Themes and Variations of the Trout Quintet

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Themes and Variations of the Trout Quintet

A quintet is a work for five instruments, in this case piano, violin,

viola, cello and double bass (piano quintet).

The fourth movement of this quintet is a theme and variations on

Schubert's song 'Die Forelle' (The Trout). Schubert (1797-1828) was a

prolific song / lied composer. Many of his songs took their

inspiration from the beauty of nature; 'The Trout' being a good

example. Much of his 'lieder' display pictorial word painting effects

in either the vocal or piano writing - note the piano 'ripples' of the

brook in the accompaniment of 'Die Forelle'.

Schubert was inspired to write the quintet in 1819 while staying with

a friend who was an amateur cellist. Schubert wrote out the parts

while he was there, so it is likely that the friends performed it as

soon as it was written.

'Die Forelle'

Key: Db major

Structure: Binary structure A :|| B

Phrasing: 16 bars in each section

Musical characteristics of song melody: Four 4 bar phrases in each

section, simple melodies and some repeated rhythms.

Theme

In the theme of 'Die Forelle', only strings are used with no piano.

The melody has dotted rhythms, which was not in the original. The

piece is however still in binary from (A :|| B). There is

ornamentation of A major added in part A with extra notes, and in part

B with an acciaccatura trill. The piece modulates to the dominant

chord near the end.

Variation 1

The similarities of Variation 1 to the theme are that it has mainly

the same notes, the same structure and the same modulation. The same

dotted notes are still obvious and the same chords are used.

However there are many differences in Variation 1 to the theme too.

The piano plays the main themes, and it was absent from playing

before. The piano plays two octaves in the treble register. There is a

viola in the background playing a counter melody, which slows towards

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