Part I - Content

"Schubert wrote Erlkonig in 1815, at the age of eighteen. Since he was not a child prodigy, he was still unknown to his native city. This was the year of the Congress of Vienna, a time when Schubert was studying with Salieri, obliquely castigating Beethoven, and writing more music than he would ever do again" (Gibbs 41) To think that Schubert composed this masterpiece at an age many of us struggled with simple counterpoint and the phrase model in theory I is simply incomprehensible. The complexity of the music and narrated story seem almost impossible to attribute to such a young composer. Around the time he composed Der Erlkonig, Schubert reportedly composed "over 20,000 bars of music".

The text of the piece is that of Der Erlkonig, a poem written by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Schubert's choice of text is not surprising as he is said to have immersed himself in the poetry of Goethe the prior year, around 1814 (Gibbs 43). The poem tells the story of a father and son riding on horseback through a windy night and their bleak encounter with the elf king.