Analysis of Franz Schubert’s “An Die Musik”
Franz Schubert “An Die Musik,” is one of the best-known song of Schubert which telling about
the attribution to the art of music. Its harmonic simplicity and gorgeous melody really blend together with the text which is taken from a poem by Franz von Schober. This essay will assess this beautiful piece from the aspect of harmony, phrase structure, piano accompaniment and how it works together with the text.
The piece is strophic which consists of two stanzas, with a postlude. Each stanza has four lines with a rhyme scheme of a-b-a-b and plugged in four phrases. Despite having strophic as an overall structure, each stanza is set in quatrain form where the first two lines act as antecedent and the last two lines act as consequent. The consequent-antecedent relationship can be identified by looking at the motive similarity, the harmony progression and the overall melody progression. The first two phrases have motive similarities, where both started and ended with the same motives, and the third phrase seem to alter the motive occurs before and grow the melody gesture even more to the fourth phrase and gradually resolve. The harmonic progression shows the relationship as well. The first two phrases have less harmonic progression than the last two phrases. The first phrase is ended by an ambiguous authentic cadence which gives three beats of rest before the second phrase’s melody begin. Between the second and the third phrase, there is a whole measure of piano’s chromatic bass line which emphasizes the change of role. The overall form can be seen in the following diagram
Schubert set a simple harmony progression which is played by simple piano texture and very effective bass line. The bass line really enhances the harmony. For instance in mm.10, starts with V chords in the first two beats but differ them by moving the bass up an octave, then the bass goes
o
4
down chromatically which then contributes to state vii /V and V 2 in the last two chords of the bar. The chord function of that bar is dominant, but the bass line makes it sound very colorful. In contribution to make a consequent –antecedent relationship, the harmony and the bass line move even more chromatic and more usage of secondary dominant in the last two phrases to make it gradually growing reaching the climax. Overall, the bass line works very well in supporting the passive right-hand piano texture. However, there is a change of manner occurs in the interlude (postlude), where the bass line get less active and the melody is played by the right-hand. This contrast creates the timbre change effect, between the piano low register (bass line), the voice, and then the piano higher register.
Choosing a strophic for Schober’s two stanzas poem was very appropriate according to the rhyme scheme happened in this poem. The first and the third line of each stanza end with ending – en (Stunden, entzunden – entflossen, erschlossen) . Matching the same phrase melody with the same
rhyme strengthens the sense of unity between the art of words (poem) and the art of sound(music), which makes the philosophy of this piece become even deeper. Since the idea of this poem is the attribution to the art of music which expresses by words. Schubert really knew how to handle the poem respectfully according to the linguistic approach the poem has had. He treats the last line of each stanza differently. There are repetitions of the last phrase of the line occurs which indicates something special with that words. The first three lines of each stanza are a metaphor describing of something. But the last lines are the expression of hope and gratitude which directly expressed without using a metaphor. Harmonically, the hope and the gratitude are expressed by driven harmonic progression using secondary dominants with the chromatic bass line climbing together with the melody to the climax and then move down making the sense of intimacy where the word repetition is exactly occur.
Reed, John (1985). The Schubert Song Companion. New York: Universe Books. pp. 36 –37.
