A little knowledge about art songs

Art song is a vocal genre of western chamber music, and it is the general name of lyric songs popular in Europe from the end of18th century to the beginning of19th century. This is a song written as an indoor concert to distinguish it from folk songs and pop songs. Traditionally, music is written for poetry, and the lyrics are very literary, which is different from most folk songs and pop songs. The accompaniment of art songs is created by composers, not improvisations by performers.

The main features of art songs:

(1) The unity of music and poetry. Art song is a highly compatible musical form between music and poetry. The lyrics mostly use famous sentences from famous artists, and through the coordination of musical lines, rhythms and pictures, the spirit, thoughts, emotions and artistic conception embodied in poems are reproduced.

② Dramatic expressive force. In the creation of artistic songs, drama has always existed, which is manifested in the ups and downs, sadness and joy of characters' emotions in a specific environment, reflecting the richness and complexity of people's emotions.

③ Diversity of music structure. The German-Austrian school represented by Schubert inherited the classical structural forms of Beethoven, Haydn and Mozart, and often adopted the methods of two-part form, three-part form, traditional sectional form and variation sectional form, and incorporated them into the developmental structure on the basis of the traditional form.

Representative works of art songs:

Mozart's Violet

The art song Violet was written by Mozart in 1785. The original poem is selected from Goethe's first opera "Erwin and Hermia". This poem describes a young man who falls in love with a frivolous woman. The poet expressed his yearning for his former lover and his perseverance and courage in pursuing love until death.

② Schubert's Bodhi Tree

Bodhi Tree is a song in Winter Journey, a vocal suite created by Austrian composer Schubert. This work has beautiful melody and delicate emotional expression, and has the style characteristics of German-Austrian folk songs, so it has become one of the most popular works among a large number of artistic songs created by Schubert. The scene described in the song is that there is a bodhi tree in front of the homeless man's hometown, and he once spent a happy time under the tree. Now he is wandering in the cold wind, and it seems that he can still hear the bodhi tree calling him gently.

(3) Mendelssohn "On Singing Wings"

Riding on Singing Wings was written in 1836. When Mendelssohn conducted in Dü sseldorf, he completed six songs of Op.34, among which the second one, Riding on Singing Wings, was the most popular one among his solo songs. The lyrics of this song are a lyric poem by Heine. The whole song, accompanied by clear melody and soft broken strings, depicts a warm and romantic picture: riding the wings of singing, going to the Henghe River with my beloved, listening to the rippling waves in the distance, and looking forward to a happy dream of bloom falling on a moonlit night. ...