Carl Loewe (1796-1869) He established a reputation across Europe both as a composer

and a singer. He is best known today for his songs, though, for all the importance they are accorded in the scholarly literature, they remain largely neglected by modern performers. He also wrote instrumental music, solo piano works, operas and oratorios. As many eighteenth century composers did, Loewe struggled to be successful as an opera composer, but later found more success with his 14 oratorios.

Early songs, rely upon mainstream late 18th-century tradition; dependence upon a single melodic line, rudimentary accompaniment and largely strophic and varied strophic forms.

From around 1817, Zumsteeg’s influence becomes strongly apparent. The ballad was the predominant vocal genre that Loewe cultivated.

Balladen (1824), The first collection, includes three of his best known works:

Edward

Der Wirthin Töchterlein

Erlkönig.

Esther op.52 a song-cycle in ‘Balladenform’

Late ballads:

Odins Meeresritt (1851)

Die Schwanenjungfrau (1857),

Loewe’s ballads, unlike Schubert’s, possessed no unifying musical motif which set the framework for the whole song: instead, each poetic idea is treated separately and episodically.

Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) According to conventional wisdom, Mendelssohn's solo and duet lieder do not rank among his most significant efforts. He remained uninfluenced by the rich corpus of Schubert's songs. Instead, initially his models were the north German lieder, including those of Reichardt and Zelter, in which the piano parts provided only modest accompaniments to the poetry. Many of Mendelssohn's songs are simple strophic settings. Material from many of his Lieder came from his instrumental works.

Zwölf Lieder, op. 9 (Berlin, 1830)

Der Jüngling 1 Frage (Droysen or Mendelssohn), Pentecost 1827 2 Geständnis (E. Devrient) 3 Wartend (Droysen), Romanze, 3 April 1829 4 Im Frühling (Droysen), 27 Jan 1830 5 Im Herbst (K. Klingemann), 22 March 1827 6 Scheidend (Droysen), 13 Jan 1830

Das Mädchen 7 Sehnsucht (Droysen), 24 June 1828 [by Fanny Mendelssohn] 8 Frühlingsglaube (L. Uhland), 19 Jan 1830 9 Ferne (Droysen), 13 Jan 1830 10 Verlust (Heine), 28 Dec 1827 [by Fanny Mendelssohn] 11 Entsagung (Droysen) 12 Die Nonne (Uhland), May 1822 [by Fanny Mendelssohn]

This set shows some evidence of a cyclic design: its two halves are subtitled ‘Der Jüngling’ and ‘Das Mädchen’; what is more, the questioning motif of the first song, Frage (‘Ist es wahr?’), is reworked in nos.2 and 3, thereby linking the three together.