Schumann wrote these songs to poems by Hans Christian Andersen, an author best known today for his fairy tales, and dedicated them to the poet, who had visited Robert and Clara Schumann earlier that year. The translations were by Adalbert von Chamisso, author of the texts for Frauenliebe und -leben, which Schumann wrote during the same period. They were in the same volume that Frauenliebe came from.

He noted in the letter that he sent with a presentation copy that Andersen may very well find the settings strange, as he himself found the texts strange at first. He continued to say that as he began to understand the poems and their strangeness more deeply, his music started to become increasingly strange as well.

While the situations depicted vary widely, the songs are still linked somewhat loosely by the keys, and considerably more strongly by their place in Schumann's ongoing tendency to explore changes in moods and feelings rather than to express and develop one single emotion, as well as by that element of strangeness.

Part of the strangeness lies in a certain emotional "compression"; in both "Muttertraum" and "Der Spielmann," Schumann compresses into one song the dramatic and emotional range that he unfolded over the course of a cycle in Dichterliebe and Frauenliebe und -leben, written around the same time.

Another part lies in an almost cinematic quality, such as in "Muttertraum," with its changing images: the theme suggesting the mother rocking the baby in her arms, the peaceful image in the vocal lines with the more ominous underlying piano, and the growing forcefulness of the darker mood as the song ends; in "Der Soldat," with the powerful scene painting from the imitation of the death march and the almost disturbingly vivid image in the postlude of the actual moment of death and the fall of the body; in "Der Spielmann," with the images of dancing and the "close-ups" of the fiddler's deterioration; and in "Verratene Liebe," as the gossip about the kiss spreads, at first quietly, and then thundering cheerfully all through the town.

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2.Muttertraum

Even though many of Robert Schumann's songs explored morbidly melancholic subjects, the sick viciousness of Muttertraum (Mother's Dream), Op. 40/2, unprecedentedly cast the composer's interests in a new, disturbing light (or more accurately, a new darkness). The piece was based on Chamisso's translation of an H.C. Andersen poem and is the second of five songs in Fünf Lieder.

With warm affection, the work's opening section describes a mother's tender moments with her angelic son. Broken sixteenth-note chords rock in both directions in the piano treble, while the piano bass notes meander to a steady, slower rhythm. The affectionate guardian is untouched by and unaware of the eavesdropping ravens, who ruthlessly declare their intent to eventually feast on her boy. The birds' brief, sinister message is very quietly supported by the pulsating chords of the accompaniment, which rather abruptly returns to the work's opening motion near the close of this verse. The last five measures of the seven-bar postlude gradually decrescendo and slow until reaching the adagio marking in the final measure.

© Meredith Gailey, All Music Guide

3.Der Soldat

The themes of heartbreak, friendship, death, and duty all merge in Robert Schumann's Der Soldat (The Soldier), Op. 40/3, a setting of one of H.C. Andersen's poems as translated by Chamisso. The text describes how a sad twist of fate and a piercing bullet create a terminal separation between two friends. On one side, blindfolded, stands the accused; on the other, the protagonist trembles, aiming his gun as a member of the firing squad. Below this gunman's mournful thoughts are the steady, quiet drum-like rolls of the piano, only occasionally interrupted by a forte chord, which implies the bass drum's pound. In the two interludes, which both contain multiple sforzando markings, attention shifts away from the protagonist's meditations to expose the intensity of the piano. The vocal line builds steadily, reaches its apex toward the middle, then fades slowly. For its size, this ballad-like song has the feel of a work of broader instrumentation. The lack of resolution in the postlude confirms that the living guilt of the protagonist promises to be far more tortuous than that which had been borne by the deceased. The piece is followed in Fünf Lieder by the hauntingly eerie Der Spielmann, Op. 40/4.

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4.Der Spielmann

In Der Spielmann (The Fiddler), Op. 40/4, Robert Schumann sharpened his knack for effectively setting a text that has tragedy tangled with merriment.

Among her cheery wedding party, the bride of H.C. Andersen's poem (translated by Chamisso) is miserably absorbed by a fiddler who fears the encroachment of his own madness. Set in D minor in 3/4 time, a festive waltz rhythm prevails. Both parts follow the shifting emotions of the text; the vocalist is particularly hushed for the sinister descriptions, and the piano violently bursts with lament during its violin-like interludes. Probably the most intense section of the tune occurs when the fiddler's dread is revealed in the final pianissimo vocal phrase, which is marked adagio. Considered the high point of Fünf Lieder, this song vaguely foreshadows the composer's own demise. The last six measures, in G major, of the 18-bar postlude drop entirely into the bass and sound some of the piano's lowest notes.

© Meredith Gailey, Rovi