so much of his splendid music. His devotion to his friends, and his irrepressible desire to utter what was in him, no doubt help to explain the anomaly, but an anomaly it will always remain. It is absolutely distressing to think of such extraordinary ability, and such still more extraordinary powers of work, being so cruelly thrown away, and of the sickening disappointment which these repeated failures must have entailed on so simple and sensitive a heart as his. Fortunately for us the strains in which he vents his griefs are as beautiful and endearing as those in which he celebrates his joys:—
He wore no less a loving face
Because so broken hearted.
His work this summer was not however to be all disappointment. If the theatre turned a deaf ear to his strains there were always his beloved songs to confide in, and they never deceived him. Of the Song in Schubert's hands we may say what Wordsworth so well says of the Sonnet:—
With this key
Shakespeare unlocked his heart; the melody
Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's wound.*********and when a damp
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand
The thing became a trumpet, whence he blew
Soul-animating strains, alas too few!
—with the notable difference that it was given to Schubert to gather up and express, in his one person and his one art, all the various moods and passions which Wordsworth has divided amongst so many mighty poets.
And now, in the midst of the overwhelming tumult and absorption which inevitably accompany the production of so large a work of imagination as a three-act opera, brought into being at so extraordinarily rapid a pace, he was to stop, and to indite a set of songs, which though not of greater worth than many others of his, are yet so intelligible, so expressive, address themselves to such universal feelings, and form so attractive a whole, that they have certainly become more popular, and are more widely and permanently beloved, than any similar production by any other composer. We have already described the incident through which Schubert made acquaintance with the Müller-lieder[3] of Wilhelm Müller, twenty of which he selected for the beautiful series or 'Cyclus,' so widely known as the 'Schöne Müllerin.' We have seen the enduring impatience with which he attacked a book when it took his fancy, and the eagerness with which he began upon this particular one. We know that the Müller-lieder were all composed this year; that some of them were written in hospital; that No. 15 is dated 'October'; that a considerable interval elapsed between the 2nd and 3rd Act of 'Fierabras'—probably the best part of July and August. Putting these facts together it seems to follow that the call on Randhartinger (see p. 327a) and the composition of the first numbers of the 'Schöne Müllerin' took place in May, before he became immersed in 'Fierabras.' Then came the first two Acts of that opera; then his illness, and his sojourn in the hospital, and more songs; then the third Act of the opera; and lastly the completion of the Lieder.
Be this as it may, there was no lack of occupation for Schubert after he had put 'Fierabras' out of hand. Weber arrived in Vienna late in September 1823, and on Oct. 3 began the rehearsals of 'Euryanthe'; and for a month the musical world of Austria was in a ferment. After the first performance, on Oct. 25, Weber and Schubert came somewhat into collision. Schubert, with characteristic frankness, asserted that the new work wanted the geniality and grace of 'Der Freischütz,' that its merit lay mainly in its harmony,[4] and that he was prepared to prove that the score did not contain a single original melody. Weber had been much tried by the rehearsals, by the growing conviction that his work was too long, and by the imperfect success of the performance; and with a combination of ignorance and insolence which does him no credit replied, 'Let the fool learn something himself before he criticises me.' Schubert's answer to this was to
- ↑ Hanslick, 'Concertsaal,' 150.
- ↑ The autograph was shown to Mr. Sullivan and the writer by that energetic Schubert apostle, Herr Johann Herbeck, in 1868.
- ↑ The Müller-lieder, 23 in number, with Prologue and Epilogue in addition, are contained in the 1st vol. of the 'Gedichte aus den hinterlassenen Papieren eines reisenden Waldhornisten' (Poems found among the papers of a travelling French-horn-player), which were first published at Dessau, 1821. Schubert has omitted the Prologue and Epilogue, and 3 poems—'Das Mühlenleben' after 'Der Neugierige'; 'Erster Schmerz, letzter Scherz,' after 'Eifersucht und Stolz'; and 'Blumlein Vergissmein' after 'Die böse Farbe.'
- ↑ See Mendelssohn's opinion, in 'The Mendelssohn Family,' i. 237.
