Composer Franz Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden” string quartet is a somber work, with all four of its movements set in a minor key. It takes its name from the composer’s lied Der Tod und das Mädchen (1817) that provides the theme for the quartet’s slow movement, a set of variations.
The poem’s depiction of Death coming to claim a young life may well have had personal resonance for the 27-year-old Schubert since in 1824, when this quartet was written, symptoms of the disease that would kill him four years later had already begun to appear.
It is presumed that the composer died of Syphilis, but there was also a pandemic raging in Europe at the time, so other causes are also possible.
Here is the Alban Berg Quartet to play this amazing music for your enjoyment:
