Reading Mozart's 35th

Another gem from Mozart's early maturity is his D Major Symphony No. 35, nicknamed the "Haffner" symphony. Written in Vienna in 1782, it began life as a serenade commissioned by the prominent Salzburg family of Sigmund Haffner. (This serenade is not to be confused with the "Haffner Serenade" of 1776.) Mozart wrote the six-movement serenade in great haste during a busy summer, and posted it piecemeal to his father Leopold, who was handling the commission at the Salzburg end.

Later in the year, the younger Mozart reworked the serenade into a symphony by adding a few instruments, taking away a couple of movements, and removing the repeat signs at the end of the first movement's exposition. With a few other minor alterations, the erstwhile serenade was first performed as a symphony in Vienna in the spring of 1783, with a lot of other music stuck between its third and fourth movements, a then-typical programme for a symphonic concert.

Movement I is a sonata marked Allegro con spirito. It opens with one of Mozart's strongest and most memorable themes, presented by the full orchestra in unison. Combining leaping octaves, a descending scale, dotted rhythms, and a trill, this theme dominates the entire movement almost to the exclusion of any other. It is a theme that creates a character in the mind's eye: huge, assertive, given to explosions of jolly laughter. An upside-down version of this theme is the first thing we hear after the transition to the dominant key of A, giving us reason to expect this to be a monothematic movement like many of Haydn's sonatas. But Mozart is merely toying with our expectations, we find when he actually does introduce a contrasting second theme in bar 48, over a dominant (E) pedal in the key of A. This leads directly to a long codetta in which the first theme undergoes some further development, beginning in the original tonic key of D and finally coming to rest in A.

The development begins in bar 95, briefly subjecting the first theme to a variety of moods and keys, overlapping with itself and with other ideas, such as the yearning countersubject in the woodwinds during the transition back to D. The recap takes us back to the opening unison statement, departing surprisingly early from the expo's transition material so as to make way for the second theme, appearing now over a dominant (A) pedal in D major. Is this a theme at all, one may wonder, seeing as it's always combined with first-theme material? Well, that first theme never seems to be absent, but the hearer is apt to welcome this tune back as the second theme anyway. When the codetta returns, this time it begins in G and works its way back to D, complete with the same extra development of the first theme, some remarkable late-in-the-game chromaticism, and the concluding scales and chords solidly reasserting D major.

Movement II is another sonata, but a fairly slow one (Andante) in G major, scored for oboes, bassoons, horns, and strings. It isn't that Mozart omitted the flutes and clarinets; rather, he simply didn't bother to add them, as he did in the outer movements, when he adapted the serenade as a symphony. This movement seems to be one continuous outpouring of melody, with curious effects like when the oboes and bassoons imitate the distant howling of wolves. Nevertheless it follows a compact, efficient sonata plan, with the second theme in D hanging under a dominant (A) pedal in the first violins. The development section, all of 14 measures long, uses a simple chord progression, and perhaps the tiniest amount of thematic material, to change the new D major tonic at the end of the expo into the dominant of good ole G major for the recap. In the latter, the first group returns virtually unchanged from the expo, including the transition to D; only now, the second theme appears in G, hanging below a D pedal in the first violins. An altered version of the codetta finishes the movement firmly in its home key of G.

Movement III is the Menuetto, one of two originally included in the serenade. I have never heard the one Mozart didn't choose to keep in the symphony, so I can't say why he chose this one particularly. After hearing many, many, many, many symphonic Minuets, I find it hard to get awfully excited about one of them. Nevertheless, one can see Mozart making an effort to infuse this very brief, simple dance form with as much rhythmic and tonal variety as possible. Scored for the same forces as the slow movement, with the addition of trumpets and timpani, the third movement consists of a brisk Minuet in D surrounding a gentle Trio in A. And that's all I have to say about it.

The Presto finale opens with the strings in unison describing a descending D-major triad, stuttering a bit over the fifth. Repeat with an added chromatic neighbor-tone, and add some bustling figuration leading to a dominant cadence, and you have the first theme. The full orchestra joins for an ecstatic passage repeating the descending-D-triad idea and effecting a transition to A major. The second theme, appearing in bar 38, sounds like someone running on tiptoe, at first hesitantly, then with comical haste. After a repeat of this theme, the bustling strings build up to a quick, exciting codetta, ending the expo in A major -- again, without a repeat sign.

The development begins with a chromatically-colored transition back to D and what initially seems to be a literal repeat of the expo section, through the initial strings-only statement of the first theme. (This is a characteristic of the hybrid form called "sonata-rondo.") Two bars into the tutti repeat, however, it veers into new territory. Sudden hushed phrases set up a new axis of contrast, from loud to soft. Ascending triads in the lower strings suggest an inversion of the main theme. As these loud-soft and upside-down ideas play back and forth, the music evolves through the keys of E and F-sharp major. The second theme appears in a new guise (B minor), complete with its repeat, and the codetta follows, modulating to A and using that key as a springboard back into D for the recap.

Thematically, a recap seems hardly necessary after viewing the development's "bizarro" version of the entire expo section; but tonally, it is vital to restore our confidence in the key of D. To this end, Mozart includes not only the expo's transition to A, but a new transition back to D for the long-awaited tonic-key version of the second theme. Then he adds a coda to make our assurance doubly sure. Or rather, to make it unsure again, by means of some chromatic horseplay, before bringing back the first group one more time, with the transition passage converted into an extended dominant-tonic cadence.

In the following video, Karl Böhm conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in the first movement of this symphony. He, at least, seems to know what he's doing, as opposed to Frans Brüggen, who can be seen conducting all 4 movements in a Youtube playlist -- or rather, failing to conduct it with an ineptitude rarely captured on video.IMAGES: Views along the Sigmund-Haffner-Gasse in Salzburg, Austria.

Blog Design (or Lack Thereof)

I haven't changed the design of my blog since it started. I suppose this is indecent of me. However, I've thought about doing it. For one mad moment, I replaced the heading of the blog with the following picture. It's got everything I wanted. It's got a long shelf of books. It's got the title and subtitle of the blog. It's just crummy, that's all. I find the text difficult to read, and the image doesn't fit the dimensions of the header correctly. Oh, well, back to the drawing board.

Meanwhile, here's a closer look at the photo of "me" that I just added to my Blogger profile. It's not actually me. It's just a picture that I found on Google Images while searching for something else. As soon as I spotted it, I said to myself: "Self, that's a perfect image for A Fort Made of Books!" Except, well, it's oriented the wrong way. So I can't use it in the header, either.

Web design is gnawing at the edges of my mind, these days. I'm going to have to bone up on it, because there's a good chance the Book Trolley is going to become its own site. Once again, I owe this sudden nudge toward creative ambition to the unresponsiveness of the editors at MuggleNet, who have been publishing my book reviews since September 2003, when I started submitting reviews under the uninspired title of "Suggested Reading." We've come a long way since then... but in the last year, we haven't gotten anywhere much! Which is why literally dozens of my reviews, targeted primarily at MuggleNet readers, have gotten no further than this blog.

Polysyllabic Cats

My cats continue to gab as though "Meow" is a language. Or maybe I'm losing my mind. Either way, it's been highly entertaining.

A few days ago, I heard Sinead make a two-sentence speech, entirely made up of single-syllable meows. Both of them were inflected as questions (I thought at the time), with three "words" in the first sentence and four in the second. Basically, "Mau mau mau? Mau mau mau mau?" For a moment, the answer was right on the tip of my tongue.

Last night, however, I decided that cats must speak a tonal language. This on the evidence of a conversation involving multisyllabic meows with descending and ascending pitches. I think it was Tyrone who said, "Meow! Meow! Meow, meow." The first two meows started with a high-pitched grace note, then plunged to a low pitch before rising toward the middle. The second pair of meows rose, then fell in pitch in a gentle arch -- oddly like a dog howling. Other than a repeat of this entire statement, the rest of the conversation consisted of throat-trills of varying lengths and pitch-levels. So, maybe inflection has nothing to do with sentence structure (e.g. whether or not something is a question). Maybe the pitches are what make different meows mean different things.

A Far Side cartoon once depicted the findings of a mad scientist who invented a device to translate the barking of dogs into human language. It turned out they were just saying, "Hey! Hey!" After a great deal of observation and thought, I've decided that all cats' meows could be translated as "Hello!" And the inflection of the human word pretty much matches that of the meow.

So the plaintive "Meoooooww?" coming from the kitchen, under the cupboard where the Pounce is kept, translates as "Hello-o-o?" as in, "Yoo-hoo! Is anybody out there?" And the brusque "Meow!" of the cat impatiently waiting while you get the Pounce down means, "HEL-lo!" as in, "Dude, what's holding you up?" And then, of course, the harsh yowl of "meYOW!" when you step on his tail means, roughly, "Hel-LO!" as in, "Say hello to my leetle friends!"

Reading Mozart's 36th

Ah, Linz! We'll always have Linz! Linz who, you ask? Linz, Austria, silly. It's, like, the third-largest city in the country, after Vienna and Graz; it's only slightly smaller than Little Rock, Arkansas! Who wouldn't enjoy a pleasure trip to the town whose bosom brought forth Johannes Kepler, Anton Bruckner, and... er... Adolf Hitler... (*audible gulp*)

Well, okay, but that didn't stop Mr. and Mrs. Wolfgang Mozart from dropping in toward the end of 1783. And anyway, Hitler hadn't been born yet. Maybe they should have kept going all the way to Vienna, but if they had, his wonderful Symphony No. 36 in C (nicknamed "the Linz Symphony") wouldn't exist.

They only meant to pause for a night or two en route from Salzburg to Vienna. But a funny thing happened in Linz. The mayor, or some local nobleman anyway, heard that the Mozarts were in town, and announced a concert to take place in 4 days' time. Caught flat-footed without a symphony up his sleeve, poor Wolfgang had to write this masterpiece in time for its first performance. Yes, folks, you heard me right. He wrote it in four days!

It's scored for a modest, classical orchestra consisting of pairs of oboes, bassoons, and horns, with a proportionate number of strings, plus two trumpets and timpani. It has the usual four movements, three of them in sonata form. In the video below, the supremely relaxed Carlos Kleiber conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in the first of four videos where, unfortunately, the breaks between the videos do not coincide with those between the movements.Movement I opens with a dignified Adagio, beginning emphatically but tending toward lyricism. The main Allegro spiritoso begins gently, though its main theme is well-calculated to bring out the exciting possibilities of trumpets, timpani, and C major. The second theme introduces a dialogue between winds and strings in which major and minor keys are set in contrast. This makes it an unusually sensitive movement for a C-major symphony; the second-group passages in the development are especially lyrical.

Movement II is an Andante in the 6/8 rhythm of a stylish, slow dance. Nevertheless, it is a sonata that graces us with its tender sentiments. I listen especially for the tiptoe passage -- you'll know it when you hear it -- and for the pounding of the horns and timpani of the codetta, in which the dreamy character of the movement seems to shake itself awake.

Movement III is the obligatory "Menuetto." (How many spellings does that word have, anyway?) Here Mozart demonstrates his ability to make much out of little, combining a descending phrase, a trill, and another pounding, repeated-note motif into a dance number full of charm and wit. The Trio spotlights an oboe soloist, later joined by a bassoon, with a truly lovely melody. Then, of course, the main Minuet returns in all its pomp, concluding however with a gentle phrase.

The Finale, the traditional Presto in sonata form, sets up a contrast between a gracious opening phrase and the brusque, muscular utterance that follows it. A similar polarity generates as much energy in a later C-major symphony by the same composer. This split-personality theme gives way directly to a bustling transition to the butter-smooth second theme. The exuberant codetta begins hushed, then bursts forth like a bottle of fizzing champagne. You may note that the second group contains more moments of harmonic and expressive richness somewhat unusual for a C-major symphony of the period, including a thread of chromatic motion.

The development interests itself solely with a musical idea from the transition passage, tossing it around between sections of the orchestra while passing through various keys and moods ranging from stern to waggishly humorous. Understandably, this bit of the transition is omitted in the recap, in which little other than a series of musical throat-clearings separates the first theme from the second. The movement ends with a coda in which the first theme returns in a burst of masculine joy that effectively synthesizes the two sides of its split personality.

You may or may not consider the city of Linz worthy of being included in your next tour of Europe. But if you don't drop in and visit this symphony, you're really missing something worth your while.

Reading Haydn's 45th

Joseph Haydn wrote his f-sharp minor Symphony No. 45 in 1772, while he was in the service of an Austro-Hungarian prince named Nikolaus Esterházy. Esterházy was a wonderful patron of music, who kept a full orchestra on his payroll and who required, and received, a continuous outpouring of original symphonies, concertos, operas, masses, and chamber music by his Kapellmeister. He kept them on retainer year-round, not only to entertain his regular court in Eisenstadt, but also (and more constantly) at his summer palace of Eszterháza near the Hungarian town of Fertőd.

Begun as a hunting lodge, Eszterháza grew under Prince Nikolaus's guiding hand into a spectacular pleasure-palace, comparable to Versailles. Sometimes he had such a good time there that he didn't want to go back to Eisenstadt. This was the case in 1772, when Haydn found his orchestra on the brink of mutiny. They had been kept so long over their proposed date of return that they were pining for their wives, who had not been allowed to join them at Eszterháza. So Haydn composed this symphony, nicknamed "Farewell," as a hint to their princely patron.
It begins with an energetic sonata, marked Allegro assai (quite fast) in f-sharp minor, a key rarely used at the time because it presented tuning difficulties to some of the players. The passionate character of the music, together with its wide melodic leaps, rhythmic displacements, contrasts of loud and soft, sudden pauses, and intense unison passages, qualify this movement as an example of the Sturm und Drang style. It is essentially a monothematic sonata, its entire Exposition being derived from the broken-triad theme referenced above. As a special surprise, however, Haydn introduces a new theme at the end of the Development. The effect is particularly striking because of the calm and gentle nature of this new theme, in contrast to the "storm and stress" that grip the rest of the movement.
Movement II, Adagio, is a calm, tender piece in A major, immediately recognizable by its repeated grace-note figures that Wiki describes as "hicupping." Oddly enough, that image didn't come to my mind. The movement's harmony is unusually rich, far-reaching, and expressive for its time. Some of the most touching passages are those in which the texture thins to one line of melody over a bass line. In such intimate moments, it is hard not to feel the sense of loneliness that Haydn apparently meant to express.

Movement III is the expected Minuet. Haydn lavished on it the tempo-marking Allegretto, though a simple "Tempo di Minuetto" would usually do. Set in the fiendishly tricky key of F-sharp Major, whose key signature looks like a briar patch, it thrives on dynamic contrasts (loud vs. soft), unexpected harmonic twists, tied-across-the-bar rhythms, and a deliberately inconclusive-sounding final phrase of each section. The trio briefly spotlights the horns, and also contains the first strong hint of minor-key angst since the first movement.

Movement IV begins as a customary Haydn finale, marked Presto in cut time. Beginning, once again, in f-sharp minor, it follows sonata form with a seemingly unstoppable energy. It's really very exciting, and it comes to the point so directly that it seems close to being finished by about 2:45 or 3:00, when the Recap comes to a sudden halt on the dominant chord. Then Haydn does something totally unprecedented.
He ends the movement with a 5-minute-long coda in a slow (Adagio) 3/8 time, beginning in the key of A (relative major to f-sharp minor) and working its way toward F-sharp Major. Flamboyantly anticlimactic, this sweet, gentle music starts softly and grows ever softer. The instrumental texture grows thinner, too. You'll notice this even on an audio recording, such as this Youtube playlist of the entire symphony. What you can't fully appreciate without seeing a live performance, is that the players are actually leaving the stage, in ones and twos and sometimes whole sections at a time, as they reach the end of their parts. Some of them, notably the horns and oboes, get somewhat of a solo before they leave. Others simply, quietly, excuse themselves until, at last, only two solo violins are left to complete the work.

As a bit of stage business combined with a musical message that even a blind man can pick up, this finale basically told Prince Nikolaus: "Enough is enough. It's time to go home." And he got the message, evidently, because the whole court moved back to Eisenstadt the next day. Ah, the power of music!

Here's a video of the finale that you may enjoy. Daniel Barenboim conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in a New Years' Day concert, and plays the business of the departing musicians as slapstick comedy.

Reading Schubert's 4th

Franz Schubert wrote his c-minor Fourth Symphony in 1816, when he was only 19 years old. He titled it his "Tragic" Symphony, though it takes a bit of imagination to hear anything tragic in it. Sure, it's in a minor key, like no other symphony by Schubert except the "Unfinished." Apart from that, the sense of nervous agitation in the first and especially the last movement, and the violence of the Minuetto, it doesn't present much that the modern ear can identify as tragedy. Perhaps, in the subtler "classic" idiom of Haydn and Mozart, wherein the young Schubert here demonstrates his mastery while beginning to stretch in a "romantic" direction, we must allow for a lower threshold of tragedy. Or perhaps we may count it a tragedy that Schubert never heard it performed. It didn't get a premiere until 1849, on the 21st anniversary of its composer's death.

(EDIT) Here is a recording of the symphony that you might want to follow along with, in a separate window, as you continue reading this. Movement I opens Adagio molto (very slowly), with an introduction full of tortured intervals and sudden falling motifs. From the opening loud unison C, it takes only ten measures to arrive at an equally loud G-flat Major chord, diabolically far from c minor. The obsessive muttering over the same, distressed phrase continues in that key, the upper and lower strings passing the melody back and forth, like an extremely bitter pill being rolled from one side of the mouth to another. Consider the musical tastebuds it pricks from the G-flat chord in measure 10 to the beginning of the Allegro vivace at the pickup to measure 30: First A-flat, then D-flat; then F, and D-flat again; then descending, with accompanying falling motifs, from A-flat through G-flat, F, and E-flat, to D; modulating simply but forcefully to G, the dominant of C-minor; and squeezing as much suspense out of that dominant as decently possible, before resolving back to C-minor at the beginning of the "fast, lively," main sonata movement.

As this opens, the violins introduce the First Theme, hushed yet passionate, over an agitated string accompaniment. The full orchestra breaks in at bar 39 for a loud transition passage full of descending arpeggios, alternating with soulful phrases based on the slow intro. In this way Schubert creates a semblance of thematic interest while shifting through a number of keys. He finally unveils the Second Theme at bar 67, beginning in the key of A-flat. Again, this theme is introduced by strings alone, followed by a repeat with winds added.

But then, Schubert transgresses sonata-form orthodoxy just a bit, by beginning to develop fragments of this theme against a background of string tremolos, broken triads, and sustained clarinet notes. Again our toes touch ground in several keys before a series of explosive, unison notes (descending from G to C) heralds the codetta. This wraps up the exposition with a colossal chain of chromatic chord progressions, driven by the rhythms of a triumphal fanfare, arriving finally at a firm A-flat cadence. Or rather, not finally. Because just when you think the expo is finished, Schubert wittily tacks on an augmented-sixth-chord transition back to C minor.

At this point in the score, a repeat sign directs us back to the beginning of the Allegro vivace. Unhappily, some performances ignore this repeat and go directly into the Development, a nowadays-too-common form of abridgement that they also inflict on the fourth movement. In my opinion, more is lost than gained by omitting the repeat of the Exposition. We buy ourselves a bit of time, but at the expense of the composer's intended proportions, and of the chance to appreciate the double entendre of the final notes of this section. For on the first iteration, bars 131-133 form a remarkable transition back to the beginning of the sonata; while on the second, they function as the first tremor of the tonal earthquake of bars 134-138.

After this shock is over, you are prepared for absolutely anything to happen as the development commences. So the strings-only reprise of the first theme, transposed down a whole step to b-flat minor, comes as surprisingly unsurprising. Schubert expands the scope of this theme, however, moving the melody to the bass line, then treating it to a touch of fuguelike stretto, then pulling it apart and messing with the bits. Then the Recapitulation introduces it again, as at first, but in g minor this time. The recap proceeds as though the entire exposition had been ratcheted up one click around the circle of fifths, modulating predictably to E-flat (relative major of c minor) in time for the second theme, all the way up to the bar 236, where the big surprises begin.

At bar 236, instead of copying bars 89 ff. and pasting it up a fifth, Schubert unexpectedly veers into the same key in which we originally heard the codetta. Trust me, the sense of surprise will not be lost on your ears, even if you don't understand the key relationships involved. From bar 88 to 89 Schubert had shifted from a d-flat minor chord to E major; at bar 235-236, where we would expect the equivalent passage to move from a-flat minor to B major, it resolves instead to E major again, and we're suddenly back in the exact same music, key and all, as the end of the exposition. But this doesn't last long. When the music slams into C major at bar 244, it's for keeps this time. The riff that enabled the Exposition to end in A-flat is replaced by a simple cascade of descending thirds, keeping the codetta solidly in C major. Even with those chromatic chains still in there, it leads back time after time to the dominant G and the tonic C. As an extra bonus, as if that isn't convincing enough, Schubert adds a quick coda in which ascending scales reassert this dominant-tonic relationship, concluding with seven solid bars of the C-major chord.

I won't drag out my analysis of Movement II very much. It's a lyrical Rondo, marked Andante and in A-flat major, again opening with a theme introduced by the strings alone. This gentle refrain is contrasted with a stern episode in which variants of an anguished, ascending phrase and a three-note moaning motive call back and forth across a pounding 16th-note accompaniment by the second violins and violas. After the second such episode, the final refrain is accompanied by a similar 16th-note figure, transformed however into something sunnier. The movement ends with a sweet coda in which the woodwinds trade fragments of the refrain theme over a triplet accompaniment in the strings.

Movement III, a minuet marked Allegro vivace, is one of those pieces that looks different on paper than it sounds. This will be because of the harsh accents that make much of it sound more like 2/4 time than the 3/4 in which it is written. In its loud unisons, its twisty chromaticism, and its heavy-footed rhythm it sounds more like something to hide from than something to dance to. I don't mean this as a criticism; I like this movement. But Schubert must have been thinking on a Scherzo brainwave, rather than a Minuet one, when he wrote this. It's an angry, threatening, possibly inebriated dance, in which even the relatively calm bits take on a sarcastic resonance. The Trio is much more classically ordered, but even it has its mysterious side, its hint of uncertainty and even menace. Schubert also added tonal variety to the symphony by placing this movement in the key of E-flat, rather than (according to classical precedent) the symphony's main key of c minor or C major.

The Allegro finale is an extremely busy-sounding movement. The strings saw away almost constantly in rapid 8th notes, accompanying a theme that either comically or tragically vibrates with nervous energy. Even the major-key, skippy bits seem only to smile over an internal panic. By bar 63, the music seems to be positively hopping up and down with anxiety, flapping its hands in a birdlike manner. In bar 85 we encounter a second theme in the predictable key of A-flat, but more interestingly, a theme broken up between the first violins and the clarinet, like two children cheerfully calling back and forth over the hubbub. This theme grows and develops, building eventually to the explosive codetta, beginning at bar 129. Here phrases that seem related to the first theme pile up at great length (and height) to a huge E-flat-major cadence.

Then, following a repeat of the Exposition (omitted in some performances), the Development begins with the movement's first moment of relative calm. It is, however, a calm disturbed by sneaky presentiments. After a moment of complete silence, the "skippy bits" from the first group resurface in the unexpected key of A major, then in F, then in D-flat, before dissolving into motives that Schubert subjects to some of the craftiest development in his symphonic career -- all by way of modulating to C major for the Recapitulation.

Once again, Schubert gets around the problem of how to round off the movement in the same key of C by veering, quite early, into a minor and letting the remainder of the recap play out a third lower than the expo. So the second theme, instead of its original key of A-flat, returns in F; and the codetta ratchets itself up chromatically, not to E-flat, but at last to C. I suppose this "transpose the whole exposition" procedure saved Schubert a lot of trouble; he certainly used it a lot. The result, however, is a bit unexpected. The final cadence is delayed by a coda, in which Schubert plays around with the C/A-flat key relationship. It's a highly amusing game that makes this symphony's concluding pages especially colorful and impressive.

Since my teen years, this work has been one of those old friends who is always welcome to drop in. It's nice to catch up with it once in a while. Lasting about half an hour, it never overstays its welcome. Scored for a classical-sized orchestra with pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings (with the basses doubling the cellos an octave down), it adheres to the traditional number (four) and order of movements (slow movement second, minuet third). It exhibits classic proportions and key relationships, but with a presentiment of the romantic era with its richer harmonies, its coarser dynamics and textural contrasts, and its emotions more vivid because less veiled.

If you had first heard this symphony after listening to loads of Haydn and Mozart, you would have thought: "Gee, I never realized Haydn felt that strongly," or perhaps, "Whoa, Mozart's taste really isn't what I thought it was." But only someone ignorant of Beethoven's first eight symphonies (which had all been written by 1814) would have thought so. Young Schubert was independently working through some of the same discoveries Beethoven had already made. His revolutionary achievements would mostly go unnoticed until decades later. But now we can appreciate this moment in Schubert's formation, and in the formation of Romantic Music, on its own terms. Isn't it wonderful?

IMAGES: Schubert, Schubert, Schubert, and Schubert. This image (at left) is supposed to represent Schubert at about the age when he wrote this symphony. It's very pretty but... well, really! It's kind of hard to believe, isn't it?

Public Enemies

Last night I took myself to a midnight movie premiere. The show was the 1930s cops-and-robbers epic Public Enemies, directed by Michael Mann, whose films are typically long, stylish, brooding affairs punctuated by intense action sequences. This one follows the parallel careers of bank robber John Dillinger and the FBI agent in charge of catching him, Melvin Purvis, from October 1933 (when Dillinger engineered a prison breakout) to July 1934 (when he was shot dead outside a movie theater).

Ah, the cast. It isn't often that one sees a film so lavishly and successfully cast. Johnny Depp makes magic as Dillinger in a portrayal that combines tenderness, humor, tragedy, and sheer magnetic masculinity in a way he has never managed before. Only someone who could play Jack Sparrow and Sweeney Todd could turn the word "Coffee" into a laugh line and (by expressing a sociopathic indifference to human life) send shivers down your spine, and within the same brief scene. To his poetically inarticulate love speeches he brings a sizzle worthy of Brando; and in spite of one crushing loss after another, he saves up his tears until just the right moment to ensure that the audience will be on his side, forever.

Appearing opposite him is Christian Bale, who actually looks and sounds like a different person for the first time (as opposed to getting by on sheer incandescent energy). His Purvis is soft-spoken, unflappable, ethically ambiguous, with a soft South Carolina accent and a remarkable restraint. Not once does he pull his trademark "whispering and screaming at the same time" trick. Attaboy.

As Dillinger's criminal associates, we get to see Stephen Dorff, David Wenham, Jason Clarke, Giovanni Ribisi, Stephen "Baby Face" Graham, and Channing "Pretty Boy" Tatum. As his two girlfriends we see the sultry Marion Cotillard and the perky Leelee Sobieski. His slick-as-butter lawyer is unforgettably portrayed by Peter Gerety. Meanwhile, on the side of the law, we get to watch a virtually unrecognizable Billy Crudup do a loathesome turn as J. Edgar Hoover. Rory Cochrane and Shawn Hatosy play a couple of ill-fated agents. Stephen Lang, who lately played "Stonewall" Jackson in one of the most tiresome Civil War movies I ever saw, recovers his manliness as Agent Winstead who, you can tell from his first squint, is going to kill John Dillinger in the end. Matt Craven plays one of Winstead's stooges. And Lili Taylor plays a female sheriff who was too far ahead of her time for her own good.

The movie is not altogether historical, of course. The escape attempt with guns carved out of soap? In real life it ended badly. The scene where Dillinger brazenly waltzes through the very FBI office that is tracking him down? Completely made-up. And Melvin Purvis couldn't have gotten command of the Dillinger task force as a reward for killing Pretty Boy Floyd, because Floyd was killed some months after Dillinger. Various members of the gang came to different fates, at different times, than as depicted in the movie.

But some things in Public Enemies are disturbingly real. The innocent civilians gunned down by the FBI by mistake, while the real bad guys got away? That happened. The girlfriend who kept the secret of Dillinger's hide-out all the way to prison? Real. The gangster movie, Manhattan Melodrama, which Dillinger went to see with his other girlfriend right before he was shot? Eerily appropriate... but also real. It's even possible that the movie holds back from portraying the full truth about Purvis's methods -- for example, he is alleged to have ordered Charles Floyd's execution without a trial -- but sometimes, the truth is so strange that fiction must stop short of it, in order to be believed.

It was a long, stylish, brooding movie punctuated by intense action sequences. No surprise there! The look of it was exquisite. The camera work was sometimes bumpier than it strictly had to be, but often strikingly effective. There were a couple of dolly-shots in which someone is walking straight toward the camera, in close-up, and they frankly made my eyes water. And there was a bit of blood and gore, as bullets made exit wounds out of people's torsos and faces. But I thought the nudity was admirably restrained; Marion Cotillard, for example, may someday be able to watch this movie with her children, in spite of a bedroom scene and a bathtub scene, the latter ending with someone saying, "Lady, put some clothes on!"

The story neither rushes nor drags, but unfolds at just the right pace, especially as the suspense builds toward Dillinger's sticky end. The clips from Manhattan Melodrama are a perfect touch, given the similarity in looks between the leads in both films. With a large cast of characters moving on complex trajectories, it is a film full of subtle variations in look and feeling. It makes the dawning of the age of Federal Crime, and the prosecution thereof, seem like the passing of a golden age (though it was only golden for the criminals who profited from it); it makes Dillinger, dangerous crook that he was, seem like a dashing, daring, Robin Hood-like hero; it makes you fear for the conscience of the Special Agent hunting him; and when Dillinger goes down, and Purvis walks away, you may be surprised by which one the film makes you pity.

Public Enemies is a great film: a feast for the eyes and for the mind. I'll expect it to get lots of nominations and rewards, when the time comes for that kind of stuff.