Franz Peter Schubert (1797 – 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short life, Schubert left behind a vast oeuvre, including more than 600 secular vocal works (mainly lieder), seven complete symphonies, sacred music, operas, incidental music, and a large body of piano and chamber music. His major works include the art song "Erlkönig", the Piano Trout Quintet in A major, the unfinished Symphony No. 8 in B minor, the "Great" Symphony No. 9 in C major, a String Quintet, the three last piano sonatas, the opera Fierrabras, the incidental music to the play Rosamunde, and the song cycles Die schöne Müllerin and Winterreise. He was remarkably prolific, writing over 1,500 works in his short career. His compositional style progressed rapidly throughout his short life. The largest number of his compositions are songs for solo voice and piano (roughly 630). Schubert also composed a considerable number of secular works for two or more voices, namely part songs, choruses and cantatas. He completed eight orchestral overtures and seven complete symphonies, in addition to fragments of six others. While he composed no concertos, he did write three concertante works for violin and orchestra. Schubert wrote a large body of music for solo piano, including eleven incontrovertibly completed sonatas and at least eleven more in varying states of completion, numerous miscellaneous works and many short dances, in addition to producing a large set of works for piano four hands. He also wrote over fifty chamber works, including some fragmentary works. Schubert's sacred output includes seven masses, one oratorio and one requiem, among other mass movements and numerous smaller compositions. He completed only eleven of his twenty stage works.

"Die junge Nonne" (The young Nun D.828 Op. 43 No. 1) tells a powerful story from the first ominous notes of a muffled storm. In a number of details (particularly in the rumble of the tremolando of the accompaniment and supporting octave triplets) the music is curiously reminiscent of Kolmas Klage from a decade earlier. Perhaps this is logical enough when we realise that that too was storm music written for a heroine whose soul was beset by storm-like grief. The key of F minor is established with the broadest of brushes. Howling wind and ringing bell are both introduced by a motif that is heard again and again in various guises (including the vocal line, itself a variant of this theme). The left hand beneath the rustlings of the right does its storm work, and then crosses over (a most eloquent gesture in this context) to sound the angelus. It is as if we are seeing, and hearing, the diabolical and the divine in the human condition in a Jekyll and Hyde juxtaposition of roles. The tension rises and the screw is mercilessly turned by a semitone rise to the key of F sharp minor. It is here, as Capell so aptly puts it, that 'every listener is aware that some powerful spirit is at work.' G sharp in the bass (under the first 'und finster der Nacht') pushes pitch and excitement higher (a D in the vocal line) but the voice now descends by semitones (D flat and then C, where the hollow incantation of 'wie das Grab' makes its eerie effect) on its return to F minor. At the third verse the music goes into F major, and the change of key is as if a cloud has cleared in the nun's understanding rather than in nature, for the storm continues raging outside. A miracle has taken place, however, and her prayer has been answered. She now has 'a recognition of the essential benignancy of the forces of the wild night' (Capell again, who is splendid on this song) and she carries us with her in the sweep of her conviction and new-found insight. Her fear of the storm, both nature's and life's, has been banished; instead we hear a type of visionary ecstasy that in lesser musical hands would have been maudlin. But aided by Schubert we are transfixed by the transformation; the hypnotic rhythm of the music, both repetitive and ever changing, would make us follow her anywhere. The effect of the final bell music is of the greatest imaginable romantic grandeur, at the same time as being gently moving and touching. The storm motif continues but it has forever lost its power to intimidate. What has started out as a force of potential danger and evil is now seen to be yet another facet of the workings of God.

In a few minutes, and not even helped by a poem of the first rank, Schubert has achieved a scene of Shakespearean dimensions in which confrontation and struggle finally resolve into acceptance and reconciliation. The young nun, now steadfast at last, has voyaged uneasily through spiritual tempests of doubt and temptation, and turned to heaven as her haven. The song's span and structure suggest the experiences of a lifetime rather than a single night, so powerfully does the music sonorously recreate the poetic symbolism of past passions in terms of the thunderstorm and final peace of mind as the ringing of the morning angelus. Thus a poem of neo-gothic extravagance has been transformed into a song about a real woman. No composer ever surpasses Schubert's ability to bring warmth and life to what could remain, in other hands, a cardboard cut-out of Sturm und Drang.

Source: Hyperion (https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dw.asp?dc=W2153_GBA JY9201517)

Although originally composed for Voice & Piano, I created this Interpretation of the "Die junge Nonne" (The young Nun D.828 Op. 43 No. 1) for Flute & Strings (2 Violins, Viola & Cello).