Robert Schumann told Franz Liszt that he considered the Manfred Overture to be one
of
his “most powerful children.” Schumann’s music for Lord Byron’s dramatic poem
Manfred stressed the
musical
medium most deferential to poetry: the melodrama, in which text is recited over an
accompanying score.
The
result is an odd musical hybrid, and of Schumann’s Manfred music only the Overture
has found an
enduring
place in the repertory. In this somber work we find Schumann at his most demonic,
setting the scene
for
Byron’s tortured hero with music of wide fluctuation, passionately designed
melodies, and insistent
rhythms.
Listen for:
This is a marvelously imagined piece of
scoring—hear,
for example, the economical and stunningly effective use of the trombones.