Conducting Schubert 8 "Unfinished" Symphony [analysis]
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- Опубликовано: 24 июл 2024
- Schubert's Unfinished Symphony (his 8th symphony) is one of the mysteries of classical music: it is not his last symphony and the composer did not die before being able to complete it, as it happened only a few decades earlier with Mozart's Requiem.
The quality of the 2 movements that Schubert wrote is stunning, and especially the first movement is one of the most innovative works he had ever written. So, why leave it on the side?
In this video we'll go through the first movement, looking at how Schubert starts to take distance from the style of the classical era, opening the doors to romanticism. We will, of course, look at the structure as well as a "mistake" in the score that has been carried from one edition to another for 2 centuries.
You can jump through different sections here:
0:00 Conducting Pills ep.12
0:30 Introduction
0:55 Why didn't Schubert finish this symphony?
3:11 The Unfinished symphony innovative concept
4:02 First motive and first theme
5:10 Second theme
7:25 Technical tip
7:55 Development
9:38 Coda
10:33 Conclusion
Here's a link to the blog post connected to this video: www.gianmariagriglio.it/condu...
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Fantastic presentation! It's really great to see how a conductor looks at small details to create an interpretation.
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you for this lesson. I appreciate this analysis.
You're very welcome, I'm glad you enjoyed it
im a conducting student and this is so helpful! thank you very much!.
You're very welcome!
Thank you so much maestro
You're very welcome!
Thanks a lot. Very interesting
thank you, I'm glad you liked it
Thank you ! Verry usefull for me !
I'm glad it is so. Thank you for your comment!
Very interesting! But Beethoven had previously written trombone parts in his symphony. I believe he first uses them in the fifth symphony
Thank you for your comment. Beethoven sure did use the trombones in his symphonies but not, as mentioned, in the first movement. In his fifth symphony, the trombones only come in in the last movement. In the sixth, they come in the 4th movement (the storm). In the ninth, in the 2nd movement
That B pedal in the 2nd bassoon (ca 7:50). I heard the Bruno Walter recording which uses this "correct" version. It really makes a difference.
Yes, I find it very interesting too.
@@ggriglio Mi dispiace maestro, but i'm searching at the original manuscript and i founded that the 2nd Basoon have a C instead of a B, so where you discovered this mistake?
You are a fortunate person to be able to conduct this symphony!
Agreed, I am very fortunate :)
Thank you for the explanation. What is the probability of Schubert intentionally had left unfinished this symphony. For some bizarre reason, I find beauty the fact that he had never finished this work. It is a anti intuitive feeling and imposible to explain... At the same time, I feel sadness... Anyway, music is amazing.
I doubt there ever will be a definitive answer to that question.
What we know is, as a fact, that Schubert did begin a number of compositions and then left them half way through. Maybe he lost interest, or got other priorities.
Certainly, the music is incredibly beautiful. And sad.
Thanks for the analysis. But the Rosamunde link is well-known and documented. Moreover, it's in the same key and uses the same forces as the two other movements. While one can always demand MORE evidence (I guess), let's not pretend that it isn't _highly_ likely the Rosamunde entr'acte was written as the finale for the symphony.
Thank you for your comment.
As far as I know, musicologists are still very well debating the matter. Brian Newbold, for instance, theorizes the Rosamunde link but the evidence appears circumstantial.
Then again, I may very well have missed something.
Aside from the key and orchestral forces, could you share the documents you are referring to?
@@ggriglio The thing is that short of Schubert writing "this is the finale", evidence will always remain circumstantial. However, the train of events that led Schubert to basically throw a bunch of random scores at Helmina von Chézy in despair when she was pressuring him for music for her play Rosamunde, just _as he was working on the B minor symphony_ , is well known.
The reason why the Unfinished is still played this way is mostly rooted in tradition, but I see no valid reason not to include the finale. Of course, the lack of the trio of the scherzo _is_ a problem, but that can be relatively easily solved, and if we're honest far greater liberties have been taken with less documentary evidence (such as, just to name one example, using Lobgesang as Mendelssohn's Second Symphony).
And the whole thing really sounds a lot better than just those first two bits.
Agreed. For the scherzo there's been an attempt by Weingartner.
More than historic accuracy, I believe the myth of an incomplete piece plays more of a role here in the collective perception.
After all, if we look at inaccuracies in music, half of Mozart's Requiem wasn't written by Mozart and yet it is performed in its entirety. If that stands, so should a performance of a "complete" Schubert's Unfinished.
Yeah, it'a always nice (although pedantic, not gonna lie) to have someone wax lyrical about the heavenliness of the Sanctus and then ask "so you're a fan of Franz Xaver Süssmayr, then"?
@@bomcabedal 😂 yes, it is
Have you and many others ever thought that the symphony is actually finished? i think it is completely finished...people mostly pay attention to the painfully beautiful first movement and ignoring somehow the second movement which is perhaps one of the saddest piece of music ever written...the second movement starts innocently with a pleasant melody, yet as the movement progresses Schubert enters into uncharted territory...a complete despair, hopelessness with the deepest sorrow and anger; he was in dead end...he could not continue further; nothing could continue after this bleak, yet unmatched beauty. Nothing can be said after this second movement--everything that needed to be said was already said in these two movements. A conductor must feel the immerse agony with the second moment, an agony that will never heal. The third and the forth movement are the pure silent that make you think what life is all about...
yes, the idea is fascinating and appealing to the romantic souls like mine (and yours too I'm guessing). However, you're looking at Schubert through the eyes of the late 19th century, as a romantic artist. Which, historically, he was not: artists were still mostly artisans without all the philosophical attachments we often attribute to them simply because we have troubles in contextualizing their lives. The silence you mention is more typical of a mahlerian mindset. Second point: Schubert was very well known for being scattered in his writing. There are hundreds of works he left unfinished. Third: there are sketches for the rest of the symphony which leads to believe that the original idea was to have a canonical symphony in 4 movements. He just never completed it.
@@ggriglio Schubert was an early romantic composer, just listen the text of his lieder. His lieder are closer to Schumann than let's say to Beethoven. Schubert's last masses are closer to Bruckner... yes, he was planning perhaps to write a four movements symphony and yes he started the third and he abandon it, and yet again, in my opinion, because of the unparalleled intensity of the second movement, he felt that the symphony does not need two extra movements.. In Mozart's Prague symphony there are only three movements-and until today we don't know really why...;Schubert did not finish part of his sonatas, not because he was scattered but simply because he often reached a dead end and started a new sonata, yet even those unfinished gems are very appreciated and recorded. Beethoven's Pastoral symphony has six movements ,and his opus 111 sonata has only two movements! The numbers of movements was not a rigid concept. Also it is bizarre that you call Schubert and artisan...there were many composers around Schubert time who might be called artisans composers like Hummel, Spohr, even Schubert's brother was a composer. Schubert was a super genius and his outside appearance did not always reflect who he really was. (the same can be said about Bach, Mozart and Haydn ...)-if he had lived longer he would have perhaps towered Bach and Mozart...
Schubert was an early romantic composer, just listen the text of his lieder. And the music of this lieder is closer to Schumann than let's say to Beethoven. Schubert's last masses are closer to Bruckner's... yes, he was planning perhaps to write a four movements symphony and yes he started the third and he abandon it, and yet again, in my opinion, because of the unparalleled intensity of the second movement, he felt that the symphony does not need two extra movements.. In Mozart's Prague symphony there are only three movements-and until today we don't know really why...Schubert did not finish part of his sonatas, not because he was scattered but simply because he often reached a dead end and started a new sonata, yet even those unfinished gems are very appreciated and recorded. Beethoven's Pastoral symphony has six movements ,and his opus 111 sonata has only two movements! The numbers of movements was not a rigid concept. Also it is bizarre that you call Schubert and artisan...there were many composers around Schubert time who might be called artisans, composers like Hummel, Spohr, even Schubert's brother was a composer. Schubert was a super genius and his outside appearance did not reflect who he really was. (the same can be said about Bach, Mozart and Haydn ...)- had he lived longer he would have perhaps towered Bach and Mozart. No offence, but i think that you don't have a deep understanding of Schubert ...
None taken.
To begin with, the term artisan does not refer to what I think of Schubert but to how composers were looked at and thought of at the time. Bach, Mozart, Haydn, even Beethoven (despite his best efforts) were considered nothing more than skilled craftsmen. The concept of genius was born quite a few decades after. That's a fact, whether you like it or not. What you or I think of Schubert is completely irrelevant to this discussion, and nonsensical to the video analysis in question.
It is obvious, as I've mentioned in my previous comment, that you are looking at Schubert's music with late-18th-century-glasses, ignoring, purposefully or not, historical facts. I don't think that's a good way to understand anything. It's just a way to justify whatever interpretation or vision you have of a composer or his music without taking into consideration a shred of the historical background or any proven facts on his life. But since you, obviously, understand his music better than me and, apparently, many others, feel free to educate me.
Please do back up your thesis with facts - of which so far you have brought none - not with conjectures or opinions. If it helps, I suggest you read a few books on the subject. Feel free to also start your video series where you can educate all of us who still live with the idea that the basics for interpreting music rely on knowledge before anything else.
@@ggriglio 😄👏
Beethoven was born December 15 or 16. You're off by 1 day. Please make a note of it. Thanks.
Right you are, he was actually baptized on the 17th.
I hope that's not the only thing you noticed about the video. That would be quite sad.