Geert Woltjer, Analysis of Beethoven's An die ferne Geliebte
Analysis of song 6
The poem of the song has the same last two lines as the first poem of the song cycle. If his love is looking at the blue lake as he did, she may sing his songs and what comes from a loving heart reaches a loving heart.
The structure of this song is more complex than that of the first five songs, although it is completely in Es. It starts with an Andante, of the form A-A-B-A and then goes into an adagio that is derived from the first motive of song 1 and ends in a coda that shows the consciousness. Then there is a repeat of the complete theme of the first song, including its harmony, that develops into an Allegro build around the first and third motives of song 1.
The song starts with a beautiful piano prelude that rises out of the sad quietness at the end of song 5. Originally Beethoven had planned a repeat of the first song here, but he delayed this till the end of the song, where the spiritual integration takes place. but in this andante a beautiful variation on the motives of the first song is developed. The first motive starts with the C-D-Es motive, and develops the jump from Es to G in the original motive in a beautiful downward line, using the variation on the first motive Bes-A-G (see piano m. 1 of first song) and the rhythmic figure on "Hügel" in m. 2 of song 1. Also the second, third and fourth motive are transformed into beautiful lines. And the bass line has a countermelody that creates a perfect balance with the right hand melody.
The voice repeats the first half of the piano melody and introduces a variation on the second half. The pitch of the third motive (m. 13-14) is lower, and the line on "zu der Laute" is with more jumps and only 1/8 notes. The right hand piano echos the voice most of the theme, where the left hand has a downwards line of chords with silence in between them on "Nimm sie hin", full chords and coloring with Es-F sounds when the text is about singing by his love.
In m. 17 the voice is echoed in the piano and flows into the second theme. The voice has a very static downward melody when the blue lake is introduced, while the harmony transforms from Es to c. The lake is represented by repeated eight notes, in the piano, where the voice shows the "letzte Strahl" by a melody build on a triad, "verglühet" with a downward sixth, and the "bergeshöh" with a very high pitch of the voice. During the process hte harmony transforms from G to c to dimininshed to F7 into Bes in order to go back to the Es of the first theme of the song in m. 27, that is repeated.
The coda at the end of the first part of the song suggests consciousness in the arpeggio Bes7 chord on "bewusst" in m. 37-38, in order to come back to the repeat of last verse of the first song, where as in magic happens what was told at the end of the first song: for these songs the distance gives way and a loving heart reaches an other loving heart.
The song cycle should be finished now, but Beethoven wouldn't be Beethoven without adding a long coda. In m. 48-56 Beethoven plays with the third motive, repeating it again and again. Then the piano interlude of the first song is combined with the word "dann", increasing expectation. M. 57-60 is a variation on the first motive, where both the piano interlude and the motive are transformed in another way in m. 60-64. The fermata on the first note of m. 64 is very important in stopping the process and going back to motive three, the loving heart. Finally, the first motive is transformed to a very high pitch with enormous jumps in the voice and a rising octave bass scale.
The piano postlude starts with a repeat of the voice melody of m. 76 after which the piano rises in an upward scale to very high levels above a Bes bourdon. Suddenly there is a diminuendo in m. 80 and the third motive is takes up again for a moment, but transforms into a downward movement to a pianissimo Es in 84. From this sound, with some rests of the downward scale that remained in the piano pedal, a crescendo line towards an Es chord finishes the story.