The Role of Piano in Dichterliebe

Piano as the Counterpart of Voice in Schumann’s Dichterliebe

Chelsea Chen

Music 303

1405 word count

During the early romantic period, writers considered instrumental music to be more superior to vocal music, believing that instrumental music could approach the “infinite”. 1 In the year 1840 deemed as the Liederjahr, Schumann returned from favoring only instrumental music. He composed the song cycle Dichterliebe set to Heinrich Heine’s Lyrisches Intermezzo. 2 Becoming Schumann’s most famous lieder, Dichterliebe meaning “A Poet’s Love”, is a combination of music with poetry. Finalized at sixteen songs, the piece offers the portrayal of love, pain, and suffering through inspiration from Heine’s poetry. Schumann maximized the expression of emotions in Heine’s poetry and from his own interpretations by enriching the role of the piano in Dichterliebe. The role of the piano becomes less of an accompaniment and more a counterpart to the voice.

Schumann shaped Dichterliebe to embody his own interpretation of the poetry. He sought to express his own commentary through personal revisions of some words to better fit the overall theme. More notably, Schumann developed a stronger role for the piano, which enabled him to illustrate the words of Heine’s poetry as well as manifest his own emotions and life experience. The piano becomes a second voice in the arrangement, elevating Heine’s lyrics beyond simple storytelling towards a deep appeal to the listener’s emotions. The collaboration of poetic lyrics and the piano depicts a new story or scenario in each song cycle and unveils a new array of emotions. The structure, harmonies, rhythm, and texture of the accompaniment are what set the piece apart from just an ordinary love song.

The role of piano in Dichterliebe sets a new perspective of interconnecting voice and music to complement and contrast each other. Though instrumental music was considered the superior in...