Franz Schubert

Life and career

Early life and education

Franz Peter Schubert was born in Himmelpfortgrund (now a part of Alsergrund), Vienna, Archduchy of Austria, on 31 January 1797, and baptized in the Catholic Church the following day. He was the twelfth child of Franz Theodor Florian Schubert (1763–1830) and Maria Elisabeth Katharina Vietz (1756–1812). Schubert's immediate ancestors came originally from the province of Zuckmantel in Austrian Silesia. His father, the son of a Moravian peasant, was a well-known parish schoolmaster, and his school in Lichtental (in Vienna's ninth district) had numerous students in attendance. He came to Vienna from Zuckmantel in 1784 and was appointed schoolmaster two years later. His mother was the daughter of a Silesian master locksmith and had been a housemaid for a Viennese family before marriage. Of Franz Theodor and Elisabeth's fourteen children (one of them illegitimate, born in 1783), only five survived to adulthood.

At the age of five, Schubert began to receive regular lessons from his father, and a year later he was enrolled at his father's school. Although it is not known exactly when he received his first musical instruction, he was given piano lessons by his brother Ignaz, but they lasted for a very short time as Schubert exceeded him within a few months. Ignaz later recalled:

I was amazed when Franz told me, a few months after we began, that he had no need of any further instruction from me, and that for the future he would make his own way. And in truth his progress in a short period was so great that I was forced to acknowledge in him a master who had completely distanced and outstripped me, and whom I despaired of overtaking.

When Schubert was eight years old, his father gave him his first violin lessons, training him to the point where he could play easy duets proficiently. Soon after, Schubert was given his first lessons outside the family circle by Michael Holzer, organist and choirmaster of the local parish church in Lichtental. In addition to instruction in piano and violin, Holzer gave the young Schubert lessons in organ, voice, harmony, and figured bass. Holzer later asserted that he did not give him any real instruction as Schubert would already know anything that he tried to teach him, recalling that he looked upon Schubert with "astonishment and silence". He also played viola in the family string quartet, with his brothers Ferdinand and Ignaz on first and second violin and his father on the cello. Schubert wrote his earliest string quartets for this ensemble. According to Ferdinand, Schubert also composed songs and piano pieces during this time, although none of these early compositions are known to have survived.

Young Schubert first came to the attention of Antonio Salieri, then Vienna's leading musical authority, in 1804, possibly at Holzer's recommendation. Salieri's previous pupils included Ludwig van Beethoven. In November 1808, he became a pupil at the Stadtkonvikt (Imperial Seminary) through a choir scholarship. At the Stadtkonvikt, he was introduced to the overtures and symphonies of Mozart, the symphonies of Joseph Haydn and his younger brother Michael Haydn, and the early overtures and symphonies of Beethoven, a composer for whom he developed the strongest admiration. His exposure to these and other works, combined with occasional visits to the opera, laid the foundation for a broader musical education. One important musical influence came from the songs by Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg, an important composer of Lieder. The precocious young student "wanted to modernize" Zumsteeg's songs, as reported by Joseph von Spaun, Schubert's friend. Schubert's friendship with Spaun began at the Stadtkonvikt and lasted throughout his short life. In those early days, the financially well-off Spaun furnished the impoverished Schubert with much of his manuscript paper.

In the meantime, Schubert's talent began to show in his compositions, including his earliest surviving piano work, an 1810 Fantasy for four hands in G major (D. 1), and his first Lied, Klagegesang der Hagar (D. 5), written a year later. A definitive transition in his life and education occurred in May 1812, when Schubert's mother died from typhoid fever. The following month, Salieri officially took Schubert as his private home student and gave him lessons twice a week in thoroughbass and composition. Musicologist Lorraine Byrne Bodley interprets the compositional output that followed his mother's death as his seeking "refuge from grief in hard and relentless work". A month after his mother's death, Schubert completed his first Salve Regina in F major (D. 27) for his local parish church, likely performed during a month's mind service for his mother. That same year, he also composed his first operatic work, Der Spiegelritter (D. 11), a Singspiel to a text by August von Kotzebue that he left incomplete. Meanwhile, at the Stadtkonvikt, Schubert was occasionally permitted to lead the Stadtkonvikt's orchestra, and Bodley writes that his earliest orchestral compositions were possibly conceived with this orchestra in mind, including his Symphony No. 1 in D major (D. 82), which he dedicated to Stadtkonvikt headmaster Franz Innocenz Lang.

Teacher at his father's school

In November 1813, Schubert left the Stadtkonvikt and returned home for teacher training at the St Anna Normal-hauptschule. In 1814, he entered his father's school as the teacher of the youngest pupils. Concurrently, Schubert continued to take private lessons in composition from Salieri, who provided him with more technical training than any of his other teachers, until they parted ways in 1817.

In 1814, Schubert met a young soprano named Therese Grob, daughter of a local silk manufacturer, and wrote several of his liturgical works (including a "Salve Regina" and a "Tantum Ergo") for her; she was also a soloist in the premiere of his Mass No. 1 (D. 105) in September 1814. Schubert wanted to marry her, but was hindered by the harsh marriage-consent law of 1815 requiring an aspiring bridegroom to show he had the means to support a family. In November 1816, after failing to gain a musical post in Laibach (now Ljubljana, Slovenia), Schubert sent Grob's brother Heinrich a collection of songs, which was retained by the family into the twentieth century.

One of Schubert's most prolific years was 1815. He composed over 20,000 bars of music, more than half of which were for orchestra, including nine church works, a symphony, and about 140 Lieder. In that year, he was also introduced to Anselm Hüttenbrenner and Franz von Schober, who would become his lifelong friends. Another friend, Johann Mayrhofer, was introduced to him by Spaun in 1815.

Throughout 1815, Schubert lived at home with his father. He continued to teach at the school and give private musical instruction, earning enough money for his basic needs, including clothing, manuscript paper, pens, and ink, but with little to no money left over for luxuries. Spaun was well aware that Schubert was discontented with his life at the schoolhouse, and was concerned for Schubert's development intellectually and musically. In May 1816, Spaun moved from his apartment in Landskrongasse (in the inner city) to a new home in the Landstraße suburb; one of the first things he did after he settled into the new home was to invite Schubert to spend a few days with him. This was probably Schubert's first visit away from home or school. Schubert's unhappiness during his years as a schoolteacher possibly showed early signs of depression, and it is virtually certain that Schubert suffered from cyclothymia throughout his life.

In 1989, the musicologist Maynard Solomon suggested that Schubert was erotically attracted to men, a thesis that has been heatedly debated. The musicologist and Schubert expert Rita Steblin has said that he was "chasing women". The theory of Schubert's sexuality or "Schubert as Other" has continued to influence current scholarship. The biographer Lorraine Byrne Bodley is sceptical "...of Solomon's 'outing' of Schubert, saying this misunderstands the passionate 'homosocial' friendships of 19th-century Europe."

Support from friends

Significant changes occurred in Schubert's life in 1816 when Schober, a student from an affluent family, invited him to lodge at his mother's house. The proposal was particularly opportune, for Schubert had just made the unsuccessful application for the post of Kapellmeister at Laibach, and he had also decided not to resume teaching duties at his father's school. By the end of the year, he became a guest in Schober's lodgings. For a time, he attempted to increase the household resources by giving music lessons, but they were soon abandoned, and he devoted himself to composition. "I compose every morning, and when one piece is done, I begin another." During this year, he focused on orchestral and choral works, although he also continued to write Lieder. Much of this work was unpublished, but manuscripts and copies circulated among friends and admirers.

In early 1817, Schober introduced Schubert to Johann Michael Vogl, a prominent baritone twenty years Schubert's senior. Vogl, for whom Schubert went on to write a great many songs, became one of Schubert's main proponents in Viennese musical circles. Schubert also met Joseph Hüttenbrenner (brother of Anselm), who also played a role in promoting his music. These, and an increasing circle of friends and musicians, became responsible for promoting, collecting, and, after his death, preserving his work. Heinrich Anschütz wrote in his memoirs that Schubert was an active member of the 1817–1818 Unsinnsgesellschaft (Nonsenses Society), and various scholars agree with this.

In late 1817, Schubert's father gained a new position at a school in Rossau, not far from Lichtental. Schubert rejoined his father and reluctantly took up teaching duties there. In early 1818, he applied for membership in the prestigious Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, intending to gain admission as an accompanist, but also so that his music, especially the songs, could be performed in the evening concerts. He was rejected on the basis that he was "no amateur", although he had been employed as a schoolteacher at the time and there were professional musicians already among the society's membership. However, he began to gain more notice in the press, and the first public performance of a secular work, an overture performed in February 1818, received praise from the press in Vienna and abroad.

Schubert spent the summer of 1818 as a music teacher to the family of Count Johann Karl Esterházy at their château in Zselíz (now Želiezovce, Slovakia). The pay was relatively good, and his duties teaching piano and singing to the two daughters, Marie and Caroline, were relatively light, allowing him to compose happily. Schubert may have written his Marches Militaire in D major (D. 733 no. 1) for Marie and Caroline, in addition to other piano duets. On his return from Zselíz, he took up residence with his friend Mayrhofer.