GRMUS T670 — 19th-Century German Art Song

2 credits
Fall
Loretta Terrigno

Focusing on song collections by Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, and Hugo Wolf, this course will compare definitions of the “song cycle,” “song bouquet,” and “songbook,” as well as “song pairs,” and seek evidence for these types in Schumann’s Dichterliebe (Op. 48) and Frauenliebe und Leben (Op. 42), Brahms’s Op. 3 songs, Die schöne Magelone (Op. 33), and Vier ernste Gesänge (Op. 121), and Wolf’s Mörike Lieder and Italienisches Liederbuch, among others. Course content will reference authors such as Beate Perrey, Rufus Hallmark, Xavier Hascher, Inge Van Rij, and Susan Youens, and explore how musical connections throughout each collection either convey poetic and musical narratives or merely hint at a network of associations. Students will investigate how each composer modifies or adapts original literary sources and gain a thorough understanding of poetic form and meter as well as of declamation, form, and harmony in the musical settings. Coursework will include short analytical papers, weekly presentations of original song interpretations, class performances, and mock pre-concert lectures.