Conference Booklet - Music - National University of Ireland, Maynooth

Ryan McClelland (University of Toronto)
Tonal Recollection in Third Movements from Schubert’s Late Instrumental Music
In Schubert‘s late chamber music and piano sonatas, th e scherzo (or menuetto) always comes as
the third of four movements, its usual placement in such works. Moreover, in these late works
the third movement generally, though not invariably, performs its typical function of bringing
back the key of the first m ovement. These features suggest for these scherzo-type movements a
traditional conception, namely a return towards the tonal and expressive spaces inhabited by
the opening movement after the explorative slow movement. In a few instances, such as the
‗Great‘ C Major Symphony, this view holds up well under closer scrutiny, but in the majority of
Schubert‘s late works it does not.
This paper explores tonal anomalies of Schubert‘s late scherzo-type movements from the
perspective of both of the preceding movements. In many instances – especially the two piano
trios and the string quintet – it is the slow movement rather than the first movement that
provides the better interpretive context for modulation and chromaticism in the third
movement. When the opening movement has the closer connection to the third movement‘s
anomalies, the type in question is most often an unusual coordination of large-scale tonal and
thematic returns (as in the ‗Death and the Maiden‘ Quartet and the last piano sonata). In
presenting these and other inter-movement relationships, the paper moves beyond structural
observation and considers expressive concerns. When a chromatic detail or formal-tonal schism
occurs in an initial or slow movement, what is its musical impact? And when this even t recurs
in the third movement, is its effect largely similar or different? Drawing principally on
hypermetric, textural, and dynamic cues, I argue the importance of attention to expressive
function in order to appreciate more meaningfully the role that th ese shared structural features
play in the global expressive trajectories of Schubert‘s late four-movement instrumental works.
Matt Steinbron (University of Louisiana at Lafayette)
Remnants of Polyfocal Tonality in Schubert’s Late Lieder
Before the later nineteenth century, the principle governing nearly all earlier tonal composition
was monotonality. Some composers (notably Schubert) allow two or more keys to coexist
within the same composition, each salient enough to render a monotonal understanding o f the
composition problematic. Such tonal structures exhibit what is known as polyfocal tonality, also
known as directional tonality. Approximately 13% of Schubert‘s Lieder are polyfocal, but only
one polyfocal song w as composed between 1824-1828. In this paper, I will examine the decline
of polyfocal tonality over Schubert‘s evolution as a song composer as well as the features of
polyfocal structure that remain as artifacts in his late Lieder.
Common features of Schubert‘s polyfocal style will be presented, including tonal
allusions, oscillation, relationships between prominent keys, and modulation techniques. To
best present these features, I will use my own method of analysis that combines Schenkerian
analysis with interpretive approaches derived from the w ork of Edward T. Cone, Harald Krebs,
and Patrick McCreless. Borrowing from Cone, I will present graphic analyses that represent the
songs‘ polyfocal structure as a synthesis of diachronic and synchronic interpretations; thus my
method of polyfocal analysis is analogous to Cone‘s third reading.
Many of Schubert‘s late Lieder exhibit polyfocal features, but after 1823 he seems to lose
the urge to create truly polyfocal structures. Late Lieder with polyfocal remnants that will be
examined include Am Fenster (D. 878), Das Weinen (D. 926), Vor meiner Wiege (D. 927), Der
Wallensteiner Lanzknecht beim Trunk (D. 931), Der Kreuzzug (D. 932), Der Winterabend (D. 938), Auf
dem Strom (D. 943), and selections from Winterreise (D. 911).