Der Erlkönig

Summary

An anxious young boy is being carried home at night by his father on horseback. To what sort of home is not spelled out; German Hof has a rather broad meaning of "yard," "courtyard," "farm," or (royal) "court." The lack of specificity of the father's social position allows the reader to imagine the details.

As the poem unfolds, the son seems to see and hear beings his father does not; the reader cannot know if the father is indeed aware of their presence, but he chooses to comfort his son, asserting reassuringly naturalistic explanations for what the child sees – a wisp of fog, rustling leaves, shimmering willows. Finally, the child shrieks that he has been attacked. The father rides faster to the Hof. There, he recognizes that the boy is dead.

The legend

The story of the Erlkönig derives from the traditional Danish ballad Elveskud: Goethe's poem was inspired by Johann Gottfried Herder's translation of a variant of the ballad (Danmarks gamle Folkeviser 47B, from Peter Syv's 1695 edition) into German as "Erlkönigs Tochter" ("The Erl-king's Daughter") in his collection of folk songs, Stimmen der Völker in Liedern (published 1778). Goethe's poem then took on a life of its own, inspiring the Romantic concept of the Erlking. Niels Gade's cantata Elverskud opus 30 (1854, text by Chr. K. F. Molbech) was published in translation as Erlkönigs Tochter.

The Erlkönig's nature has been the subject of some debate. The name translates literally from the German as "Alder King" rather than its common English translation, "Elf King" (which would be rendered as Elfenkönig in German). It has often been suggested that Erlkönig is a mistranslation from the original Danish elverkonge, which does mean "king of the elves."

In the original Scandinavian version of the tale, the antagonist was the Erlkönig's daughter rather than the Erlkönig himself; the female elves or elvermøer sought to ensnare human beings to satisfy their desire, jealousy and lust for revenge.

Settings to music

The poem has often been set to music with Franz Schubert's rendition, his Opus 1 (D. 328), being the best known. Other notable settings are by members of Goethe's circle, including the actress Corona Schröter (1782), Andreas Romberg (1793), Johann Friedrich Reichardt (1794) and Carl Friedrich Zelter (1797). Beethoven attempted to set it to music but abandoned the effort; his sketch however was complete enough to be published in a completion by Reinhold Becker (1897). A few other nineteenth-century versions are those by Václav Tomášek (1815), Carl Loewe (1818) and Louis Spohr (1856, with obbligato violin) and Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst (Polyphonic Studies for Solo Violin). 21st century examples are pianist Marc-André Hamelin's "Etude No. 8 (after Goethe)" for solo piano, based on "Erlkönig". and German rock singer Achim Reichel on his album Wilder Wassermann (2002). The German band Rammstein was also inspired by the poem for the song 'Dalai Lama'. The adaptation takes place in an airplane through bad weather. British doom metal band Pagan Altar have also adapted the work in their song 'The Erl King' on 2006's 'Mythical and Magical.'

Folksinger Steve Gillette adapted the poem for the opening track of his 1968 self-titled album. Gillette's version adds a final verse describing the father's reaction to his son's death: "To the trees in the night wind he cries aloud/Seeks out the face of death in every passing cloud/Down in the meadow where the boy's grave is laid/Nothing but the willow that waves in the glade"

The Franz Schubert composition

Franz Schubert composed his Lied "Erlkönig" for solo voice and piano in 1815, setting text from Goethe's poem. Schubert revised the song three times before publishing his fourth version in 1821 as his Opus 1; it was catalogued by Otto Erich Deutsch as D. 328 in his 1951 catalog of Schubert's works. The song was first performed in concert on 1 December 1820 at a private gathering in Vienna and received its public premiere on 7 March 1821 at Vienna's Theater am Kärntnertor.

The four characters in the song – narrator, father, son, and the Erlking – are all sung by a single vocalist. Schubert placed each character largely in a different vocal range, and each has his own rhythmic nuances; in addition, most singers endeavor to use a different vocal coloration for each part.

1. The Narrator lies in the middle range and begins in the minor mode.
2. The Father lies in the lower range and sings in both minor and major mode.
3. The Son lies in a higher range, also in the minor mode.
4. The Erlking's vocal line, in the major mode, provides the only break from the ostinato bass triplets in the accompaniment until the boy's death.

A fifth character, the horse, is implied in rapid triplet figures played by the pianist throughout the work, mimicking hoof beats.

"Erlkönig" starts with the piano playing rapid triplets to create a sense of urgency and simulate the horse's galloping. The left hand of the piano part introduces a low-register leitmotif composed of successive triplets. The right hand plays triplets throughout the piece until the last three bars. The constant triplets drive the frequent modulations of the piece as it switches between the characters.

This motif is directly associated with the Erlking and recurs throughout the piece. These motifs continue throughout. As the piece continues, each of the Son's pleas becomes higher in pitch than the last. Near the end of the piece, the music quickens and then slows as the Father spurs his horse to go faster and then arrives at his destination. The absence of the piano creates multiple effects on the text and music. The silence draws attention to the dramatic text and amplifies the immense loss and sorrow caused by the Son's death.

The piece is regarded as extremely challenging to perform due to the multiple characters the vocalist is required to portray, as well as its difficult accompaniment, involving rapidly repeated chords and octaves which contribute to the drama and urgency of the piece.

"Erlkönig" is through-composed; although the melodic motives recur, the harmonic structure is constantly changing and the piece modulates within characters. The rhythm of the piano accompaniment also changes within the characters. The first time the Erlking sings in measure 57, the galloping motive disappears. However, when the Erlking sings again in measure 87, the piano accompaniment plays arpeggios rather than chords.

"Erlkönig" has been transcribed for various settings: for solo piano by Franz Liszt; for solo voice and orchestra by Hector Berlioz; for solo violin by Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst.

The Carl Loewe composition

Carl Loewe's setting was published as Op. 1, No. 3 and composed in 1817–18, in the lifetime of the poem's author and also of Schubert, whose version Loewe did not then know. Collected with it were Op. 1, No. 1, Edward (1818; a translation of the Scottish ballad), and No. 2, Der Wirthin Töchterlein (1823; The Innkeeper's Daughter), a poem of Ludwig Uhland. Inspired by a German translation of Scottish border ballads, Loewe set several poems with an elvish theme; but although all three of Op. 1 are concerned with untimely death, in this set only the "Erlkönig" has the supernatural element.

Loewe's accompaniment is in semiquaver groups of six in 9/8 time and marked Geschwind (fast). The vocal line evokes the galloping effect by repeated figures of crotchet and quaver, or sometimes three quavers, overlying the binary tremolo of the semiquavers in the piano. In addition to an unusual sense of motion, this creates a flexible template for the stresses in the words to fall correctly within the rhythmic structure.

Loewe's version is less melodic than Schubert's, with an insistent, repetitive harmonic structure between the opening minor key and answering phrases in the major key of the dominant, which have a stark quality owing to their unusual relationship to the home key. The narrator's phrases are echoed by the voices of father and son, the father taking up the deeper, rising phrase, and the son a lightly undulating, answering theme around the dominant fifth. These two themes also evoke the rising and moaning of the wind. The Erl-king, who is always heard pianissimo, does not sing melodies, but instead delivers insubstantial rising arpeggios that outline a single major chord (that of the home key) which sounds simultaneously on the piano in una corda tremolo. Only with his final threatening word, "Gewalt", does he depart from this chord. Loewe's implication is that the Erlking has no substance, but merely exists in the child's feverish imagination. As the piece progresses, the first in the groups of three quavers is dotted to create a breathless pace, which then forms a bass figure in the piano driving through to the final crisis. The last words, war tot, leap from the lower dominant to the sharpened third of the home key; this time not to the major but to a diminished chord, which settles chromatically through the home key in the major and then to the minor.