SYMPHONY NO. 4, IN D MINOR, OP. 120
I. Andante; allegro II. Romanza III. Scherzo IV. Largo; finale (Played without pause.)
Weingartner regards the D minor symphony of Schumann as inferior to the first and second of the same composer. I fail to see why. Surely this symphony does not fall behind its companions; it is the one of Schumann’s four that can be heard with full enjoyment. The middle movements breathe a romantic spirit that Schumann himself never surpassed as expressions of gentle, dreamy melancholy. I know of few more haunting pages in orchestral music than those of the trio in the scherzo.
This symphony was composed in 1841, immediately after the Symphony in B flat major, No. 1. According to the composer’s notes it was “sketched at Leipsic in June, 1841, newly orchestrated at Düsseldorf in 1851. The first performance of the original version was at the Gewandhaus, Leipsic, under David’s direction. December 6, 1841.” Clara Schumann wrote in her diary on May 31 of that year: “Robert began yesterday another symphony, which will be in one movement, and yet contain an adagio and a finale. I have heard nothing about it, yet I see Robert’s bustle, and I hear the D minor sounding wildly from a distance, so that I know in advance that another work will be fashioned in the depths of his soul. Heaven is kindly disposed toward us: Robert cannot be happier in the composition than I am when he shows me such a work.” A few days later she wrote: “Robert composes steadily; he has already completed three movements, and I hope the symphony will be ready by his birthday.”
Their first child, Marie, was born on September 1, 1841. On the thirteenth of the month, his wife’s birthday, Marie was baptized and the mother received from her husband the D minor symphony: “which I have quietly finished,” he said.
Schumann was not satisfied with the symphony, and he did not publish it. In December, 1851, he revised the manuscript. During the years between 1841 and 1853 Schumann had composed and published the Symphony in C (No. 2) and the Symphony in E flat (No. 3); the one in D minor was published therefore as No. 4. In its first form the one in D minor was entitled “Symphonische Phantasie.”
The symphony in the revised and present form was played for the first time at the seventh concert of the Allgemeine Musikverein at Düsseldorf on March 3, 1853, in Geisler Hall. Schumann conducted from manuscript. At this concert selections from the Mass were performed for the first time.
The concert master, Ruppert Becker, made these entries in his diary concerning the rehearsals and the first performance of this symphony in Düsseldorf:
“Tuesday, evening of March 1. Rehearsal for 7th Concert. Symphony by Schumann for the first time; a somewhat short but thoroughly fresh and vital piece of music. Wednesday, 2. 9 o’clock in the morning, 2 rehearsal for concert. Thursday, 3. 7th concert: Program.
“Of Schumann compositions these were new: Symphony D minor, which he had already composed 12 years ago, but had left lying till now. 2 excerpts from a Mass: both full of the most wonderful harmonies, only possible with Schumann. I liked the symphony especially on account of its swing.”
The symphony was dedicated to Joseph Joachim. On the title-page of the manuscript was this inscription: “When the first tones of this symphony were awakened, Joseph Joachim was still a little fellow; since then the symphony and still more the boy have grown bigger, wherefore I dedicate it to him, although only in private. Düsseldorf, December 23, 1853. Robert Schumann.”
The parts were published in November, 1853. The score was published the next month.
It was stated for many years that the only changes made by Schumann in this symphony were in the matter of instrumentation, especially in the wood-wind. Some time after the death of Schumann the first manuscript passed into the possession of Johannes Brahms, who finally allowed the score to be published, edited by Franz Wüllner. It was then found that the composer had made important alterations in thematic development. He had cut out elaborate contrapuntal work to gain a broader, simpler, more rhythmically effective treatment, especially in the last movement. He had introduced the opening theme of the first movement “as a completion of the melody begun by the three exclamatory chords which make the fundamental rhythm at the beginning of the last movement.” And, on the other hand, some thought the instrumentation of the first version occasionally preferable on account of clearness to that of the second.
It was Schumann’s wish that the symphony should be played without pauses between the movements. Mendelssohn expressed the same wish for the performance of his “Scotch” symphony, which was produced nearly four months after the first performance of this Symphony in D minor.
The first movement begins with an introduction, ziemlich langsam (un poco lento), D minor, 3-4. The first motive is used later in the “Romanze.” The orchestra gives out an A which serves as background for this motive in sixths in the second violins, violas, and bassoons. This figure is worked up contrapuntally. A dominant organ-point appears in the basses, over which the first violins play an ascending figure; the time changes from 3-4 to 2-4.
The main body of this movement, lebhaft (vivace), in D minor, 2-4, begins forte with the development of the violin figure just mentioned. This theme prevails, so that in the first section there is no true second theme. The characteristic trombone figure reminds one of a passage in Schumann’s piano Quartet in E flat, Op. 47. There is a heroic figure in the wood-wind instruments. After the repetition comes a long free fantasia. The true second theme, sung in F major by first violins, appears. The development is now perfectly free. There is no third part.
The “Romanze,” ziemlich langsam (un poco lento), in D minor—or, rather, A minor plagal—opens with a mournful melody said to be familiar in Provence. Schumann intended originally to accompany the song of oboe and first violoncellos with a guitar. This theme is followed by the dreamy motive of the introduction. Then the first phrases of the “Romanze” are sung again by oboe and violoncellos, and there is a second return of the contrapuntal work—now in D major—with embroidery by a solo violin. The chief theme brings the movement to a close on the chord of A major.
The scherzo, lebhaft (vivace), in D minor, 3-4, presents the development of a rising and falling scale-passage of a few notes. The trio, in B flat major, is of a peculiar and beautiful rhythmic character. The first beat of the phrase falls constantly on a rest in all the parts. The melody is almost always in the wood-wind, and the first violins are used in embroidery. The scherzo is repeated after the trio, which returns once more as a sort of coda.
The finale begins with a short introduction, langsam (lento), in B flat major, and it modulates to D minor, 4-4. The chief theme of the first movement is worked up against a counter figure in the trombones to a climax. The main body of the movement lebhaft (vivace), in D major, 4-4, begins with the brilliant first theme, which has the character of a march, and it is not unlike the theme of the first movement with its two members transposed. The figure of the trombones in the introduction enters. The cantabile second theme begins in B minor, but it constantly modulates in the development. The free fantasia begins in B minor, with a G (strings, bassoons, trombones), which is answered by a curious ejaculation by the whole orchestra. There is an elaborate contrapuntal working out of one of the figures in the first theme. The third part of the movement begins irregularly with the return of the second theme in F sharp minor. The second theme enters in the tonic. The coda begins in the manner of the free fantasia, but in E minor; but the ejaculations are now followed by the exposition and development of a passionate fourth theme. There is a free closing passage, schneller (più moto), in D major, 2-2.