Classical Music | Mezzo-Soprano

Recorded on 11/06/2010, uploaded on 11/06/2010

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Frauenliebe und -leben, op. 42        Robert Schumann

Likely inspired by the events of his own courtship of Clara Wieck, Schumann's song cycle Frauenliebe und -leben (A Women's Love and Life) was composed in 1840, known as his "Year of Song" and the year of his marriage to Clara. Based on the poem cycle by the German poet Adelbert von Chamisso written in 1830, it tells the story of a woman's love for her man from their first meeting to beyond his death. Schumann selected eight poems from Chamisso's cycle to set to music.

As with many of Schumann's Lieder, the piano plays a crucial role in portraying the mood of the poem. As a result, the piano accompaniment possesses a strong independence from the voice, yet simultaneously creates a more unified, artistic whole by subtly enhancing the mood of the lyric and, in some cases, even giving expression to that which is not easily brought about in words alone.

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The third song of the set, "Ich kann's nicht fassen, nicht glauben" ("I cannot grasp or believe it"), portrays the narrator's disbelief that she has gained the love of her man and believes she is living in a dream. Moving to the key of C minor, the voice is set against a mainly chordal accompaniment at times staccato, at others legato. The third stanza brings a brief glimpse of the relative major before the first stanza and the key of C minor return. In "Du Ring an meinem Finger" ("Thou ring on my finger"), the fourth song, the narrator muses about her engagement ring. Schumann's settings is intensely lyrical and marked with the special indication "innig" ("intimate").              Joseph DuBose