Lieder for Viola and Piano
inspired by songs of Hugo Wolf and Franz Schubert

1979

14 minutes

Viola and piano

May 2, 1980, New York city, Composers’ Forum, Bruno Walter Auditorium, Lincoln Center Library; Jacob Glick, viola and Vivian Fine, piano

Arsis Press

Available on demo CD

1. Allegretto
2. Molto tranquillo
3. Allegretto rustico
4. Lento
5. Sustained, with fervor
6. Flowing

The inspiration for Lieder for Viola and Piano comes from Hugo Wolf, and, in The Song of the Trout, from Schubert. Motifs from these composers are used, but never literally. The intent was to convey the composer’s involvement with the lyric and dramatic elements of traditional lieder in her own language.

–Vivian Fine

 

Fine used gestural ideas from some of Hugo Wolf’s and Schubert’s songs for her Lieder. There are six short movements, all written with the period of one month….Each movement’s gesture is stated clearly and then manipulated contrapuntally….For Fine, the use of these contrapuntal devices, such as canon and retrograde, were not just easy ways to generate more music, but a natural expansion of already well-made melodies. When asked if, after writing a melody, she could read it backward and mentally hear the retrograde, her answer was “Yes!”

–Heidi Von Gunden, The Music of Vivian Fine, Scarecrow Press, 1999

Allegretto

Molto tranquillo