Schubert: Die Forelle

By David Govertsen

Schubertiade (1896), by Julius Schmidt

This Sunday we celebrate the birthday of Viennese composer and songsmith extraordinaire Franz Schubert.  As a pioneer of the song cycle genre with over six hundred songs written for solo voice and piano to his credit, he has clearly earned a place in the art song pantheon.

The music of Schubert has naturally found a home on many Fourth Coast concerts.  ‘Die Forelle’, heard here in an arrangement for vocal quartet and piano, kicked off our ‘What a Zoo!’ program, which I had the pleasure of curating two seasons ago. 

Elliot Mandel Photography

Composed in 1817 when Schubert was barely twenty years old, the song tells the tale of the titular trout and a meddlesome fisherman.  The cheerful melody in the piano depicts the lively fish swimming about in the clear water as the fisherman attempts to catch it.  The fisherman grows impatient and muddies the waters in order to trick the trout; the fish is caught!  Here Schubert likewise muddies the musical waters with thick, crunchy chords in the left hand of the piano, returning to the original theme as the trout emerges from the water hooked on the fishing line.

I am always struck by the imagery that jumps off the page in a Schubert song.  Using only the keys of a piano and the voice of a singer he is able to conjure vivid depictions of nearly any subject; from the pounding of horses’ feet in ‘Erlkönig’, to the incessant turning of the spinning wheel in ‘Gretchen am Spinnrade’, to the lively antics of the trout in ‘Die Forelle’.  To think that he achieved this in only thirty-one short years of life makes one wonder what could have been. 

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag, Herr Schubert!

This performance was recorded live on June 2, 2019 at the Logan Center for the Arts in Hyde Park with pianist Kuang-Hao Huang.  Audio by Joshua Sauvageau.

Author

Bass-baritone David Govertsen joined Fourth Coast Ensemble in 2017.  He has been active as a professional singer and educator for nearly twenty years, portraying a wide variety of opera’s low-voiced heroes, villains, and buffoons.  He discovered Schubert’s magical marriage of text and music as an undergraduate and has been hooked on art song ever since.