Robert Schumann: Vogel als Prophet (Bird as Prophet) from Waldszenen, Op. 82

Timo Andres, piano

“Bird as Prophet” surrounds a tiny, six-bar chorale (the “prophecy”?) with a gnomic swirl of arpeg­gios, each ending in an upward inflec­tion. This music never really resolves; rather it contin­u­ally ques­tions what came before it—“What now? And what then?” The melody consists mainly of leading tones (the “wrong” notes which border the actual harmonies); even as the figu­ra­tion of the music is fanciful, the affect is baleful, needling. The closing section is iden­ti­cal to the first; the bird is revealed a false prophet, and the piece is left as a series of unan­swered questions.
–Timo Andres, 2012

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