Schubert: Octet for Winds and Strings in F major, D. 803, Op. 166
Schubert’s landmark Octet for Winds and Strings in F major, D. 803, Op. 166 dates from 1824, the same year that produced the bleak “Rosamunde” and “Death and the Maiden” Quartets, and a miserable period of declining health and happiness for the composer. It is remarkable then, if counterintuitive, that Schubert left behind a work of such sustained verve and character in the midst of his own suffering. Schubert wrote the Octet on commission from Count Ferdinand Troyer, a nobleman, philanthropist and amateur clarinetist who requested a companion piece to Beethoven’s exceedingly popular Septet. Schubert stretched Beethoven’s orchestration with the addition of a second violin, but maintained his uncommon six-movement structure, including both a scherzo and a minuet, a theme and variations fourth movement, and slow introductions to the outer movements. Like in Beethoven, Schubert’s Octet also privileges the clarinet and violin as the primary solo instruments, but substantial solo material abounds for all instruments.
The initial movement, first poised and affected and then buoyant, articulates dotted figures as a unifying motive that threads the whole Octet. The tender Adagio flaunts Schubert’s endless melodic imagination as he lavishes the movement with theme after glimmering theme. A boisterous Scherzo restores the essential levity of the serenade tradition, music of the outdoors. The fourth movement spins clever, characterful variations out of a charmingly uncomplicated theme before the Menuetto marries the stately tradition inherited from 18th-century models with Schubert’s ever-vocal style. Again heeding Beethoven’s precedent, the fraught tremolos and throbbing chords of the Andante introduction to the finale signal a darker turn just before the jubilant Allegro that rounds out the work. The grandeur of the finishing chords aptly crown the Octet’s tremendous scope in instrumental forces, compositional breadth and emotional depth.
© Graeme Steele Johnson for Chamber Music Northwest
Schubert’s landmark Octet for Winds and Strings in F major, D. 803, Op. 166 dates from 1824, the same year that produced the bleak “Rosamunde” and “Death and the Maiden” Quartets, and a miserable period of declining health and happiness for the composer. It is remarkable then, if counterintuitive, that Schubert left behind a work of such sustained verve and character in the midst of his own suffering. Schubert wrote the Octet on commission from Count Ferdinand Troyer, a nobleman, philanthropist and amateur clarinetist who requested a companion piece to Beethoven’s exceedingly popular Septet. Schubert stretched Beethoven’s orchestration with the addition of a second violin, but maintained his uncommon six-movement structure, including both a scherzo and a minuet, a theme and variations fourth movement, and slow introductions to the outer movements. Like in Beethoven, Schubert’s Octet also privileges the clarinet and violin as the primary solo instruments, but substantial solo material abounds for all instruments.
The initial movement, first poised and affected and then buoyant, articulates dotted figures as a unifying motive that threads the whole Octet. The tender Adagio flaunts Schubert’s endless melodic imagination as he lavishes the movement with theme after glimmering theme. A boisterous Scherzo restores the essential levity of the serenade tradition, music of the outdoors. The fourth movement spins clever, characterful variations out of a charmingly uncomplicated theme before the Menuetto marries the stately tradition inherited from 18th-century models with Schubert’s ever-vocal style. Again heeding Beethoven’s precedent, the fraught tremolos and throbbing chords of the Andante introduction to the finale signal a darker turn just before the jubilant Allegro that rounds out the work. The grandeur of the finishing chords aptly crown the Octet’s tremendous scope in instrumental forces, compositional breadth and emotional depth.
© Graeme Steele Johnson for Chamber Music Northwest