Composed in 1827, the year before Franz Schubert died at the age of just 31, Winterreise is made up of 24 songs, written to texts by Wilhelm Müller. Its story, told in fragments and references rather than structured narrative, is seen through the eyes of a heartbroken young man. Disappointed in love, he makes his way through a desolate, frozen winter landscape.
“A stranger I came, A stranger I depart…”
The opening lines of “Good Night”, the first song in Franz Schubert’s cycle, Winterreise seemed to resonate with a terminally ill Fryderyk Chopin: So much so that in the ears of some observers they spilled over into the manuscript of the composer’s masterfulSonata for Cello and Piano.
In Schubert’s song cycle, the protaganist is a dying poet. Themes of banishment, lost love and icy despair pervade. Just as they did in Chopin’s life at the time he composed his Cello Sonata. It was winter. His health was in rapid decline. He was twice exiled: he’d left his native Poland for good, and his paramour George Sand had just evicted him from their nest with the publication of an exposé thinly-veiled as a work of fiction.
Which brings us back to the first movement of Chopin’s Cello Sonata. It’s problematic. It puzzled even his closest allies. Was it too intimate? Wasting away on his deathbed, Chopin asked to hear it, only to find he could bear no more than the first few measures. In fact, he omitted the movement from the sonata’s 1848 premiere. Clearly, it had profound personal significance. Most likely because he turned to—and quoted—Schubert’s song at the time of his separation from George Sand, which she had publicly portrayed as entirely his fault. Was it regret? Or, as in the final stanzas in Schubert’s song, did the ailing Chopin recognize his fate was sealed?
These are the last words spoken
Soon I’ll be out of sight
A simple farewell message
Goodnight, my love, good night.
The only known photo of Fryderyk Chopin (1810 – 1849), taken near the end of his life.
Today we would call Chopin and novelist George Sand (Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil) a “celebrity couple.” Sand’s popularity as writer rivaled Balzac and Victor Hugo. She and Chopin were together for ten years, but separated two years before his death. Sand notably did not attend his funeral.
Listen to the song Gute Nacht (“Good Night”) – the first in Franz Schubert’s Winterreise song cycle – sung from the female perspective in a masterful performance by soprano Joyce DiDonato, joined by pianist Yannick Nézet-Séguin.
…and now, listen for an eerily similar opening line in the cello in this #Heifetz2022 performance featuring cellist Boubacar Diallo and pianist Yoon Lee!