The Schubert collection
Visitors unfamiliar with Schubert can get an accessible overview of his life and thematic lists of the articles about him on this website here: Beginning Schubert.
The short, Schubert-related entries in the monthly scrapbooks (marked in pale blue) are also included in the list. The order of the entries is latest to earliest. This collection differs from the list produced by selecting the category 'Schubert', in that the 'Schubert Collection' includes some extended comments on the contents of some of the entries.
The entries marked in light grey are introductions to multiple-page articles; their component articles are listed immediately following them, marked with lighter grey.
141 articles listed.
Schubert's syphilis revisited (yet again)
A critical review of One night with Venus, a lifetime with mercury
Richard Law UTC 2026-02-04 09:12
Words: 5,258; reading time: 23 minutes
Schubert on tour
A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schubert in Graz, der Steiermark, Niederösterreich und dem Burgendland.
Richard Law UTC 2023-07-10 14:22
Words: 692; reading time: 3 minutes
Broadening the mind
Some reflections on Franz Schubert's travels in Austria and his path to the inner exile.
Richard Law UTC 2022-05-02 04:14
Words: 2,678; reading time: 12 minutes
Schubert on tour
A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schuberts Aufenthalte in Oberösterreich, Salzburg und Umgebung.
Richard Law UTC 2022-04-30 06:21
Words: 1,547; reading time: 7 minutes
Schubert in da hood
Franz Schubert growing up with family, friends and neighbours in a close-knit community. [8 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 25,742; reading time: 1 hour 57 minutes
Updated on 2026-04-01
Making a start at a reconstruction of Franz Peter Schubert's life in his family and neighbourhood:
—Brothers and sisters from the east
—The two Schubert families
—The Schubert family businesses
—Ignaz and Elisabeth Wagner
—Michael Holzer
—The Grob family
—The female factor
—The family bond
Brothers and sisters from the east
The Schubert brothers and the Vietz sisters find their way to Vienna.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 2,610; reading time: 11 minutes
The two Schubert families
The Leopoldstadt and the Himmelpfortgrund Schuberts.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 1,450; reading time: 6 minutes
The Schubert family businesses
Surfing the wave of educational reform in the Austrian Empire.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 4,508; reading time: 20 minutes
Ignaz and Elisabeth Wagner
The close friends from the east.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 2,902; reading time: 13 minutes
Michael Holzer
The choirmaster in Lichtental, Schubert's first music teacher.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 3,895; reading time: 17 minutes
The Grob family
The Swiss silk-weaving families in Lichtental
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 3,438; reading time: 15 minutes
The female factor
The female community in Himmelpfortgrund, Lichtental and Rossau.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 2,091; reading time: 9 minutes
Updated on 2026-04-22
The family bond
A close family despite their differences.
Richard Law UTC 2020-07-08 14:24
Words: 3,671; reading time: 16 minutes
Updated on 2026-04-01
Scrapbook for June
Lieder evening in Vienna | 'Latest comments' change | Barn wall smiley
UTC 2020-06-01 02:01
Words: 162; reading time: 1 minute
Hidden Schubert
The Schubert materials we can't show you.
Richard Law UTC 2020-05-29 10:44
Words: 930; reading time: 4 minutes
The Atzenbrugg enlightenment
A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schubert und sein Freundeskreis in den Schlössern Atzenbrugg und Aumühle.
Richard Law UTC 2020-05-19 09:33
Words: 5,404; reading time: 24 minutes
Franz Schubert und sein Freundeskreis in den Schlössern Atzenbrugg und Aumühle
Announcing a recent book by Oliver Woog, the concert guitarist and Schubert researcher, which throws new light on the party life of the young Schubert crowd.
Richard Law UTC 2020-05-11 10:11
Words: 488; reading time: 2 minutes
Scrapbook for April
Who's that train? | Schubert portrait 'Young Franz Schubert'
UTC 2020-04-01 02:01
Words: 592; reading time: 2 minutes
Scrapbook for March
COVID-19 sanity check | Disgusting | Thuggery | New site navigation | Saint Joseph's Day | Can the UK National Health Service cope with COVID-19? | Do not touch me, woman | Two inspectors call | And don't step in the excrement | Country music for the doolally | The Schubert guide to handwashing | Before social media
UTC 2020-03-01 02:01
Words: 1,893; reading time: 8 minutes
Du bist die Ruh, swipe right edition
A lonely reader of the New York Review of Books looking for Miss Perfect.
Prudence Crowther UTC 2020-02-09 10:04
Words: 521; reading time: 2 minutes
A lonely hearts advertisement in the New York Review of Books gets a Schubertian response.
Du bist die Ruh D 776
Another masterpiece from Friedrich Rückert's Oestliche Rosen (1819/1822), masterfully set to music by Franz Schubert (1823/1826).
Richard Law UTC 2020-02-09 10:04
Words: 3,905; reading time: 17 minutes
Behind Rückert's superficial charm and simplicity there is great skill and expressive power. Schubert's setting of Rückert's poem is a work of genius worthy of the work of genius that is the text. Nevertheless, the depths and subtleties of Rückert's original are often overlooked or misunderstood.
Jägers Liebeslied D 909
Franz von Schober's much ado about nothing sinks without trace, taking Schubert's rubber ring with it.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-24 09:03
Words: 2,860; reading time: 13 minutes
Franz von Schober (1796-1882) wrote the poem Jägers Liebeslied, date unknown. It was set to music by Schubert in February 1827. The text of the poem presents us with many problems. Schubert's setting takes over all these problems and adds a further layer of musical problems. Whereas Schubert's musical genius elevated many mediocre or bad texts into worthwhile songs, Schober's poem brought Schubert's music down to its own inconsequential level.
Die Sterne D 939
Musical mission impossible: Leitner's terrible poem and Schubert's attempted rescue.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-20 14:15
Words: 1,895; reading time: 8 minutes
Carl Gottfried Ritter von Leitner (1800-1890) wrote the poem Die Sterne, 'The Stars', in 1819. It was set to music by Schubert in January 1828. In 1828 the song found its way into Opus 96, the album of four songs that was dedicated to Charlotte Princess Kinsky. The quality of Leitner's poem is terrible – what we might expect of a nineteen year-old dilettante. Schubert did his best to rescue the piece, but his best was not good enough. The question remains: why did he set this terrible poem to music?
Franz Schubert and Franz von Schlechta
Cracking the door, but just a little bit.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-17 16:43
Words: 4,553; reading time: 20 minutes
The biographical links between Franz Schubert and Franz von Schlechta stretch from their first meeting (probably in the Vienna Stadtkonvikt in 1813) to Schlechta's elegy written just after Schubert's death. Although Schlechta does not appear to be one of the prominent members of the circle of friends around Schubert, the length of his relationship with Schubert suggests an area of social activity outside the immediate, well-known Schubert circle.
Fischerweise D 881
Franz Xaver Freiherr Schlechta von Wssehrd's mediocre poem, rescued by Franz Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-15 10:21
Words: 4,770; reading time: 21 minutes
A textual and contextual analysis of Schlechta's poem, a lyric out of which Schubert managed to create one of his most entertaining songs.
Schubert portrait Whac-A-Mole
As soon as we whack one, another one pops up.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-05 10:48
Words: 6,876; reading time: 31 minutes
Updated on 2020-02-16
An examination of the claim that an 1827 painting by the Hungarian artist Gábor von Melegh (1801-1835) is a portrait of Franz Schubert. The detailed iconography of the painting does not support this conclusion. No direct evidence for the attribution exists and all the circumstantial evidence presented to this day does no stand examination.
Ueber allen Gipfeln Ist Ruh' D 768
One genius stands on another's shoulders: Goethe and Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2020-01-01 08:14
Words: 10,235; reading time: 46 minutes
A text interpretation of Goethe's magnificent poem Wandrers Nachtlied II, (Ein gleiches) (1780) and a look at some of the legends which surround its creation. The poem was set magnificently to music by Franz Schubert as D 768 in 1823.
Schubert in love
Four trembling hands in F minor.
Richard Law UTC 2019-12-21 08:16
Words: 4,864; reading time: 22 minutes
An examination of the traces of Franz Schubert's great passion for Caroline, Countess Esterházy in 1828 and the dedication to her of the four-handed Fantasy in F minor, Opus 103, D 940.
Chillin' with the Kinskys
Joseph von Spaun touches his forelock.
Richard Law UTC 2019-12-18 08:02
Words: 8,827; reading time: 40 minutes
Recovering Franz Schubert's concert evening for Princess Charlotte Kinsky in 1828 from Joseph Spaun's obfuscation. A discussion of the concert, which was held in Vienna around the beginning of July 1828 and which involved Schubert and Schönstein and led to the dedication to her of the group of four Schubert songs, Opus 96.
Another Schubert portrait turns up
Well, its got the specs at least, but nothing else.
Richard Law UTC 2019-10-17 07:19
Words: 1,477; reading time: 6 minutes
Last year an auction house in California sold a painting done in 1831 by the little known artist Josef Bartholomeus Vieillevoye (1788-1855). The auction house titled the piece 'A portrait of the composer Franz Schubert'. It is easy to demonstrate that the portrait cannot possibly be of Franz Schubert, if only for the reason that Schubert had already been decomposing for nearly three years at the time the portrait was painted.
Scrapbook for September
The Brexit deal explained | On the rug edge | Half-baked | Dim and dimmer | Greta Thunberg: climate victim | Home page illustrations | Die Schöne Müllerin website
UTC 2019-09-01 02:01
Words: 1,273; reading time: 5 minutes
A Schwanengesang website
Will this delusion ever end? Doesn't look like it.
Richard Law UTC 2019-09-29 10:08
Words: 781; reading time: 3 minutes
The collection of Schubert songs marketed under the weepy label Schwanengesang should be allowed to fade into oblivion. Unfortunately, a new website has been created as a 'Schwanengesang resource'.
The trembling aspen
A look at the literary and musical life of a Populus tremula, with a contribution from Franz Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2019-09-27 14:12
Words: 7,116; reading time: 32 minutes
Updated on 2025-07-28
A review of the background and usage of the simile zittern wie Espenlaub, 'tremble like aspen leaves' as it occurs in German and English culture. The review culminates with an appreciation of Franz Schubert's masterly setting of Johann Gaudenz von Salis-Seewis' poem, Der Jüngling and der Quelle (D 300).
Dr Rita Steblin
An obituary notice for the Beethoven and Schubert scholar.
Richard Law UTC 2019-09-13 10:13
Words: 320; reading time: 1 minute
The Canadian musicologist Dr Rita Steblin died in Vienna on 3 September 2019 year. Her death at only sixty-eight is a loss to Beethoven and Schubert scholarship, but she leaves behind a considerable corpus of archival research which has substantially advanced our understanding of these two composers in particular.
Franz Schubert and Ludwig Rellstab
Yet more Schwanengesang nonsense. Seven execrable poems, six desperate settings, one super hit.
Richard Law UTC 2019-09-09 14:27
Words: 9,402; reading time: 42 minutes
Updated on 2020-10-22
Ludwig Rellstab was a fourth-rate writer, whose prose and verse works were soon forgotten after his death, deservedly so. Franz Schubert set six of Rellstab's poems to music in 1828; his settings were published posthumously as part of the Schwanengesang collection. This article analyses in detail the defects of Rellstab's lyrics. Schubert's settings are also uninspired, except for Ständchen, 'Leise flehen meine Lieder', which somehow managed to transcend the incompetence of the text to create one of Schubert's greatest hits.
Heinrich Heine and Franz Schubert
Two worlds collide.
Richard Law UTC 2019-08-26 09:07
Words: 6,392; reading time: 29 minutes
A look at fourteen of Heine's poems from Die Heimkehr, selected from the nearly ninety poems that Schubert did not set to music in his group of Heinelieder. Although Schubert's choice of poems seems largely to have been the result of his depressed, Winterreise state, other considerations may have been important. We examine Heine's texts in terms of their suitability in tone and content for a Schubertian setting. With Heine's poetry in Die Heimkehr we have moved decisively out of the Romantic period and its Biedermeier conventions. The belljar of repressive censorship over Austria at the time would have made almost all of Heine's poems unpublishable there. In such a cultural climate there was no incentive for Schubert to experiment in the representation of new tones and moods in song.
Franz Schubert and Heinrich Heine
Dismantling Schwanengesang — and about time, too.
Richard Law UTC 2019-08-14 17:12
Words: 18,353; reading time: 1 hour 23 minutes
Updated on 2019-09-15
Schwanengesang is a brand name thought up by a Viennese music publisher after Schubert's death. It consists of fourteen settings: seven of poems by Ludwig Rellstab, six of poems by Heinrich Heine and one of a poem by Johann Gabriel Seidl. The collection lacks all coherence and in a sane world would not be considered as a musical whole. Furthermore, Schubert's settings of the six poems from Heine's Die Heimkehr do not succeed in finding a musical correlative to Heine's complex, ironic verse and cannot be regarded as successful settings.
Scrapbook for June
Boris the Card | Lindenbaum | The choice is theirs | News from the asylum | The last insanity
UTC 2019-06-01 02:01
Words: 863; reading time: 3 minutes
Schubert the Insignificant
Time to get rid of the 'Circles of Friends'. While we are about it, let's cast a gimlet eye on the Schubertiaden, those instruments of exploitation and oppression.
Richard Law UTC 2019-06-21 08:21
Words: 6,435; reading time: 29 minutes
Schubert was a social nonentity for the whole of his life. That state of irrelevance continued for at least thirty years after his death. Schubert's 'greatness', 'fame' or 'significance' is an entirely modern phenomenon, one that really only came into being by about the beginning of the 20th century. A serious biographical account has to avoid inflating his early insignificance with his later fame.
Diving deep into Goethe's Der Fischer
Keeping cool on the bottom with the eighteen year-old Franz Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2019-06-08 16:51
Words: 8,922; reading time: 40 minutes
Updated on 2019-06-12
Goethe's 1778 poem Der Fischer, 'The Angler': an analysis of its subtle metrics, an interpretation of its content and its biographical context. The poem was masterfully set to music by the 18 year-old Franz Schubert in 1815 (D 225).
How many people listen to Schubert's music these days?
Not many.
Richard Law UTC 2019-06-02 14:03
Words: 1,945; reading time: 8 minutes
How 'great' is Schubert in the current state of classical music? An investigation of Schubert's representation in Classic FM's 'Ultimate Hall of Fame'
Not a portrait of Franz Schubert
Let's sort it all out, once and for all.
Richard Law UTC 2019-05-23 08:21
Words: 9,494; reading time: 43 minutes
Updated on 2019-05-28
The 'Abel' portrait of 'The Young Schubert' does not depict Schubert, young or old. It is time to abandon this delusion and look at the interesting role that the painting seems to have played in the Nonsense Society in the years around 1817-1818.
Franz Schubert's Mensch
What did the preacher in Zseliz mean?
Richard Law UTC 2019-05-13 08:42
Words: 4,697; reading time: 21 minutes
Updated on 2019-05-14
An investigation of the meaning of the word das Mensch put into the mouth of a preacher in Zseliz by Schubert in a letter written to his brothers in 1818. What would be the best English equivalent?
Scrapbook for April
Blending in | David Lama | Sunday morning coming down | Lest we forget | To leave or not to leave…
UTC 2019-04-01 02:01
Words: 1,339; reading time: 6 minutes
All things Winterreise
An impressive new website for the Schubert/Müller song cycle.
Richard Law UTC 2019-04-11 08:07
Words: 302; reading time: 1 minute
Updated on 2019-07-16
Wilhelm Müller's 'three suns'
Memories of Die Winterreise in the current northern hemisphere cold snap.
Richard Law UTC 2019-02-01 11:04
Words: 1,197; reading time: 5 minutes
Revisiting Wilhelm Müller's poem Die Nebensonnen, poem 23 in the Winterreise song cycle. Is the optical phenomenon of very cold winters, 'sun dogs', the factual basis for Müller's imagery in the poem?
Dass sie hier gewesen D 775: Rückert and Schubert
Two lyrical geniuses at work.
Richard Law UTC 2019-01-16 15:29
Words: 2,828; reading time: 12 minutes
An analysis of Friedrich Rückert's poem Daß der Ostwind Düfte, which Schubert set as Dass sie hier gewesen . The poem is a tour de force interpretation of the poetry of the medieval Persian writer, Hafez. Both the language and symbolism of the poem demand careful reading and consideration.
Alinde D 904: Rochlitz and Schubert
A lesson in metrical magic from the master.
Richard Law UTC 2018-12-03 13:12
Words: 5,364; reading time: 24 minutes
An analysis of Johann Friedrich Rochlitz's poem Alinde and Schubert's remarkable musical setting of it. The poem marks the transition from fixed Classical metrical forms to flexible speech forms and Schubert responded masterfully to the complex challenge of setting it to music.
19 November 1828: the death of Franz Schubert
190 years ago – time to be rational.
Richard Law UTC 2018-11-18 14:46
Words: 8,774; reading time: 39 minutes
An examination of the chronology of the four months leading up to Franz Schubert's death on 19 November 1828 as well as the medical assessment of Schubert's general ill-health and the immediate cause of death, typhoid fever.
Ballet Zürich's Winterreise
Great despair – and that's only the audience.
Richard Law UTC 2018-10-15 17:55
Words: 210; reading time: 1 minute
Gay days in Old Vienna?
Oh no, not that again! [3 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-30 22:30
Words: 10,597; reading time: 48 minutes
A partial investigation into the suggestions that there was endemic homosexuality or bisexuality among Schubert and the other members of the circles of friends. The article looks firstly at the history of the concept of homosexuality in German speaking countries; secondly, the reaction to homosexual behaviour in Biedermeier times as presented in the 'Poets' War' between Heinrich Heine and August von Platen; and thirdly some aspects of Biedermeier life and the culture of Empfindsamkeit that might be mistakenly interpreted as homosexual behaviour.
Deviant deed or personality type?
Writing about homosexuality when there wasn't any.
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-30 22:31
Words: 1,504; reading time: 6 minutes
Warm beds and elevated feelings
Sublime thoughts, openly expressed.
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-30 22:33
Words: 3,909; reading time: 17 minutes
Updated on 2019-09-30
How to write a big book in two days
Professor Julian Horton shows us how.
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-19 17:02
Words: 1,045; reading time: 4 minutes
A late and not altogether serious review of Professor Julian Horton's 2015 book Schubert, a book suitable only for holders of gold and platinum credit cards.
Schubert's downward spiral, 1827
Driven to despair by a fourteen-year-old girl, apparently.
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-17 11:18
Words: 9,062; reading time: 41 minutes
Updated on 2018-09-18
Schubert's alleged unrequited passion for Augusta Grünwedel; many questions, few answers. Did he really order a certificate of baptism in 1827? If so, why? And if he had really proposed marriage to someone, who was it?
Franz Schubert in search of lost time
Does happiness linger in places? No.
Richard Law UTC 2018-09-01 16:37
Words: 10,917; reading time: 49 minutes
Updated on 2018-09-07
Schubert's second stay with the Esterházy family in Zseliz in the summer and autumn of 1824. A break from the bleakness of life in Vienna, where so many of his friends were absent. The mystery of the relationship between Schubert and Countess Caroline, unsolved to this day, despite new details of her brief and unsuccessful marriage.
Rolling the bacterial dice in Old Vienna
Ah, Treponema pallidum pallidum! — and who's your pretty friend?
Richard Law UTC 2018-08-23 15:17
Words: 10,540; reading time: 47 minutes
Schubert's syphilis infection. It appeared at the beginning of 1823 and caused him two years' distress of varying intensity. He was unlucky: the disease appears to have dogged and depressed him until the end of his life, but despite that it never really brought the Schubert composing machine to a standstill.
Franz Schubert below stairs
July-November 1818: 200 years ago in Hungary.
Richard Law UTC 2018-07-08 16:22
Words: 19,038; reading time: 1 hour 26 minutes
Updated on 2019-05-08
An investigation into Franz Schubert's first stay as music master for the Esterházy de Galántha family at their country house in Zseliz in Hungary in the summer and autumn of 1818. It was a youthful travel adventure with a holiday romance thrown in, but in the end he was glad to get back to his beloved Vienna.
3 June 1828: Fugue at midnight
Franz Schubert once again working for nothing, 190 years ago.
Richard Law UTC 2018-06-03 11:22
Words: 5,324; reading time: 24 minutes
Updated on 2018-06-27
The mysterious excursion to the Monastery of Heiligenkreuz to play Ignaz Kober's famous organ there. Schubert composed a four-handed fugue for the occasion. Schubert's perceived deficits in fugal composition and his efforts to remedy them.
26 March 1828: Schubert's only concert
A breakthrough for Franz 190 years ago that came just too late.
Richard Law UTC 2018-03-22 09:54
Words: 3,998; reading time: 18 minutes
Franz Schubert's only public concert, on 26 March 1828. A success that even generated some income, despite competition from Paganini's concert series, but which was never held again.
Midnight, 21 February 1818
On this day 200 years ago, Franz Schubert was drunk in charge of an inkpot.
Richard Law UTC 2018-02-21 00:01
Words: 6,383; reading time: 29 minutes
Exploring the famous 'ink-blot' autograph of Schubert's Die Forelle, 'The Trout' – as well as the many other autographs extant.
Franz Schubert's 31st birthday
31 January 1828. Celebrating his last birthday with a big hit.
Richard Law UTC 2018-01-30 08:32
Words: 1,313; reading time: 5 minutes
Franz Schubert's acclaimed setting of Ave Maria . Yet one more great hit that became popular only after his death. Spiritual feelings from the anti-clerical composer that even surprised his father.
January 1818: Franz Schubert dodges the draft
Saved for musical posterity by three quarters of an inch.
Richard Law UTC 2018-01-24 17:15
Words: 1,087; reading time: 4 minutes
Updated on 2018-02-14
The assessment of Schubert's suitability for the life of a soldier as recorded in the registration and conscription sheet for the Schubert family on their move to the new school in Rossau. Fortunately, Franz was not cut out for the job, as was apparent at the first glance.
The mystery of Schubert's Unfinished Symphony
A tour of words in single quotation marks, such as 'given', 'acquired', 'stolen', 'hidden', 'lost', 'found', 'unknown' and 'discovered'.
Richard Law UTC 2017-10-17 15:28
Words: 7,214; reading time: 32 minutes
The complex and uncertain history of Symphony No. 7 (or No. 8), D 759, the Unfinished Symphony. Was it unfinished, unfinishable, forgotten or did it require no further finish?
Goethe's Heidenröslein
Surviving a little prick.
Richard Law UTC 2017-06-01 11:05
Words: 11,463; reading time: 52 minutes
Updated on 2017-07-25
The complex and uncertain history of the text of Goethe's Heidenröslein, brilliantly set to music by Franz Schubert (D 257), including a close analyis of the text. The poem has entered the German psyche, but is also remembered for settings by other composers in the tradition of the Volkslied.
Christian Schubart: the prison years
The author of Die Forelle gets taught a lesson. [10 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:40
Words: 20,749; reading time: 1 hour 34 minutes
Schubart's dungeon cell in Hohenasperg
Now you see it, now you don't.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:41
Words: 2,875; reading time: 13 minutes
The commander and the clergyman
Bad cop and even worse cop with some old scores to settle.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:42
Words: 2,725; reading time: 12 minutes
His Serene Radiance
Carl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:43
Words: 1,759; reading time: 7 minutes
Re-education
Improving you until you stink.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:44
Words: 573; reading time: 2 minutes
Some relief, 1778
The worst seems to be over.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:45
Words: 1,580; reading time: 7 minutes
Fresh air, 1779
A glimpse of a distant, unreachable horizon. The permissibility of pleasure.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:46
Words: 2,117; reading time: 9 minutes
The entertainer, 1780
Keeping the commander and his troops cheerful.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:47
Words: 2,231; reading time: 10 minutes
Renewal, 1782
Recovering from Rieger.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:48
Words: 1,110; reading time: 5 minutes
The Crypt of Princes
Insult your captor publicly: that will get you out of prison in no time.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:49
Words: 1,709; reading time: 7 minutes
Free at last
He might have been better off staying in prison.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-15 18:50
Words: 3,221; reading time: 14 minutes
Schubert: Greatest Hits
Pick 'n mix in the sweetshop. Some tips on getting to know Schubert's music.
Richard Law UTC 2017-05-01 14:29
Words: 837; reading time: 3 minutes
A selection of Schubert's works that is intended to help a person unfamiliar with them to get started. It is not comprehensive – much excellent and beautiful music is not on the list – just an attempt to help answer the question that faces all classical music listeners at some time or other: where do I start?
Lied auf dem Wasser zu singen
D 774. Great poem. Great music. Two geniuses at work.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-30 10:01
Words: 5,809; reading time: 26 minutes
An analysis of Graf Friedrich Leopold zu Stolberg-Stolberg's poem Lied auf dem Wasser zu singen, für meine Agnes, first published 1783, set to music by Schubert in 1823 as Auf dem Wasser zu singen, 'To be sung on the water', Op. 72, D 774. This poem is one of the few that Schubert set that was worthy of his genius.
Schubert's friend Johann Senn
For some people, being born on the first of April is no joke. [7 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:40
Words: 21,195; reading time: 1 hour 36 minutes
A reconstruction of the life of Johann Senn, Schubert's great friend from the Stadtkonvikt. An independently-minded thinker, an intellectual rowdy, a man of principle who disdained money – just the sort of person to interest the secret police in those nervous times. The loss to the Schubert circle following his arrest and deportation was incalculable.
—The Senn family
—The Tyrolean Fatherland
—Johann Senn in the Stadtkonvikt and after
—Revolting students
—Cooling down the hotheads
—The first exile
—The wilderness years
—Life and literary failure after the army.
The Senn family
A Tyrolean family at the centre of political turmoil.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:41
Words: 2,069; reading time: 9 minutes
The Tyrolean Fatherland
A land of exceptionalism, independence and Catholic bigotry.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:42
Words: 2,450; reading time: 11 minutes
Johann Senn in the Stadtkonvikt and after
The young Tyrolean in Vienna.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:43
Words: 3,131; reading time: 14 minutes
Revolting students
German nationalism and political reform.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:44
Words: 1,360; reading time: 6 minutes
Cooling down the hotheads
The suppression of academic unrest.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:45
Words: 3,432; reading time: 15 minutes
The first exile
Johann Senn's exile in Innsbruck and his army years.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:46
Words: 4,412; reading time: 20 minutes
The wilderness years
Life and literary failure after the army.
Richard Law UTC 2017-04-24 16:47
Words: 3,837; reading time: 17 minutes
Schubert: from child to musical genius
It was managed by a job… and a good job, too!
Richard Law UTC 2017-03-01 07:44
Words: 7,123; reading time: 32 minutes
Updated on 2017-03-03
Getting Franz Schubert a good education at the Akademisches Gymnasium with board in the Stadtkonvikt , all paid for by the Emperor, was a careful and ingenious plan of his father's that took time and effort. It succeeded.
Will the real Schubert please stand up?
Franz Schubert, master of disguise.
Richard Law UTC 2017-02-13 10:57
Words: 3,137; reading time: 14 minutes
Updated on 2025-01-19
What did Franz Schubert look like? Hits, misses and outright errors in his pictorial representation.
Franz Peter Schubert's family
Marking the 220th anniversary of the birth of the composer Franz Peter Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2017-01-18 16:02
Words: 2,713; reading time: 12 minutes
The Schubert family, seen through its 'Family Chronicle', particularly as it involves Schubert's relationships to his siblings and his step-siblings.
Who is Schober? what is he?
Why are you asking me? I've no idea either. [9 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:40
Words: 21,746; reading time: 1 hour 38 minutes
Franz von Schober is an extremely important figure for Schubert scholarship. During the second half of Schubert's life he was probably the composer's closest friend. Schober's life and his relationship with the composer and his other friends is a tangled ball of knotty puzzles. At moments he is revered, at other moments reviled.
—Growing up, growing apart
—On the couch
—Family life
—The cloud of unknowing
—The Schobert wakes
—The cultural circles: 1815-1823
—The dark years: 1823-1826
—The final Schubert years: 1825-1828
—Schober after Schubert
Growing up, growing apart
All change: Sweden, Germany and Austria
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:41
Words: 1,412; reading time: 6 minutes
On the couch
Austrian analytics: detachment, integration, inferiority, compensation.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:42
Words: 1,200; reading time: 5 minutes
Family life
Depravity, tragedy and 'bluebottles' taking notes.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:43
Words: 2,800; reading time: 12 minutes
The cloud of unknowing
Managing the documentary record.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:44
Words: 1,207; reading time: 5 minutes
The Schobert wakes
Schubert and Schober: charisma, friendship, money and social power.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:45
Words: 2,723; reading time: 12 minutes
The cultural circles: 1815-1823
The singer, the salons, the reading club and the dilettante.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:46
Words: 4,575; reading time: 20 minutes
The dark years: 1823-1826
Schubert's crisis years, Schober in Breslau.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:47
Words: 1,611; reading time: 7 minutes
The final Schubert years: 1825-1828
The days of wine and roses in the coffee-house.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:48
Words: 2,344; reading time: 10 minutes
Schober after Schubert
Moving on and falling out.
Richard Law UTC 2016-12-09 06:49
Words: 3,567; reading time: 16 minutes
The Schubert trajectory
Standing back for a detail-free biography.
Richard Law UTC 2016-11-04 19:11
Words: 3,726; reading time: 16 minutes
When Schubert's life ended, on 19 November 1828, he was 31 years old. What had the trajectory of that life been? What would he have seen had he been able to turn around and look impartially at that trajectory?
The Jacobin Conspiracy
Making the mood music of Schubert's times. [6 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:00
Words: 14,407; reading time: 1 hour 5 minutes
An account of the failed Jacobin revolution in Austria and Hungary, its ruthless suppression and its legacy of half a century of political fear and repression. In the Vienna of this period, making music was the safest thing to do.
—Circles of conspiracy
—Franz Hebenstreit
—Andreas von Riedel
—Joseph Vinzenz Degen
—Making the punishment fit the crime
—The atmosphere under the belljar
Circles of conspiracy
Secret meetings, handwritten circulars and strange gestures.
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:01
Words: 1,476; reading time: 6 minutes
Franz Hebenstreit
The hothead cavalry lieutenant with the big voice.
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:02
Words: 3,274; reading time: 14 minutes
Andreas von Riedel
The mathematics teacher. How much can a man survive?
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:03
Words: 4,264; reading time: 19 minutes
Joseph Vinzenz Degen
Some pieces of silver. Fortune favours the betrayer.
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:04
Words: 777; reading time: 3 minutes
Making the punishment fit the crime
Learning from the conspiracy. Closing down discussion and criticism.
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:05
Words: 485; reading time: 2 minutes
The atmosphere under the belljar
The calm people of the becalmed empire keep their noses clean.
Richard Law UTC 2016-10-01 09:06
Words: 2,020; reading time: 9 minutes
Rustling inspiration
More for Schubert fans: a closer look at Wohin? from Die schöne Müllerin.
Richard Law UTC 2016-09-22 13:56
Words: 1,243; reading time: 5 minutes
In Die schöne Müllerin, one of the most charming and well-executed poems is undoubtably Wohin? It is the first appearance of the stream that will lead the wandering miller to his mill and to his girl and – always the good listener – will accompany him to the bitter end. The rustling stream has its inspiration in the epochal 'rustic' anthology Des Knaben Wunderhorn (1808).
Franz's belljar
The belljar of the Austrian Emperor Franz II comes down over his people. Young composers included.
Richard Law UTC 2016-09-13 07:18
Words: 5,510; reading time: 25 minutes
Emperor Franz II/I , 24 years old at his accession to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire in March 1792, reacted quickly to the dangers that faced him. The French Revolution of 1789 would not to be repeated in his territory. In these dangerous, combustible times he needed calm, he needed security; he needed police and he needed censors. Artistic life in Austria existed under a belljar of his repressive measures that directly affected Schubert and his circle.
The other Spaun
Crazy uncle Franz Seraph von Spaun: an heroic life of principled resistance bordering on the psychotic.
Richard Law UTC 2016-09-05 10:58
Words: 6,675; reading time: 30 minutes
Schubert fans know of Joseph and Anton von Spaun as early and prominent members of the Freundeskreise , the so-called 'Circles of Friends' around Schubert. Both were respectable and loyal friends who supported the young composer in many ways. Their father Franz Xaver von Spaun was an upstanding member of society in the Austrian town of Linz. In contrast, their uncle, Franz Seraph, was a bloody-minded malcontent whose life was a trail of wreckage. This is his story.
Gretchen am Spinnrade
Schubert again. This time the seventeen year-old's 'stroke of genius of the first order'.
Richard Law UTC 2016-06-13 17:41
Words: 2,970; reading time: 13 minutes
The text and context of Franz Schubert's setting of Gretchen am Spinnrade, Op. 2, D 118, composed in October 1814. Goethe's Faust, Mephistopheles and their pact; Gretchen overheard in the tempest of demonic passion that will ultimately ruin her.
Before Schubert
The ancestors who made him possible. [5 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:40
Words: 11,945; reading time: 54 minutes
In the course of two generations, Schubert's ancestors moved from the world of feudal peasants living in a distant province of the Holy Roman Empire to the life of a musical genius in its capital, Vienna. Each of those two generations – the composer's grandparents and then his parents – took a gigantic step in raising the family out of its agricultural anonymity into the metropolitan culture of the capital.
—Carl and Susanna Schubert
—The two brothers
—The brothers reach Vienna
—The two sisters
—Franz Theodor and Elisabeth's children
Carl and Susanna Schubert
The pious farmer who educated his sons; the farming family who survived disease and famine to prosper.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:41
Words: 4,885; reading time: 22 minutes
The two brothers
Johann Karl and Franz Theodor: from the farming village to the Jesuit High School.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:42
Words: 2,751; reading time: 12 minutes
The brothers reach Vienna
Karl lands on his feet in the big city, then helps Franz Theodor to do the same.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:43
Words: 2,048; reading time: 9 minutes
The two sisters
Elisabeth and Magdalena Vietz: two sisters for two brothers.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:44
Words: 1,126; reading time: 5 minutes
Franz Theodor and Elisabeth's children
The composer's family: fifteen children, few survivors, one musical genius.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-24 08:45
Words: 853; reading time: 3 minutes
For the greater glory of God: Carl Schubert
The servant of the Catholic God leads an upright and pious life albeit without lasting utility.
Richard Law UTC 2016-05-01 07:46
Words: 2,265; reading time: 10 minutes
Out of the swamp
More Schubert. Matthisson and Brun wallow, Goethe and Schubert ascend to the light.
Richard Law UTC 2016-04-17 17:08
Words: 3,534; reading time: 16 minutes
In 1792 Friedrich von Matthisson wrote a poemAndenken , 'Remembrance'. It was first printed ten years later in 1802 and Franz Schubert set it to music in April 1814 ( D 99 ). In the year Matthisson wrote the poem, his friend Friederike Brun wrote her own variation on it, which she titled Ich denke dein , 'I think of you'. Then, in the spring of 1795, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was inspired by a musical setting of Brun's poem to compose his own lyric to that music. He titled it Nähe des Geliebten , 'The proximity of the loved one'. In February 1815 Schubert set Goethe's version to music ( D 162), giving us an example of what happens when two geniuses collaborate.
Die Forelle
Fishy tales, speculations, a decade in a dungeon, oblivion and immortality. You can't beat a good song. [5 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:50
Words: 18,547; reading time: 1 hour 24 minutes
In the Schubert song Die Forelle the bright rustic idyll of the first two verses darkens when, by a subterfuge, the angler catches the fish – a dark event which hints at a much darker event in real life. This article is a study of the circumstances surrounding the creation of the poem by the musician, writer and journalist Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart around 1782, during his ten year incarceration in the fortress of Hohenasperg at the arbitrary decree of Carl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg.
—The biography of a poem
—Franz Schubert –The Trout Quintet
—Franz Schubert –The Trout
—Christian Schubart – The road to doom
—Christian Schubart – Taking the bait
—Christian Schubart –The Trout: text analysis
Franz Schubert – The Trout Quintet
The young genius playing for his supper in provincial Austria.
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:51
Words: 1,418; reading time: 6 minutes
Franz Schubert – The Trout
A taste of immortality for a forgotten poet from an unknown composer.
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:52
Words: 430; reading time: 1 minute
Christian Schubart – The road to doom
How to make enemies and the fine art of annoying nearly everyone at the same time.
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:53
Words: 7,717; reading time: 35 minutes
Christian Schubart – Taking the bait
Muddying the waters and choosing the perfect bait for the victim: a masterpiece!
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:54
Words: 6,835; reading time: 31 minutes
Christian Schubart – The Trout
The bright, romantic allegory of deception and kidnap on the autopsy slab.
Richard Law UTC 2016-02-07 16:55
Words: 1,953; reading time: 8 minutes
Die Winterreise
Schubert yet again, but no cheerful bits at all this time, just loss, betrayal, rejection, alienation and wandering. [5 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:10
Words: 9,781; reading time: 44 minutes
A textual and contextual analysis of the poems of Die Winterreise by Wilhelm Müller, music by Franz Schubert (Winterreise, Op. 89, D 911). Müller's poems were published in 1823 and Schubert set them to music in 1827.
—Introduction – Entering the tunnel
—Chapter 1 – The birth of the text of Die Winterreise
—Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12
—Chapter 3 – Poems 13-24
—Chapter 4 – Wilhelm Müller
—Chapter 5 – Franz Schubert
Chapter 1 – The birth of the text of Die Winterreise.
The 'Urania' text, the 'Waldhornist' text and Schubert's synthesis.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:11
Words: 1,210; reading time: 5 minutes
Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12
A narrative of loss, rejection and wandering: the first twelve poems of the Die Winterreise and the narrative thread.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:12
Words: 1,768; reading time: 8 minutes
Chapter 3 – Poems 13-24
Themes of despair, alienation and wandering: the last twelve poems of the Die Winterreise; thematic structure and the death paradox.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:13
Words: 2,061; reading time: 9 minutes
Chapter 4 – Wilhelm Müller
The biographical background to Wilhelm Müller's poem collection Die Winterreise.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:14
Words: 1,913; reading time: 8 minutes
Chapter 5 – Franz Schubert
The biographical background to Franz Schubert's setting of the song-cycle Winterreise.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-31 16:15
Words: 2,325; reading time: 10 minutes
Die schöne Müllerin
Schubert again. Two blondes making out. A talking stream looks on as the hunter gets the girl. Many trigger alerts here. [4 pages]
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-03 16:10
Words: 9,504; reading time: 43 minutes
A textual and contextual analysis of the song cycle Die schöne Müllerin, Op. 25, D 795, text by Wilhelm Müller and music by Franz Schubert. Müller's poems were published in 1820 and Schubert set them to music some time between autumn 1823 and spring 1824.
—Introduction
—Chapter 1 – The song-cycle and its prologue
—Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12
—Chapter 3 – Poems 13-23
—Chapter 4 – The context of the work
Chapter 1 – The song-cycle and its prologue
The genesis of the idea of a song-cycle from Wilhem Müller's prologue to Die schöne Müllerin.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-03 16:11
Words: 2,021; reading time: 9 minutes
Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12
Love and joy: a structural analysis of the first twelve poems of the Die schöne Müllerin.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-03 16:12
Words: 2,360; reading time: 10 minutes
Chapter 3 – Poems 13-23
Despair and death: a structural analysis of the last eleven poems of the Die schöne Müllerin.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-03 16:13
Words: 2,558; reading time: 11 minutes
Chapter 4 – The context of the work
The problem of the narrative song-cycle; the biographical component.
Richard Law UTC 2015-12-03 16:14
Words: 2,242; reading time: 10 minutes
Quote and image of the month for November
Quote: Wilhelm Müller, Die Winterreise. Image: Carl Julius von Leypold, Der Wanderer im Sturm/The wanderer in the storm.
UTC 2015-11-01 01:02
Words: 55; reading time: 1 minute
All Souls' Day, 2 November
Some thoughts for All Souls' Day, 2 November on the Litany for All Souls' Day of Johann Georg Jacobi, set to music by Franz Schubert.
Richard Law UTC 2015-11-02 10:12
Words: 1,730; reading time: 7 minutes
Schubert, you idiot!
How Franz Schubert managed to write one of the greatest secular choral works, despite messing up somewhat.
Part of an occasional series on the composer.
Richard Law UTC 2015-09-28 15:20
Words: 1,673; reading time: 7 minutes
The story behind the choral work Ständchen, D 920, text by Franz Grillparzer, music by Franz Schubert; written and composed in July 1827 and first performed by the girls of Anna Fröhlich's singing school in Vienna on 11 August 1827. The musicologist Harry Goldschmidt justly called it eine der genialsten Eingebungen Schuberts überhaupt, 'one of the most brilliant of all Schubert's inspirations'. ['Franz Schubert – ein Lebensbild', 1954 311]
Beginning Schubert
An introduction to his biography and works dealt with on this website.
Richard Law UTC 2020-05-22 16:04
Words: 998; reading time: 4 minutes
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