Robert Schumann: The Book of Songs

Arguably no other nineteenth-century German composer was as literate or as finely attuned to setting verse as Robert Schumann. Jon W. Finson challenges long-standing assumptions about Schumann's Lieder, engaging traditionally held interpretations. He argues against the belief that the "Year of Song" simply reflects Schumann's personal life. Finson also devotes attention to the form and metric structure of German poetry that is almost entirely new to the discussion of Schumann's songs.

CONTENIDO

Preface

Part I: Schumann's Early Songs and the Lieder of his first maturity
Introduction: Schumann's Criticism and Early Lieder
1. Songs of marriage
2. Irony and the Heine Cycles
3. Cycles of Wandering
4. Romances, Ballads, and the Via Media
5. Lyrical Schemes: Collections of Earlier Lieder und Gesänge

Part II: Schumann's Later Songs
6. The Advent of the "New Style" and the later cycles
7. Poets in Review during the later years
8. Collections in the New Style
Epilogue: Reception of the late Style
Abbrevations
Notes
Editions of Music Consulted and Selected Bibliography
Index of Song Titles and Text Incipits
General Index