The song cycle is the most original musical form created in the first half of the nineteenth century. It most clearly embodies the Romantic conception of experience as a gradual unfolding and illumination of reality in place of the Classical insistence on an initial clarity. The form of Schubert's song cycle is not less precise than that of a Classical sonata, but its precision is only gradually comprehended as it unfolds.


Ch. 3 : Mountains and Song Cycles - The Romantic Generation (1995)

Charles Rosen Quotes

The song cycle is the most original musical form created in the first half of the nineteenth century. It most clearly embodies the Romantic...

The song cycle is the most original musical form created in the first half of the nineteenth century. It most clearly embodies the Romantic...

The song cycle is the most original musical form created in the first half of the nineteenth century. It most clearly embodies the Romantic...

The song cycle is the most original musical form created in the first half of the nineteenth century. It most clearly embodies the Romantic...