Schumann's musical aesthetics

[fnork]

For no particular reason at all, I felt like reading through my old masters thesis done this spring on Schumann's musical aesthetics, and thought I'd share it here just in case any Schumann fans would be interested. Several things I would probably rewrite, other things are fairly decently written. It's downloadable here for anyone that would be interested in this quite fascinating topic:

https://rapidshare.com/#!download|354p2|3678849038|SchumannA%CC%82%C2%B4s%20musical%20aesthetics%20-%20Final%20version.doc|355|0|0

The paper is some 20+ pages or so, so just a brief outline about the content:

Schumann and his music has been suffering from some confusion with regards to meaning and content, confusion which came about already when Schumann was still a young composer. Why otherwise would he have abandoned (more or less entirely, though there are some exceptions) his poetical titles, which are to be found in his early piano works? Through Schumann's prolific writings on music, letters, essays and reviews, we get a clear picture of a composer who is very much against actual program music (in the paper, I'm mainly referring to his reviews of Berlioz Symphonie fantastique and Beethoven's Pastoral symphony), and yet, he himself repeatedly gave titles to his compositions, and he frequently referred to his music being inspired by non-musical works of art. What differentiates Schumann in his ways of suggesting an extra-musical side to his works from other composers of the time who wrote pure "program music" (ie Berlioz)? My paper, which initially was to be simply about Schumann's early piano works, ended up hoping to answer some of these questions, to which there aren't always clear-cut answers. Having no particular reader in mind, I tried to write the paper to suit also someone who not necessarily would know an awful lot about Schumann, and thus, the paper sort of goes through his life little by little. I was mainly interested in looking at his literary idols - ETA Hoffman and Jean Paul, and how they came to influence his own musical thinking. The parallels one can draw between Schumann and these two figures are truly striking. The conclusion, towards the end of the paper, might be worth quoting here:

"I hope that it has come across clearly in my work how Schumann created something new and unheard of in music modeled partially on his inspirational sources. In the writings of Jean Paul and ETA Hoffmann he found a special kinship and managed, very successfully, to create new musical forms partly modeled on their writings. In this regard, Schumann went far not only in terms of structuring music, but also in its content and in his use of the invented characters Florestan and Eusebius, letting them represent different sides of his music. Furthermore we can see, after closely reading through his writings and letters, how he managed to put to words the special relation that music had with other art forms. He showed clearly how there was a large grey area between the world of pre-determined so-called "program music" and that of "absolute music", and it was somewhere in this grey-zone - where music was allowed to have some meaning which nevertheless would remain vague - that Schumann felt at home."

[magic_hands]

Thank you for such an informative read. This is what piano forums should be about, though I don't know how much attention this'll get here considering the antagonism in these threads against the Schumann.

Unfortunately I haven't had time to read your whole essay, though I have downloaded it for a later time. Are you a pianist yourself? If so, which works do you play? I personally have always struggled with how I feel about the composer. I have never downright fallen in love with any of his pieces, though have had dalliances with his Symphonic Etudes and piano trios. Is there anything I can do to feel the same veneration that so many great musical minds have? Maybe I'll just have to accept I may never understand.

With regards to your essay, I'm not quite understand what you meant by him being in the grey area (I thought Schumann was the torch bearer of programme music...), I think I may have to read your essay soon

[evitaevita]

I'd like to thank you wholeheartedly for your post. I really appreciate your work.

This is what piano forums should be about

+1

Unfortunately, I didn't have enough time to read the whole essay and write about it, but when I can, I'll be back!

Evitaevita

[fnork]

With regards to your essay, I'm not quite understand what you meant by him being in the grey area (I thought Schumann was the torch bearer of programme music...), I think I may have to read your essay soon

Whenever you get time to read it, you might take note of how actively Schumann OPPOSED program music. That is not to say that he didn't believe that music didn't carry extra-musical meaning, in fact, that's what one could argue that his music is usually about. I could argue further about it, but better read the paper whenever you have time.