Franz Schubert

:Schubert redirects here. For other uses, see Schubert (disambiguation).

Posthumous history of Schubert's music

Some of his smaller pieces were printed shortly after his death, but the more valuable seem to have been regarded by the publishers as waste paper. In 1838 Robert Schumann, on a visit to Vienna, found the dusty manuscript of the C major symphony (the "Great", D.944) and took it back to Leipzig, where it was performed by Felix Mendelssohn and celebrated in the Neue Zeitschrift. There continues to be some controversy over the numbering of this symphony, with German-speaking scholars numbering it as symphony No. 7, the revised Deutsch catalogue (the standard catalogue of Schubert's works, compiled by Otto Erich Deutsch) listing it as No. 8, and English-speaking scholars listing it as No. 9.

Related Topics:
1838 - Robert Schumann - C major symphony - Leipzig - Felix Mendelssohn - Otto Erich Deutsch

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50 of his songs were transcribed for piano and then popularised by Franz Liszt.

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The most important step towards the recovery of the neglected works was the journey to Vienna which Sir George Grove (of "Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians" fame) and Sir Arthur Sullivan made in the autumn of 1867. The travellers rescued from oblivion seven symphonies, the Rosamunde music, some of the Masses and operas, some of the chamber works, and a vast quantity of miscellaneous pieces and songs. This led to more widespread public interest in Schubert's work.

Related Topics:
Sir George Grove - Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians - Sir Arthur Sullivan - 1867

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Another controversy, which originated with Grove and Sullivan and continued for many years, surrounded the "lost" symphony. Immediately before Schubert's death, his friend Eduard von Bauernfeld recorded the existence of an additional symphony, dated 1828 (although this does not necessarily indicate the year of composition) named the "Letzte" or "Last" symphony. It has been more or less accepted by musicologists that the "Last" symphony refers to a sketch in D major (D936A), discovered by Ernst Hilmar in the 1970s and eventually realised by Brian Newbould as the Tenth Symphony.

Related Topics:
Eduard von Bauernfeld - 1828 - 1970s - Tenth Symphony

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Franz Liszt said Schubert was "the most poetic musician ever".

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