[+] Wolff, Christoph. "Schubert's 'Der Tod und das Mädchen': Analytical and Explanatory Notes on the Song D. 531 and the Quartet D. 810." In Schubert Studies, ed. Eva Badura-Skoda and Peter Branscombe, 143-172. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982.
Schubert's song "Der Tod und das Mädchen" takes the form of a dialogue in which Death is represented by a slow chordal sequence and the maiden by recitative-style writing. This is probably modeled on very similar procedures in Gluck's Alceste and the cemetery scene from Mozart's Don Giovanni. In addition to a musical reworking in a setting of a similar poem ("Der Jüngling und der Tod," D. 545) composed shortly thereafter, the song also reappears in the String Quartet in D Minor, D. 810. Although the most obvious instance of this is the expanded version of the song's chordal sequence that serves as the theme for the slow movement's variation set, material from the entire song can be seen to be present in the remaining three movements as well, thus imparting a cyclical nature to the work as a whole.
Index Classifications: 1800s
Contributed by: J. Sterling Lambert
