While the best Schubert songs tend to be those with an obsessional musical idea driving forward the central argument (Die Junge Nonne, Der Zwerg, Auf dem Wasser zu singen), a significant number of the lesser known ones employ recitative, notably the ballads, those lengthy, discursive 'drawing-room operas' rarely performed today. The best of them, like Der Taucher and Lodas Gespenst were experiments in the dramatic cantata style so successfully used by Haydn in Ariadne auf Na

Preparations for Schubertreise XX in Dublin on April 23rd next are in full swing. Yet another lengthy ballad, this time a setting of Schiller's virtuoso "Die Bürgschaft', 'The Bond'. A tale of loyalty and persistence in the face of incredible odds, it elicits some of Schubert's best cinematic effects, and shows him mastering the balance between recitative and melody proper. Remember that he is just eighteen in 1815 — what accomplished voice-leading and harmony! Schubert's re