Schubert biography courtesy

Described by Liszt as ‘the most poetic of composers’, Schubert became the quintessential composer of the early Romantic period.

Schubert biography courtesy of love

He composed prolifically, writing music in almost all of the major genres, and his songs set a standard that was unsurpassed for more than a century. His was a short, brilliant life, spent almost entirely in the city of Vienna.

His early death, at the age of 31, inspired a welter of sentimental myths. An image of a happy-go-lucky bohemian lingered well into the twentieth century.

Schubert biography courtesy

The truth was darker and more complex. In his lifetime, Schubert was known for his songs, part-songs and shorter piano pieces. The discovery of his wider output began in 1839, when Robert Schumann came across the manuscript of the ‘Great’ C major Symphony, then unperformed.

In the 1860s further orchestral masterpieces such as the ‘Unfinished’ Symphony and the C major String Quintet received their premieres. Though chamber works like the ‘Trout’ Quintet, the Octet and the