The Octet in F major, D. 803 was composed by Franz Schubert

Franz Schubert

Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...

 in March 1824. It was commissioned by the renowned clarinetist Ferdinand Troyer

Ferdinand Troyer

Count Ferdinand Troyer was an Austrian noble, philanthropist, and amateur clarinettist.Born in Brünn , Moravia, Troyer became the chief steward to Archduke Rudolf of Austria-Tuscany. It was noted that on 2 March 1817, Troyer played the obbligato to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Parto for the Vienna...

 and came from the same period as two of Schubert's other major chamber works

Chamber music

Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...

, the Rosamunde

String Quartet No. 13 (Schubert)

The String Quartet No. 13 in A minor , D. 804, Op. 29, was written by Franz Schubert between February and March 1824...

 and the Death and the Maiden

Death and the Maiden Quartet (Schubert)

The String Quartet No. 14 in D minor, known as Death and the Maiden, by Franz Schubert, is one of the pillars of the chamber music repertoire. Composed in 1824, after the composer suffered through a serious illness and realized that he was dying, it is Schubert's testament to death...

 string quartet

String quartet

A string quartet is a musical ensemble of four string players – usually two violin players, a violist and a cellist – or a piece written to be performed by such a group...

s.

Structure

Consisting of six movements

Movement (music)

A movement is a self-contained part of a musical composition or musical form. While individual or selected movements from a composition are sometimes performed separately, a performance of the complete work requires all the movements to be performed in succession...

, the Octet takes almost an hour to perform.

1. Adagio – Allegro – Più allegro ;
2. Adagio ;
3. Allegro vivace – Trio – Allegro vivace ;
4. Andante – variations. Un poco più mosso – Più lento ;
5. Menuetto. Allegretto – Trio – Menuetto – Coda ;
6. Andante molto – Allegro – Andante molto – Allegro molto.

The Octet boasts the largest scale for any chamber work

Chamber music

Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...

 by Schubert. It is scored for a clarinet

Clarinet

The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...

, a bassoon

Bassoon

The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...

, a horn

Horn (instrument)

The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....

, two violin

Violin

The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

s, a viola

Viola

The viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.- Form :The viola is similar in material and construction to the violin. A full-size viola's body is between and longer than the body of a full-size violin , with an average...

, a cello

Cello

The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

, and a double bass

Double bass

The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...

. This instrumentation is similar to that of the Beethoven Septet

Septet (Beethoven)

The Septet in E-flat major, Opus 20, by Ludwig van Beethoven, was sketched out in 1799, completed and first performed in 1800 and published in 1802. The score contains the notation: "Der Kaiserin Maria Theresia gewidmet", or translated, "Dedicated to the Empress Maria Theresa." It is scored for...

, differing only by the addition of a second violin.

Background

In response to a reported request by Troyer for a work similar to Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...

's Septet, Op. 20

Septet (Beethoven)

The Septet in E-flat major, Opus 20, by Ludwig van Beethoven, was sketched out in 1799, completed and first performed in 1800 and published in 1802. The score contains the notation: "Der Kaiserin Maria Theresia gewidmet", or translated, "Dedicated to the Empress Maria Theresa." It is scored for...

, Schubert composed the Octet in early 1824. The work was first performed at the home of Troyer's employer, the Archduke Rudolf (to whom Beethoven's Archduke Trio

Archduke Trio

The Piano Trio [No. 7] in B-flat major, Op. 97, by Ludwig van Beethoven is a piano trio for piano, violin, and cello, published in 1811. It is commonly referred to as the Archduke Trio, because it was dedicated to Archduke Rudolph of Austria, an amateur pianist who was a friend and composition...

 is dedicated) and included many of the musicians who premiered the Septet.

Analysis

The basic structure of the movements is similar to those of the Septet, as are many of the key relationships between the movements and principal key (E flat for the Septet, F major of the Octet).
The theme of the first movement is derived from Schubert’s song Der Wanderer

Der Wanderer

Der Wanderer is the name of a Lied composed by Franz Schubert in October 1816 for voice and piano. A revised version was published near the end of May 1821 as opus 4, number 1. The words are taken from a German poem by Georg Philipp Schmidt...

. The fourth movement variations are based on a theme from Schubert's Singspiel Die Freunde von Salamanka.

Recordings

The Melos Ensemble was founded to perform works such as the Octet for wind instruments and strings. The Octet was recorded in 1967 with Gervase de Peyer

Gervase de Peyer

Gervase Alan de Peyer is an English clarinetist and conductor.-Professional career:Gervase de Peyer was born in London and attended Bedales School. He was awarded a scholarship to the Royal College of Music where he studied clarinet with Frederick Thurston and piano with Arthur Alexander...

 (clarinet), William Waterhouse (bassoon), Neill Sanders

Neill Sanders

Neill Sanders was a British horn player, principal hornist of the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the BBC Symphony Orchestra and a member of the Melos Ensemble for 29 years. He was a professor in Kalamazoo, Michigan and founded a chamber ensemble and a festival there.-Biography:Neill Sanders...

 (horn), Emanuel Hurwitz

Emanuel Hurwitz

Emanuel Hurwitz CBE was a British violinist. He was born in London with parents of Russian-Jewish ancestry....

 and Ivor McMahon

Ivor McMahon

Ivor McMahon was an English violinist. He played with notable orchestras including the Philharmonia Orchestra and the English Chamber Orchestra and is best known for playing second violin in the Melos Ensemble.-Professional career:...

 (violin), Cecil Aronowitz

Cecil Aronowitz

Cecil Aronowitz was a British viola player, a founding member of the Melos Ensemble, a leading chamber musician and an influential teacher at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Northern College of Music.-Biography:...

 (viola), Terence Weil

Terence Weil

Terence Weil was a British cellist, principal cellist of the English Chamber Orchestra, a founding member of the Melos Ensemble, a leading chamber musician and an influential teacher at the Royal Northern College of Music.-Biography:Terence Weil was trained as a cellist under Herbert Walenn at the...

 (cello) and Adrian Beers

Adrian Beers

Adrian Simon Beers MBE was a British double bass player and teacher at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Northern College of Music...

 (double bass).

A recording of the chamber ensemble of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields with Iona Brown

Iona Brown

Iona Brown, OBE was a British violinist and conductor.Elizabeth Iona Brown was born in Salisbury. Her parents Antony and Fiona were both musicians...

 (violin) and Timothy Brown

Timothy Brown (hornist)

Timothy Brown is a British horn player, a leading chamber musician and co-principal of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. He was a member of the Melos Ensemble in its second phase...

 (horn) won a Grand Prix du Disque

Grand Prix du Disque

The Grand Prix du Disque is the premier French award for musical recordings. The award was inaugurated by l'Académie Charles Cros in 1948 and offers prizes in various categories. The categories vary from year to year, and multiple awards are often made in any one category in the same year...

.

The Camerata Freden recorded it in 2003 with Adrian Adlam

Adrian Adlam

Adrian Adlam is a British violinist, conductor and music educator. He was educated at Westminster Abbey, Winchester College, Conservatoire Royale de Musique of Brussels and the Hochschule fur Musik, Hanover....

 (violin), Cristiano Gualco (violin), Michael Hesselink (clarinet), Marjolein Dispa (viola), Michel Dispa (cello), Ilka Emmert (double-bass), Letizia Viola (bassoon) and Ron Schaaoer (horn).

External links

• Performance of the Octet on modern instruments by the Musicians from Marlboro from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
  Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
  The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum or Fenway Court, as the museum was known during Isabella Stewart Gardner's lifetime, is a museum in the Fenway-Kenmore neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, located within walking distance of the Museum of Fine Arts and near the Back Bay Fens...
  
   in MP3
  MP3
  MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression...
  
  format