Death And The Maiden Quartet: Music For Halloween

Autumn is a time when trees lose their leaves, the sun is out for a shorter period of the day, and kids have to go back to school. In some ways, it seems like Death is near. Franz Schubert spent much of his life compose grim music, and we already experienced his haunting Erlkönig. Today, the day before Halloween, I want to explore one of the last and most morbid of Schubert’s string quartets. It is nicknamed Death and the Maiden because he borrows the melody from a song by the same title he composed nine years earlier. The lyrics of the song are from a poem by Matthias Claudius, and it is a dialogue between a young lady and Death who promises her peace and rest once she dies. Did I say this quartet was morbid?

Schubert may have had many reasons to compose this work. He needed money after selling several scores to a publisher who paid him very little. At this point in his life, he probably found that his audiences enjoyed the grim side of his compositions. Finally, he recently was diagnosed with an illness that had no cure and faced his own mortality at the young age of 25 when he composed this quartet.

When you are listening, note that every movement is composed in a minor key. This is very unusual, especially for the early 1800s. Further, Schubert wrote this movement by using theme and variation. The contrasting variations in a major mode are the only time the foreboding nature of the quartet relents. Finally, the last movement is in the style of a tarantella, which is a quick Italian style dance. In a way, it is a final dance of Death. There are also times when the composer quotes the melody from Erlkönig. This quote is no accident or a matter of laziness. Schubert is likely alluding to the notion of an untimely death for someone far too young, both the maiden in the poem and perhaps himself.

I have included the whole quartet, played by the Jerusalem Quartet, in the playlist. If you have 45 minutes to enjoy the entire work, I highly recommend it. If you are short on time, enjoy the first and last movements as bookends of this great work.