Die schöne Müllerin

Schubert was without doubt the pre-eminent song composer of his time, elevating this essentially intimate form into a vehicle for profound expression and subsequently influencing Schumann, Brahms, Mahler, Wolf and many others. He was also among the first to group songs into cycles, with a connecting narrative and dramatic thread. The first of his two great cycles is Die schöne Müllerin (The Fair Maid of the Mill) to words by Wilhelm Müller, composed largely in 1823, as the 25-year-old composer’s health began to fail. Nevertheless, the songs demonstrate Schubert’s unfailing sensitivity to poetry and ability to add depth and meaning through his manner of setting them. Across the 20 songs, a journeyman sets out optimistically and becomes smitten with the miller’s beautiful daughter. She instead falls for a strapping huntsman and rejects the journeyman, who drowns himself in the brook. The conceit may seem antiquated to us now, but Schubert locates in the tale a parable for lost innocence and the place of the Romantic artist in an unforgiving world.