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Assignment 5 – 3604B Analysis of Romantic Music

Professor Emily Adamowicz

Dan Luong

In both Hugo Wolf’s In dem Schatten meiner Locken and Johannes Brahms’s Immer Leiser wird

mein Schlumme, the use of chromatic-harmonic devices create tonal ambiguity. This tonal ambiguity

helps to portray image of the character in the lied. In Wolf’s lied, the character is singing in a seductive

manner and expresses that she wishes to wake her beloved. Although she expresses this on three

separate occasions, she never follows through. This conflict within the character is shown through the

tonicization of distantly-related key areas. Within the first 10 measures, Hugo explores 3 keys that are

related by a major third, B-flat major, D major, and G-flat major. The transitions between the different

keys are also unprepared, but musical coherence is still achieved through the use of motivic repetition.

The opening motive of Tonic-Subdominant motion in B-flat major could also be enharmonically

reinterpreted as a Dominant-Tonic motion in E-flat major. Along with tonal ambiguity, Hugo sets the

music in a way that lacks direction. There are a lot of instances within the lied where the character

expresses an idea and there would be a slight pause before the music picks itself up again. The

ambiguity in tonality and lack of direction throughout the lied helps to portray the character as someone

who has trouble making decisions or someone lost in their thoughts.

While Brahm’s Immer Lesier wird mein Schlumme is much more solemn, he uses similar devices

to achieve tonal ambiguity. The lied is set in C-sharp minor and expresses a somber mood throughout.

Instances of tonal ambiguity can be seen in measures 13-19 and measures 41-47. In measures 14-19,

Brahms explores E major, G major, D, major, F major, and C major. While it may seem like these keys

have no relation to one another, Brahms actually used both the major second and minor third division of

the octave to go from key to another. The first pair of keys, E major and G major, acts as a pair related

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by minor third. D major and F major is the second pair that’s related by a minor third. Disregarding G

major and F major, we can now see that E major, D major and C major are all related by a major second.

This advanced use of the symmetrical division technique helps to achieve tonal ambiguity which

accentuates important phrases within the text. In this lied, the character sings about her somber and

expresses her yearning for her loved one. Both instances of the use of symmetrical division technique

set the text in a dreamlike manner, expressing a sense of hope. At the end of the lied, when the

character sings “if you wish to see me once more, come, o come soon!”, Brahms uses the symmetrical

division technique to go through E major, G major, B-flat major, and finally ending on D-flat major. It is

also interesting to note that D-flat major is the parallel major to the original key, C-sharp minor. This

gradual shift in tonality towards the parallel major throughout the song could perhaps be linked to the

title, which translates to, “My slumber grows ever more peaceful.”