Liszt's transcription of Schubert's Der Wanderer shows how the features Liszt introduces that change Schubert's song help to convey a preexisting narrative in an instrumental language, reflecting his awareness of Schubert's interpretation of the text. Each feature Liszt deployed to elaborate the model has a correspondence with a narrative device. For instance, before the narrator's recitative from the model he adds a measure that prolongs the dominant with an extended arpeggio, then he inserts a "rhetorical pause"; both of these devices increase the rhetorical tension until the declamatory passage begins and thus create more contrast than the model. As another example, Liszt explores keyboard registers to create an echo-like imitation for the line "wo bist du?," lending a sense of "interrogation." Liszt's distinctive features transformed Schubert's song; at the same time, they contribute to transcription in the way the composer transfers the literary spirit of the original song to the piano.

Works: Liszt: Der Wanderer (56-65).

Sources: Schubert: Der Wanderer (56-63).

Index Classifications: 1800s

Contributed by: Hyun Joo Kim