Liederkreis: Dichterliebe (A Poet's Love) (1840)

lied = song;  lieder (plural) ;   liederkreis =  song cycle


Dichterliebe, "A Poet's Love" (composed 1840), is Schumann's best-known song cycle.  
The texts for the 16 songs come from Heinrich Heine's the Lyrisches Intermezzo, written 
1822–23 and published as part of the poet's Das Buch der Lieder.

The cycle is about a young man's yearnings of love for a woman who rejects him, and the 
young man's coming to terms with his disappointments.

The very natural, almost hyper-sensitive poetical affections of the poems are mirrored in 
Schumann's settings, with their miniaturist chromaticism and suspensions.  The poet's love 
is a hothouse of nuanced responses to the delicate language of flowers, dreams and fairy-tales.

Following the song-cycles of Franz Schubert (Die schöne Müllerin and Winterreise), 
those of Schumann constitute part of the central core of the genre in musical literature.

Below are the 20 poems of Heine's Lyrisches Intermezzo.  The 4 with italized titles were 
left out of Shumann's Dichterliebe:

Im wunderschönen Monat Mai Aus meinen Tränen sprießen Die Rose, die Lilie, die Taube, die Sonne Wenn ich in deine Augen seh' Dein Angesicht so lieb und schön Lehn deine Wang' an meine Wang' Ich will meine Seele tauchen Im Rhein, im heiligen Strome Ich grolle nicht Und wüßten's die Blumen, die kleinen Das ist ein Flöten und Geigen Hör' ich das Liedchen klingen Ein Jüngling liebt ein Mädchen Am leuchtenden Sommermorgen Es leuchtet meine Liebe Mein Wagen rollet langsam Ich hab' im Traum geweinet Allnächtlich im Traume seh' ich dich Aus alten Märchen Die alten, bösen Lieder

In the wonderfully fair month of May From my tears spring The rose, the lily, the dove, the sun When I look into your eyes Your face, so dear and fair Rest your cheek against my cheek I would plunge my soul In the Rhine, in the holy stream I bear no grudge And if they knew it, the blooms, the little ones There is a fluting and fiddling I hear the little song sounding A young man loves a girl On a radiant summer morning My love, it shines My coach rolls slowly I have in my dreams wept Every night in my dreams I see you From old fairy-tales it beckons The old, angry songs

     No. 1.  'Im wunderschönen Monat Mai'   (In the Wonderfully Fair Month of May)

                      Matthias Goerne, Baritone, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Piano


                           In the wonderfully fair month of May,
                           as all the flower-buds burst,
                           then in my heart 
                           love arose.

                            In the wonderfully fair month of May, 
                           as all the birds were singing, 
                           then I confessed to her 
                           my yearning and longing.