Genre

Genre

Vocal Music

HYPERLINK "http://www.allmusic.com/genre/classical-ma0000002521" ClassicalPeriod

Romantic

Comp Date

November, 1816

Avg Duration

3:13

Franz SchubertWiegenlied ("Schlafe, schlafe, holder ssser Knabe"), song for voice & piano ("Mille Cherubini in Coro"), D. 498 (Op. 98/2)

Share this pageDescription by James Leonard

Schubertwrote three songs entitled Wiegenlied (Lullaby): they are settings of texts byKrner(D. 304), by Seidle (D. 867) and this one (D. 498) by an unknown author whomSchubertmistakenly took to be Claudius. Of the three of them, this is by far the most affecting. TheKrnersetting is sweet and supple, the Seidle setting is long and relatively monotonous, but this anonymous setting is not only as lovingly tender as theKrner, but also has a pathos that adds immeasurably to its depth. The poem is in three verses, with the first and third verses full of fairly standard-issue lullaby images, but the central verse opens with an image that abruptly ceases the flow of charming maternal images: "Sleep in the sweet grave." As it turns out, this Wiegenlied is to a dead child; indeed, it seems to have been written at almost exactly the same time as the death ofSchubert's youngest half brother, Theodor, only a few months old. In those days, more than half of all the children born in Europe died in infancy, and several ofSchubert's own brothers and sisters died before they could walk. In setting this Wiegenlied to whatGraham Johnsonjustly describes as "the most fragile, the most heartfelt" melody,Schubertperhaps wrote an epitaph for all his dead sisters and brothers.