Schubert, FRANZ PETER, the celebrated composer, was born in Vienna on January 31, 1797. His father, who came of a Moravian peasant stock, had settled some years previously as a school-master in a district of the city called the Lichtenthal; his mother before her marriage had been a cook. Their two elder sons, Ignaz and Ferdinand, adopted the father's calling. Franz's musical gifts very early declared themselves. At first he was taught the violin by his father, and the piano-forte by his brother Ignaz; but he very soon outstripped their powers of instruction. His training was therefore entrusted to Holzer, organist of the parish church, whose raptures over the boy's talents were a poor substitute for the conscientious care which they demanded. Before he was eleven years of age young Schubert was leading soprano in the Lichtenthal choir, whence he was soon transferred to the Konvikt or choristers' school of the Court-chapel. Franz at once took his place as one of the violin-players in the school band, where he soon became leader. The constant practice thus afforded him was doubtless an inestimable advantage, though it must always be regretted that his theoretical training was practically left to take care of itself; for Ruzicka, the music-master at the Konvikt, seems to have taken much the same line with Schubert as Holzer had done before him. The circumstances of the school were not favourable to study. The boys were allowed to go hungry, and in winter without fire, so that even practice was carried on under difficulties. But Schubert's thirst for composition triumphed over all such obstacles, and in its endeavour to be satisfied interfered seriously with his progress in the ordinary curriculum. He made many friends at this time, for his schoolfellows were all proud of his gifts and were delighted to take part in the performance of his compositions; while in Spaun, one of the senior choristers, he found a benefactor who kept him supplied with music-paper, a luxury beyond the reach of his own very slender resources. During the five years thus spent Schubert tried his hand at almost every kind of composition, the work which marks the completion of this period being a symphony in D (October 28, 1813).
On his departure from the Konvikt he became an under-teacher in his father's school in order to avoid the conscription. Even at this early date he wrote some of his most enduring compositions. Of these may be mentioned that immortal song the Erl King, truly marvellous as the work of a youth of eighteen, and the Mass in F, first performed by the Lichtenthal choir under the direction of the composer. Among those who congratulated him on this occasion was Salieri, under whose guidance his more recent studies had been made. Schubert's delivery from the drudgery of his father's school was brought about by Franz von Schober, a young man of his own age, who had met with some of his songs, and who, on coming to the university of Vienna, lost no time in finding out the composer. As soon as he became aware of Schubert's anomalous position, he proposed that he should share his lodging and be free to devote himself entirely to his art. Franz fell in with the arrangement, which, however, was put an end to by the interference of Schober's brother after a few months, when Schubert was doubtless laid under a similar obligation to other friends; for, with the exception of £4 paid to him for a cantata written for a Herr Watteroth, his work as yet had brought him in nothing. His short residence with Schober was marked by an event which had a lasting influence on his career—his acquaintance with Vogl, the eminent singer and actor, who very soon appreciated his genius, and became his firm and most valued friend. Vogl's fine literary taste enabled him to curb that omnivorous instinct of Schubert's which impelled him to lavish his treasures of melody on words altogether unworthy of them. To him also Schubert owed the recognition (inadequate as it was) of his talents by the Viennese, for Vogl constantly sang his songs at the houses of people of influence in the first instance, and eventually in public.
In 1818 Schubert became teacher of music in the family of Count Johann Esterhazy at his country seat at Zelész, in Hungary, where he passed several months, finding in the beauty of his surroundings a new stimulus to composition. The end of the year, however, saw him back in Vienna and installed in lodgings with the poet Mayrhofer. The two would often work together in the same room, the one writing verses which the other as rapidly set to music. On February 28, 1819, Schubert was first brought before the public as a composer by the performance of one of his songs, the Schäfers Klagelied, at a concert in Vienna. In the summer he made an extended tour with Vogl, and found time to compose, during a halt at Steyr, his well-known pianoforte quintett (op. 114). His comic operetta, the Zwillingsbrüder, finished 19th January 1819, was produced at the Kärnthnerthor theatre on June 14, 1820, and two months later came the first performance of the Zauberharfe at the Theater-an-der-Wien. His appearance in print was delayed until April 1821, when his old schoolfellow Leopold Sonnleither and another friend named Gymnich had the Erl King engraved at their own cost. But as Schubert's songs began to be heard more frequently the enthusiasm with which they were received at length overcame the hesitation of publishers in accepting his MSS. As many as twenty songs were issued in eight months, but unfortunately no permanent pecuniary benefit was secured to the composer. In 1822 Schubert completed his opera Alfonso and Estrella, the libretto of which was furnished by Schober. It was rehearsed at Gratz, but was not brought to performance during the composer's lifetime. Liszt produced it at Weimar in 1854; but it did not meet with any real success until March 1881, when with a new libretto and considerable curtailment it was produced at Carlsruhe. To 1822 belong also the two movements of the unfinished symphony in B minor, in which for the first time in his orchestral writings Schubert displays a complete individuality. His first acquaintance with Weber and his formal introduction to Beethoven are also noteworthy among the events of this year.
During 1823 Schubert devoted much attention to dramatic music, writing with great rapidity the three-act opera of Fierabras; but to himself these labours resulted only in intense disappointment and depression, although we owe to his efforts in this direction the beautiful Rosamunde music, the orchestral parts of which were discovered at Vienna in 1867 by Sir George Grove in a cupboard where they had remained untouched for forty-four years. A second long stay with the Esterhazys at Zelené restored Schubert from his state of extreme dejection, the visit being marked by the composition of many important works, including some pianoforte duets written for his two pupils, the daughters of Count Esterhazy. Of these the best known is probably the Divertissement à la Hongroise, inspired by Hungarian airs which Schubert heard sung by a servant as he passed the door of the kitchen. The summer of 1825 was devoted to a pleasant tour with Vogl, the two friends delighting every one with their performance of Schubert's new songs from Walter Scott's Lady of the Lake, to which he referred when he wrote 'The way in which Vogl sings and I accompany, so that for the moment we appear to be one, is something quite new and unexpected to these good people.' And yet the seven songs which proved so successful were sold on his return to Vienna for the paltry sum of £20!
The compositions of 1826 included a quartett in D minor and the pianoforte sonata in G, usually known as the Fantasie. One of Schubert's happiest inspirations, the song Hark! Hark! the lark, came suddenly upon him as he sat in a beer-garden one Sunday afternoon in July; his other Shakespearian songs, Who is Sylvia? and the 'drinking song' in Antony and Cleopatra, being also attributable to this date. In the autumn he missed a probable appointment as director of the music at the Court Theatre of Vienna through his refusal to alter certain pieces which he had composed as a test of his fitness for the post. Some months later Schubert's songs were brought under the notice of Beethoven. They were put into his hands during his last illness by his devoted attendant Schindler, who had Schubert's welfare much at heart. The perusal of them was a revelation to him, and drew from him the exclamation: 'Truly Schubert has the divine fire!' A recurrence of his malady prevented his acquaintance with Schubert's other works, but he often spoke of him and foretold the stir which he was destined to make in the musical world. During these days Schubert twice visited the man whom of all others he admired, and, when the end had come, was one of the torch-bearers at Beethoven's funeral.
In 1827 Schubert was elected a member of the representative body of the Musical Society of Vienna, an honour which he greatly appreciated, while his prospects were further brightened by advantageous proposals from foreign publishers, the best possible proof of his growing reputation.
He was thus spurred on to surpass his former achievements in the composition of his noblest symphony (No. 9 in C), begun in March 1828, and if possible more characteristic of him than the earlier one in B minor. His rate of production during this his last year was truly prodigious, for besides the symphony he wrote his Mass in E flat, the oratorio Miriam's War-song, the string quintett in C, and three pianoforte sonatas. He also composed several songs, the words of which his friend Schindler had found among Beethoven's papers. One of these, Die Taubenpost, is dated October 1828, and is probably the last piece written by Schubert. He gave his first and, as it proved, his only concert in the hall of the Musik-Verein at Vienna on the evening of March 26. The venture was extremely successful, so that for the time being the needy composer was placed beyond want, although he had to abandon his usual summer excursion on account of his poverty, which must indeed have been extreme, since he was driven to dispose of some of his finest songs for a few pence apiece.
At the end of August he took up his abode with his brother Ferdinand in a new house in the suburb of Neue Wieden, but the change seems to have had a bad effect upon his already weak state of health. He recovered sufficiently to join some friends in a short walking tour; but his illness soon returned, bringing with it complete loss of appetite. Yet he was as active as ever, both in body and in mind. He walked much, and talked of his plans for a proposed new opera, Graf von Gleichcn. He was able to go to hear Beethoven's quartett in C sharp minor, which greatly moved him, and to attend the first performance of a Requiem composed by Ferdinand Schubert. At the same time a study of Handel's scores caused him to reflect upon his own deficiencies in counterpoint, and to determine to remedy them by a course of lessons with Sechter, the best-known authority on the subject. The dates of the lessons were fixed and the text-book chosen. But Schubert's time for work was now over. On November 11 he wrote to Schober telling him that for eleven days he had taken neither food nor drink, and asking for some of Cooper's novels to read. A few days later he became delirious and was found to be suffering from an attack of typhus fever, to which he succumbed on Wednesday, November 19, 1828, in the thirty-second year of his age. In accordance with his latest wish his remains were buried near Beethoven's grave in the cemetery of Währung; they were reinterred in the central cemetery of Vienna on September 23, 1888.
Among composers Schubert is remarkable for the apparently ceaseless impulse to compose which possessed him; and, as a consequence, for the vast and, considering the shortness of his life, almost incredible quantity of music with which he has enriched the world. He is still more renowned for the absolute spontaneity of his writings and for the poetic spirit with which he has imbued them. But his special and peculiar eminence lies in the department of song-writing, in which he reached the highest limit of excellence, the earliest of his lyrical productions affording perfectly mature examples of artistic musical form applied to song. In other branches of composition the deficiencies of his theoretical training are often evident, but here his instincts were never at fault. There were occasions when the torrent of inspiration rushed upon him with irresistible force. At such times the recitation or perusal of a poem seemed to touch some hidden spring in him, and in a few moments he had wedded it to music in such perfect accord with the words that the finest poems of the greatest poets were by this means not so much enhanced as transcended. His usual custom, however, was to write steadily for a long time every morning; and he would sometimes compose six or seven songs in his best manner in less than as many hours. But the lyrical spirit was by no means confined to his songs; it found its way into his instrumental works, which reveal a wonderful prodigality of ideas, although comparatively little learning is displayed in turning them to account. In his orchestral writings Schubert is celebrated for extraordinary delicacy in his method of instrumentation, especially in his treatment of the wood-wind; and this is the more remarkable from the fact of his never having heard the effect of his very finest passages—for some of his noblest pieces were not performed until long after his death. He rarely altered anything he had written, and could never understand the immense pains taken by Beethoven in perfecting his scores. Schubert wrote as one impelled by imperious necessity to relieve his mind of ideas, which in his case were sometimes forgotten as soon as they were committed to paper—a fact which will be the more readily appreciated when it is remembered that, although his years were fewer than those of any other master of the first rank, he composed more than 500 songs, ten symphonies (including two left unfinished), six masses, a host of sonatas and other works for the pianoforte, a number of string quartetts (those in A minor and D minor being especially fine), as well as several operas, cantatas, and overtures. Schubert's personal character was extremely modest and retiring; hence perhaps, to some extent, his failure to obtain any permanent appointment by which he might have been delivered from that sadly precarious mode of existence which doubtless hastened his end. His sweetness and amiability of disposition endeared him to every one, while he was generous to a fault. The insignificance of his appearance gave no token of the genius it concealed; his friend Lachner describes him as 'looking like a cabman.'
For an exhaustive account of Schubert's life, together with a complete list of his works, see the article by Sir George Grove in his Dictionary of Music. There are Lives by Kreissle von Hellborn (1866) and Reissmann (1873); see also the Beiträge by Max Friedländer (1883).