Schiller and Music COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES ImUNCI Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures From 1949 to 2004, UNC Press and the UNC Department of Germanic & Slavic Languages and Literatures published the UNC Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures series. Monographs, anthologies, and critical editions in the series covered an array of topics including medieval and modern literature, theater, linguistics, philology, onomastics, and the history of ideas. Through the generous support of the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, books in the series have been reissued in new paperback and open access digital editions. For a complete list of books visit www.uncpress.org. Schiller and Music r.m. longyear UNC Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures Number 54 Copyright © 1966 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons cc by-nc-nd license. To view a copy of the license, visit http://creativecommons. org/licenses. Suggested citation: Longyear, R. M. Schiller and Music. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966. doi: https://doi.org/ 10.5149/9781469657820_Longyear Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Longyear, R. M. Title: Schiller and music / by R. M. Longyear. Other titles: University of North Carolina Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures ; no. 54. Description: Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, [1966] Series: University of North Carolina Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures. | Includes bibliographical references. Identifiers: lccn 66064498 | isbn 978-1-4696-5781-3 (pbk: alk. paper) | isbn 978-1-4696-5782-0 (ebook) Subjects: Schiller, Friedrich, 1759-1805 — Criticism and interpretation. | Music and literature. Classification: lcc pd25 .n6 no. 54 | dcc 838/ .609 ·. To Katie TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction . Abbreviations I. Music in Schiller's life. 7 II. Music in Schiller's dramatic works. 34 III. Music as a literary effect. 68 IV. Schiller's musical philosophy . 94 V. Musical settings of Schiller's works I. Art-Songs. 2. Choral Works 3. Operas ... 4. Program Music. Bibliographical essay. Notes. Index. INTRODUCTION Friedrich Schiller's career spanned two of the major epochs in German cultural history: the Sturm und Drang and Weimar Classicism. His many activities - dramatist, poet, philosopher, literary and social critic, historian, physician, and educator - are truly astounding in their diversity. A study of his life reveals the importance which music played in it; an investigation of his literary work shows the signifi­ cance of music in heightening dramatic action, as characterizing agent, or as metaphor; a reading of his philosophical writings discloses that music played an ancillary but not negligible role in his aesthetic system. Schiller influenced the music of his time and afterwards not only because his poems became texts for vocal music or his dramas became opera librettos or subjects for program music, but also because of his ideas on the moral nature and seriousness of art. Such recent writers as Jurgen Mainka and Wolf­ gang Seifert have strongly expressed their dissatis­ faction with the existing literature concerning Schiller's relationship to music, for virtually all of it consists of occasional studies, mostly for anniver­ saries of his birth or death, which are either dis­ cussions of a limited aspect of his interest in music or are vague, broad surveys for the general reader. The few exceptions - Brandstaeter's pioneering study (1863), the essays in the Schiller issue of Die Musik (1905), and Knudsen's doctoral dissertation (1908) - are brief and are outmoded because of the infor­ mation both about Schiller and about the music of his time which has become available during the past six decades; furthermore, question-begging and bias 2 Introduction characterize the attempts to connect Schiller's musical aesthetics with the music of his time, and relatively few of the compositions based on Schiller's works have been studied. For these reasons, a new investigation of the topic 'Schiller and Music' is necessary, if only to complement the many investi­ gations of the relationship of Goethe and Herder to this art. The procedure of this study has consisted of asking certain questions. Although they are not uni­ versally applicable, the student of the importance of music in a writer's life and work can ask them in the course of his investigations. I. What role did music play in Schiller's life? What were his formative musical experiences? What was the musical competence of his friends? What music could he hear? To what extent did he participate in musical activities, either as a performer or a listener? u. What use, as a dramatist, did Schiller make of incidental music? What precedents and which of his predecessors influenced him? Who wrote his inci­ dental music, how did Schiller like it, and under what conditions was it used? III. How did Schiller use music in dramatic characterization and poetic metaphor? Is there a 'musical' poetic language? IV. To what extent did Schiller regard music in his aesthetic philosophy? Who influenced his ideas on music? How did he employ musical and aesthetic terminology to describe an art with which he was not technically conversant? How did he regard the Introduction 3 various musical genres and the composers of his time, and are his formal aesthetic views on music and his opinions of specific works in any way related? Did his musical philosophy influence subsequent generations? v. How did Schiller think his works should be set to music and how did he regard the attempts of his contemporaries to put music to his words? Which subsequent composers did he inspire and how did they use his dramatic and poetic works as texts for art-songs and cantatas, librettos for operas, or subjects for program music? The principal sources for this study have been Schiller's dramas, poems, philosophical works, correspondence, and the compositions based on Schiller's writings. Since there are several different editions of letters to and from Schiller, I have indicated the date of the letter rather than the pages of the collection in which it is printed, for one can reasonably assume that all the letters will eventually be collected in the Nationalausgabe of Schiller's com­ plete works. The ravages of World War II had the side effect of destroying most of the unpublished music to Schiller's works, and what little has survived has been preserved mostly by accident. Space limitations do not permit me to acknowl­ edge the contributions of all those who helped with this study, but I would like to give special thanks to Karl and Editha Neumann, Donald Grout, Eric Werner, Karl-Heinz Hahn, Robert Munster, Lee S. Greene, and particularly Lothar Hoffmann- 4 Introduction Erbrecht and Reinhard Buchwald, for their friendly advice, assistance, and encouragement. I owe much to the help of the reference divisions of the libraries of Cornell University, the University of Southern Mississippi, and the University of Tennessee, and to the music divisions of the Library of Congress, the University of North Carolina, and the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek. The Goethe-Schiller Archiv in Weimar, the Weimar Nationaltheater, the Baren­ reiter-Verlag in Kassel, and the Friedrich-Schiller­ Universitat in Jena most kindly sent publications and microfilms, mostly without cost, of material and manuscripts unobtainable here. Much of the initial research was aided through an appointment as a Visiting Scholar at Cornell University during the summer of 1962, and subsequent study was facili­ tated by the excellent Germanics collection at the University of Tennessee and a grant from the Kentucky Research Foundation. I owe special thanks to Ramona Cormier for her suggestions concerning Chapter rv and to Thomas B. Stroup for his editorial advice. Nevertheless, the errors in this study are mine and mine alone. Finally, my biggest debt of gratitude, to my wife, I can only partially repay by dedicating this study to her. Lexington, Kentucky R. M. LONGYEAR ABBREVIATIONS DR Deutsche Rttndschau Geiger Ludwig Geiger, ed., Briefwechsel z1vischen Schiller ttnd Korner. Stuttgart and Berlin, 1892, 4 vols. Grove Eric Blom (ed.), Grove's Dictionary of Music a11d Musicians, 5th. ed. London, r 9 54 JAMS Journal of the American Musicological Sociery JMP Jahrbuch der M11sikbibliothek Peters Jonas Fritz Jonas, ed., Schillers Briefe. Stuttgart, ' 1892, 7 vols. MGG Friedrich Blume, ed., Die Mttsik in Ce­ schichte ttnd Gegemvart. Kassel, r 9 5 r M&L ivlusic and Letters MQ Musical Qttarter!J PMLA Publications of the Modern Language Associ­ ation SA Schillers sdmtliche Werke, Sakular-Ausgabe. Leipzig, n.d., 16 vols. SGTG Schriften der Cesellschaft fur Theatergeschichte SP Max Hecker and Julius Peterson, eds., Schillers Persiinlichkeit. Weimar, 1904, 3 vols. Sulzer Johann Georg Sulzer, Allgemei11e Theorie der schonen Kiinste, 2d. ed., Leipzig, r 792, 4 vols. K articles by Kirnberger s articles by Schulz K-S articles by Kirnberger and Schulz Suphan Bernhard Suphan, ed., Herders sdmmtliche Werke. Berlin, 1878, 33 vols. I. MUSIC IN SCHILLER'S LIFE 7 That music permeated the life of Friedrich Schiller is shown not only in his writings and letters but also in the reminiscences of his contemporaries, and to realize the extent of his knowledge of music and its personal significance to him is to realize its value in his literary and philosophical works. We should look, therefore, first at music in his life. Schiller was not born into a musical family. His father, a captain in the army of Karl Eugen, Duke of Wiirttemberg, is not known to have had any incli­ nation toward either music or literature. His mother, an innkeeper's daughter, liked the 'geistliche Lieder,' or spiritual songs, by Klopstock, Gellert, and Uz, and it is significant that those who discuss this aspect of Schiller's childhood mention the poets rather than the composers.1 Young Fritz, whose childhood ambition was to be a Lutheran minister, was more influenced by the words than the tunes, which were simple melodies in a folklike style rather than the sturdy Lutheran chorales of the Reformation or the arrangements of them by J.