Фортепианный квинтет Франца Шуберта как идеальное воплощение феномена пятеричности в камерно-инструментальной музыке романтизма

Abstract

В статье исследуется феномен “Форель”-квинтета Ф. Шуберта в концепции символики пятеричности, определяющей композиционные, музыкально-речевые и исполнительские средства. Рассмотрено специфику строения Квинтета Шуберта, в которой концепция пятеричности цикла соотносима с семантикой частей католической мессы, что привносит в интонационно-тематический состав генетически-песенных образов высокий ореол христианской абстракции. Охарактеризовано глубинную связь “Форель”-квинтета с концепцией высокого бидермайера, в которой простота песенного материала и строфических форм сопряжена с высокой символикой богослужебных истин и знаков.

У статті досліджено феномен “Форель”-квінтета Ф. Шуберта в концепції символіки п’ятеричності, що визначає композиційні, музично-мовні та виконавські засоби. Розглянуто специфіку будови Квінтету Шуберта, в якій концепція п’ятеричного циклу співвідносна із семантикою частин католицької меси, що привносить в інтонаційно-тематичний склад генетично-пісенних образів високий ореол християнської абстракції. Охарактеризовано глибинний зв’язок “Форель”-квінтету з концепцією високого бідермайєра, в якій простота пісенного матеріалу та строфічних форм пов’язана з високою символікою богослужбових істин і знаків.

The piano “Trout”-quintet by Franz Schubert, a well-known composition, paradoxically, doesn’t receive much attention of musical researchers. This circumstance can be understood as the Biedermeier mystical symbolism that creates concentration of semantic indicators alongside with relative modesty of its texture, has been outside attention of musicological analysis for a long time. Schubert’s lyrical gift forms his trust to a single imagery of his statement, ignoring “instrumental theater” of symphonic precepts of the Vienna school. However, in such outwardly unartful music we can find a chasm of secret effulgence and meanings connected with theological symbolism and with a Quinarity phenomenon too. The quintet (composed in 1819) was being put to notes by a mature master (the 4th, 5th and 6th Symphonies have been already published by this time) during a difficult historical era. Despite the cultural stagnation that was a reaction to Metternich’s censorship, and, maybe, thanks to it, the socalled functional genres in art that were main for Biedermeier began to blossom. An interest in a simple citizen, his world, thoughts, its feelings has also defined this relevant type of music. Long ago the “Trout”-quintet with its charming song melodies and dancing rhythms, in spite of its external artlessness and simplicity of expression, found an aura of the special light importance difficult to be explained. Certainly, the title given by Schubert to the quintet basing on variations of its fourth part of the theme of the song “Trout” has a considerable role in such phenomenon. The subject that is important for the composer, obviously, appeared in the five-part quintet not incidentally, a trout – fish – Jesus’s symbol, and Celts had the Fisher King (we don’t forget that Schubert was working in the period of times of a maximum of manifestation of “Celtomania”). The Quinarity in the five-part Shubert’s quintet is shown multi-dimensionally, it has a lot of meanings, including mystical ones, but we should remember about the Quinarity of the Catholic mass with her traditional parts: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei. Analyzing the lyrics of the “Trout” themselves, we can find that behind its external artlessness there is also a deep implication, a certain mystical sense. The last ones F. Schubert has yet again emphasized in his variations on the “Trout”-theme – in the fourth part of the quintet – which, in turn, became the culmination of all Piano quintet, having appeared in the point of its golden ratio. The “Trout”-quintet, in the opinion of the author of the research, represents an ideal sample of an embodiment of the phenomenon of the Quinarity in all its multidimensionality in chamber instrumental music as mysticism of a consecrated sense. The five-part form itself, being non-standard in the classical cyclization, emphasizes the originality and its uniqueness-perfection several times in the cycle which, in the first, second and last parts gives us variations on the structure of the first part – an unusual sonata form with lines of strophicity originating from vocal forms. In the third and fourth parts F. Schubert shows consistently dynamic-tempo and semantic culminations. In is turn, the fourth part consists of five (!) variations on the subject of the “Trout” in which the fourth tragic and minor variation is the semantic culmination of all this part. So all the fourth part (the semantic culmination) is as if a matrix according to which all the cycle has been written, or, in other words, the whole Quintet is a projection of variations to the subject of the “Trout”. Thus, a difficult determined Shubert’s “innuendo”, artlessness, major-minor glows, an infinite variety of lyricness in the “Trout”-quintet are filled with polysynthetic symbolics, some religious mystical sense, a certain lightest manifestation of hymn singing, deep absorption in the Idea. But, at the same time, its music is alien to all outer effects of a deliberate condensation of the texture and dynamics, that “simfonizing” of ensemble sounding which, by inertia of the Vienna school, was regarded as a merit(and it was so in the concept of Vienna composers of this time!) to representatives of the great art phenomenon of the German culture. So, having made a detailed consideration of the dramaturgic scenario of the Quintet, its obvious parallels with the structure of ritual and ceremonial actions, including church liturgics, come to light and form a deep mystical implication of the “Trout”-Quintet.