“Fussreise.” (Mörike Lieder)
“Lieber alles.” (Eichendorff Lieder);
-- see Everett, Journal of Music Theory 48/1 (2004): 51-4
“Frech und Froh I.” (Goethe Lieder);
-- see Everett, Journal of Music Theory 48/1 (2004): 51-4
"Cophtisches Lied II.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Dank des Paria.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Erschaffen und Beleben.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Frech und Froh II.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Komm, Liebchen, komm!” (Goethe Lieder)
"Nimmer will ich dich verlieren!” (Goethe Lieder)
"Der Schäfer.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Die Spröde.” (Goethe Lieder)
"St. Nepomuks Vorabend.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!” (Goethe Lieder)
From these I have chosen four as the material for a series of posts beginning today. Those are
I have already written about "Der Schäfer" (Goethe Lieder no. 22) on the blog: see this post. In this song, the relation of a rising line to text is quite simple: a lazy shepherd suddenly perks up and becomes industrious when a romantic relationship blooms (or possibly when a nagging spouse gets him moving). The rising line -- and closing cadence -- mimics the new energy. Overall, one can hear a rising line from ^5: -- see the earlier post for details of the reading --"Cophtisches Lied II.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Erschaffen und Beleben.” (Goethe Lieder)
"Komm, Liebchen, komm!” (Goethe Lieder)
"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!” (Goethe Lieder)
"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!” (Goethe Lieder no. 35; published in 1889). The poem is in two verses, each of which is six lines long, consisting of three rhymed couplets. An English translation of the first verse is here: link.
Not your average drinking song, this one is more forceful than exuberant and it is predominantly in a minor key, including in the ending. The initial F#5 (as written) is maintained throughout as a focal tone ^8. Its chromatic descent is marked with circles below. The box shows the first instance of a vigorous ascending figure that becomes more and more prominent as time goes on.
The third couplet offers a rare example of a ^5-^6-(^8)-^#7-^8 minor key ascending Urlinie, against which the left hand of the piano part offers another version of its rising octaves (boxed). The coda has still another one of those to end, this time as a simple minor key rising line through an octave.
The third and final couplet of the second verse offers an expanded version of the minor-key ascending Urlinie. Note, incidentally, that the two unfolded thirds, D5-F#5, E#5-C#5, expose the minor key problem in an even more obvious way than did the end of the first verse: D5 moves to C#5 and has to be reconceived in order to be heard as moving upward (against the grain of the voice leading) to E#5. A familiar Schenkerian dodge has to be called into play to make this happen: the device Allen Forte called overlapping (and which is one species of upward register transfer or Übergreifen). In a sequence, a note may be obliged to resolve downward, but another voice may overlap it, and still a third overlap that--and the resulting "line" going up may nevertheless be regarded as a unitary figure. In this case, ^6 resolves down to ^5 and is overlapped by ^8, which also moves down. There is no ^9 to overlap again: ^8-^7 just repeats itself.
Here is the entire texture. The piano hammers away at the rising figure -- see the box in bar 2 -- and finally bursts out in an extended chromatic run (boxed in the second and third systems). Both voice and piano, then, provide an ascending line to ^8 in this structural cadence. (The final bars look like they might be a reprise (see at "Wie zu Anfang"), but they are in fact a fairly brief recall acting as a coda.)
