Schubert: Symphony No.4 in C minor, D.417 – “Tragische” (1816)
Adagio molto– Allegro vivace
Andante
Menuetto: Allegro vivace
Allegro
On 31st March 1824 Schubert had written to his friend, the painter Leopold Kupelwieser, to inform him that he had recently completed an octet and two string quartets, going on to declare that he wanted to write a third quartet “and thus pave my way for a grosse Symphonie” (which indeed soon proved to be the Great C major). So, despite evidence of this clearly stated goal, it may be perplexing to learn that the last ten years of his life actually presented no opportunities at all for the public performance of a new symphony. His first six had been composed at a rate of one per year, when there was an orchestra available to him either at school (the Vienna Stadtkonvikt) or at Otto Hatwig’s music salon in the Schottenhof, where the composer’s own family string quartet formed the nucleus of the band. Thereafter he actually completed only one more (the aforementioned “Great” No.9), even though he began no fewer than five others (including the famous “Unfinished”, as well as the Tenth – on which he was working right up to his death: readers may be familiar with Brian Newbould’s extraordinary performing version). No doubt there were many more being spawned in his mind, and it might not be too fanciful to speculate that the last quartets, piano trios, piano sonatas, and the C major string quintet were really all latent symphonies that could never expect to find an orchestra to play them. Prof. Newbould reminds us in his classic book on the symphonies that “…the appeal of the symphony was so strong that he never lost his commitment to it…”.
He also draws characteristically perceptive comparisons between this fourth symphony and various examples of early Beethoven, late Mozart and Haydn – by way of explaining its origins (and realisation) as a fundamentally turn-of-the-century Classical symphony (all Schubert lovers are urged to seek out a copy of this indispensable volume: “Schubert and the Symphony: A New Perspective”), yet at the same time acknowledging that he was here attempting something beyond what he had already achieved in Nos.1 to 3: first – and most obviously – is the key of C minor, the first of just two out of thirteen attempted symphonies to be cast in the minor mode (even though he had already produced more than 50 songs in minor keys). This in itself was not at all unusual at the time, especially considering both Beethoven and Mozart also left us only the two each in the minor. What is of greater significance is an expansive scale and ambition arising out of this new departure. Right from the start we are aware of a heightened drama – one that Prof Newbould traces back to the opening of Haydn’s Creation, uncannily mirrored in Schubert’s first few bars. Indeed, he may even have surprised himself at what he had done, since he was later to add the title “Tragic” only as an afterthought. This description might in the end be thought misleading, since much of the symphony is actually rather upbeat. Nevertheless, there are substantial passages of the type of Sturm und Drang (“Storm and Stress”) music which became popular during the mid-1760s/70s – emanating from a lengthy slow introduction and into the main part of the first movement proper. Yet, after the recapitulation of its second subject in the tonic major key of C, the movement ends almost joyously – as if the journey we experience in Beethoven’s Fifth has been compressed into a single movement!
Sturm und Drang does reappear for the main material of the finale, and also in the contrasting sections of an otherwise gentle, highly lyrical, and occasionally timeless Andante. Yet the Menuetto – verging on a scherzo – is nothing if not rhythmically jolly, and the symphony ends in a blazingly triumphant C major – which some might not consider particularly well earned, until we remind ourselves that, aged nineteen, Schubert was not trying to be a Beethoven, and that eighteenth century minor-key symphonies did usually end with a protracted Tierce de Picardie (i.e. moving from minor to major). Yet, the previous year this particular teenager had produced one of the great tragic masterpieces of all time: his setting of Goethe’s Erlkönig.
© Alan George
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