Franz Liszt — Liebestraum No. 2 in E major – Analysis

A couple beside a grand piano in a nineteenth-century music room, inspired by Liszt’s Liebestraum No. 2.
In Uhland’s “Seliger Tod”, love’s bliss leads to awakening in a beloved’s embrace. Liszt carries that intensity into the singing line of his second Liebestraum.

Franz Liszt’s Liebestraum No. 2 in E major, S.541/2, is the central nocturne in the collection Liebesträume. It draws on his song “Gestorben war ich”, S.308, to words by Ludwig Uhland, and retains the poem’s title, “Seliger Tod”, or “Blessed Death”. Death here is an image of love’s bliss: the speaker loses himself in his beloved’s embrace, only to be awakened by her kisses.

The piano version appeared in Leipzig in 1850, published by Friedrich Kistner alongside the other two nocturnes. Within the collection, the second has a distinctive musical character. Its slow tempo and restrained opening coexist with chromatic harmony, strongly accented melodic notes and a climax explicitly marked grandioso. These changes unfold within a short span, giving the piece a concentrated expressive trajectory.

Much of its force comes from the differences between successive appearances of the song. At first, the melody emerges amid rests and separate accompanying entries. Later, it is surrounded by quick figures, projected above repeated chords and, towards the close, transferred to the piano’s lower range. Each change of accompaniment alters the weight and character of the same melodic idea.

The central question of this analysis is how that melody remains recognisable while the density, register and pace of the surrounding music change. Harmony is equally important. E major is announced by the key signature, yet a settled sense of tonal grounding emerges gradually. The points of arrival acquire their expressive significance through the music that leads to them.

Movements / Structure

The second Liebestraum is played without a break. The divisions below map its continuous course; they are analytical descriptions, rather than separate movements or titles supplied by Liszt. E major and 3/4 time provide the overall framework, while the form develops through successive reworkings of the song material.

The continuity of the melodic idea holds the work together. Changes are most readily heard in the accompaniment, the density of the chords, the range of the keyboard and the dynamics. The form takes shape through the different degrees of intensity with which the song returns and develops.

Musical Analysis

The introduction: motion before melody

Before the principal melody begins, a short introduction establishes the piece’s pattern of movement and repose. Both hands rise through groups of notes that quickly widen the sound, then arrive at longer-held chords. The distinction is audible from the outset: the ascent creates expectation, and the sustained chord allows its resonance to settle before the phrase continues.

The marking Quasi lento, abbandonandosi calls for a slow pace and freedom of delivery. Abbandonandosi suggests allowing the phrase to unfold without pressing heavily on the beats. The upward motion nevertheless gives it a clear direction, with the sustained chords serving as destinations for the quicker notes. Flexibility of timing operates within a carefully organised succession of tension and waiting.

The four-sharp key signature indicates E major, but the introduction’s chromatic notes delay an immediate sense of tonal ease. There is more harmonic uncertainty at the opening than the work’s lyrical title might suggest. The listener initially follows the ascent and its interruption; the significance of the eventual harmonic destination becomes clearer as the piece unfolds.

The first presentation: a song shaped by rests

The arrival of the main line changes the organisation of the sound. The broad rising figures recede, and attention turns to a melody articulated through longer note values, dotted rhythms and breathing spaces. Liszt’s il canto accentato assai asks for the song to be brought clearly into focus at the piano. Above all, this concerns the balance between the principal voice and the surrounding notes: the important melodic notes need sufficient weight to sustain a coherent phrase.

Here the accompaniment enters in distinct contributions. Low supporting notes, chords and short melodic figures appear between the notes of the song, leaving spaces that become part of the phrasing. This differs from the even flow of arpeggios often associated with the Romantic nocturne. Expression depends on when each voice enters and on how the melody remains connected across the accompaniment’s rests.

3/4 time provides a common framework, while the note values give the three beats differing degrees of emphasis. Some notes linger; others enter after a rest, and the short closing figures allow each breath to occupy a slightly different amount of time. The pulse remains perceptible without becoming a regular dance step. The effect is close to vocal declamation, in which melodic direction determines where the emphasis falls.

Within this relatively open texture, the lower part occasionally takes on melodic activity of its own. Descending left-hand figures answer the upper line or continue its momentum. They become particularly audible when the principal voice holds a note or pauses briefly. The accompaniment thus helps carry the song forward, preparing the more intricate cooperation between the hands that follows.

The first surge and the end of the initial statement

The initial restraint gradually gives way. Crescendo and rinforzando, together with the indication appassionato, accompany a widening range and stronger melodic accents. Supporting chords gain weight, while the distance between the bass and the high notes broadens the phrase. The increase in intensity involves the whole texture.

Harmony contributes to this movement. Chromatic alterations change the support beneath the melody, preventing the early phrases from sounding as though they have already reached a definitive resting place. A melodic descent can lead to renewed harmonic expectation instead of closing the section. The first surge therefore grows out of the opening manner of delivery, with small, successive renewals of tension.

This course ends with a slowing and fading of the sound, followed by a fermata before the double bar. The first large presentation, following the main body of the song, has reached its close. The pause makes the next entry formally distinct: when the new accompaniment begins, it is heard as a fresh treatment of material the listener already knows.

Dolcissimo: the melody within the decorated texture

At dolcissimo, the accompaniment becomes finer and more continuous. Small descending and ascending figures pass between the hands, filling the space between melody and bass. Their movement occupies many of the gaps heard in the first presentation and gives the phrase greater fluidity. The familiar song now unfolds within a denser succession of notes, while its melodic outline remains largely intact.

The instruction sempre marcato il canto armonioso defines the balance required: the singing line must remain clearly audible throughout. Its longer notes need to retain their continuity above the quick accompanying figures. The relative strength and connection of the melodic notes determine whether the listener hears a sustained phrase or merely a succession of small keyboard patterns.

In Example 1, the melody’s longer note values stand apart from the quick accompaniment. Movement passes between the two hands to connect the texture, while the instruction above the staff asks the pianist to keep the song in clear focus.

Liszt, Liebesträume S.541/2, bars 35–37: dolcissimo and sempre marcato il canto armonioso, with the melody in longer note values above semiquaver accompaniment.
Example 1. Franz Liszt — Liebesträume, S.541: No. 2 in E major (“Seliger Tod”), bars 35–37. Dolcissimo: the singing line within the decorated texture. Friedrich Kistner, Leipzig, undated reprint [1886], plates 1751 / 6865, p. 13, third system. Faithful crop from the digitised copy held by the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, 2 Mus.pr. 4748, bsb00051595.

The difficulty lies in asking one hand to fulfil different functions at once. A melodic note may need to be held and supported while the remaining fingers continue the accompaniment. Changes of clef and register also allow the hands to cover a wide span. A clear performance depends on hearing the individual voices and grading their sound accordingly.

The principal change at dolcissimo is therefore in the listener’s experience of melodic duration. In the first presentation, rests and separate accompanying entries made the breathing spaces more explicit. Here, quick movement continues around the held notes and draws the phrases more closely together. This increased activity prepares the next, much more forceful change of texture.

The chordal climax: grandioso and appassionato assai

The move to un poco animato is immediately audible. The sound grows stronger, the accompaniment gathers into repeated chords and the melody becomes more prominent. With f grandioso, Liszt decisively expands the scale of expression. The delicate activity of the preceding section gives way to denser chordal writing and a more pronounced rhythmic drive.

Example 2 shows the beginning of this change. Repeated chords establish a distinct rhythmic presence beneath the main melodic notes. Compared with Example 1, the accompaniment is more compact, and f grandioso changes the expressive scale of the passage.

Liszt, Liebesträume S.541/2, bars 43–45: un poco animato and forte grandioso, with repeated chords beneath the melody.
Example 2. Franz Liszt — Liebesträume, S.541: No. 2 in E major (“Seliger Tod”), bars 43–45. Un poco animato — f grandioso: the move to a denser chordal texture. Friedrich Kistner, Leipzig, undated reprint [1886], plates 1751 / 6865, p. 14, first system. Faithful crop from the digitised copy held by the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, 2 Mus.pr. 4748, bsb00051595.

The climax builds in stages. Stringendo presses the music forward, crescendo markings increase the dynamic level and the melody rises higher. Beneath it, repeated chords maintain the energy between the principal notes. The widening range and persistent accompaniment make the phrase sound increasingly urgent, even where the melodic motion itself remains relatively simple.

At appassionato assai, accented octaves give the descending melodic line a clear profile. The contrast with dolcissimo involves dynamics, articulation and accompaniment together. The phrase has gained weight and breadth, while the repeated chords continue to propel it. Its vocal origins remain audible in the melody’s contour and breathing spaces, now expressed through a much more outwardly impassioned piano sound.

The tension begins to subside as the upper voice breaks off and the motion continues lower down. Rests in the upper part leave the left hand more exposed, until fermatas suspend the flow. The accumulated energy passes from full chordal writing into shorter figures and pauses, preparing the return of the decorated texture.

The withdrawal: from con passione to sotto voce

The decorated writing returns at con passione, still carrying some of the preceding intensity. The familiar quick figures restore fluidity, but the phrase now has greater expressive weight. This return carries the experience of the climax into the process of subsiding, using a different kind of piano writing.

The decisive change of colour comes at sotto voce. The melody moves lower while the accompaniment retains its repeated chords. This alters the relationship between the voices: the principal line acquires a darker timbre and must remain distinct within a quieter dynamic range. The intimacy of the passage comes from the low register and the melody’s subdued delivery.

Before the final close, a further swell and upward movement prolong the expectation. Calmato and smorzando then reduce the activity and allow more time for the sound to fade. The last chord establishes E major. After the successive changes of accompaniment, dynamics and harmony, this sustained ending is heard as the completion of the entire course of the piece.

The poem and the postponement of tonal arrival

The title “Seliger Tod”, or “Blessed Death”, becomes clearer when Uhland’s brief poem is read as a whole. Across its eight lines, the speaker has “died” of love’s bliss and lies in his beloved’s embrace. Her kisses awaken him, and the final image reveals heaven in her eyes. Death and burial belong to the description of this experience of love. The verse moves towards awakening and the recognition of happiness.

Susan Youens draws attention to a particular choice in Liszt’s original song, “Gestorben war ich”, S.308: he avoids establishing the home key until the reference to heaven in the final line. This is the significance of the harmonic delay. The key signature tells the musician that the work belongs to E major, yet the music initially withholds a settled sense of arrival there. As the phrase continues, the listener waits for a more conclusive resting place.

When the key is established alongside the final poetic image, two developments reach completion together. The words reveal where the speaker’s experience has led, while the harmony provides the point of repose it had postponed. Youens’s observation brings this relationship into focus: the tonal arrival gains weight from its position within the poem. Recognising the closing chord is only part of the experience; what precedes it, and the words sung at that moment, give the arrival its significance.

In the piano nocturne, the melody is heard without words, and the music extends beyond a single presentation of the song. After the initial statement, Liszt returns to the material at dolcissimo, changes the accompaniment and increases its expressive scale at grandioso. Completed vocal phrases become starting points for further development at the keyboard. The relationship between poetry and harmony helps explain the work’s origins, but cannot by itself account for every return or climax in the instrumental version.

This distinction allows the poem to inform listening without constructing a programme Liszt did not specify. Each reappearance of the melody need not represent a new incident, nor must grandioso correspond to some additional action by the lovers. Bliss and intense emotion provide the broad expressive context. Within it, the piano develops its own continuity through changes of texture, dynamics and register.

At the end of the nocturne, E major is established after this extended development. The sustained final chord and the subsiding motion complete a course longer than the original delivery of the words. A listener familiar with the poem may connect this calm with the fulfilment of the experience of love, while continuing to hear how the music itself prepares its close.

🪶 A Chapter in the Life of the Work

The nocturne Liszt revisited on a smaller scale

In 1850, Friedrich Kistner published the three piano Liebesträume in Leipzig. For the second nocturne, Liszt had returned to “Gestorben war ich”, a song he had composed in the middle of the previous decade. Uhland’s eight lines had become a brief declaration for voice and piano. In the new version, the voice was absent from the performance: the pianist took responsibility for the melody, its accompaniment and the expansive surges Liszt had developed around them.

A much smaller piano treatment of the song also survives from approximately the same period, now catalogued as S.540a. Leslie Howard notes that Liszt left it untitled; “Gestorben war ich”, the name by which it is identified, points to its source. The melody had thus acquired two different forms at the keyboard: a short, simply written transcription and the much more extensive nocturne issued by Kistner.

Fifteen years after that publication, Liszt worked on it again. The piece now known as S.192/1 carries the date January 1865. Its opening remains recognisable: the same key and metre, with rising figures arriving at sustained chords. Yet the new page reduces the scale of the piano writing. In the modern critical edition, Sehr langsam, pianissimo and una corda establish a very slow, quiet manner from the outset. The nocturne’s material has been recast in simpler form. The piece belongs to the small piano compositions associated with Baroness Olga von Meyendorff, Liszt’s friend and correspondent.

This later treatment had a much longer wait for publication. In 1928, decades after Liszt’s death, José Vianna da Motta included it as the first of the Vier kleine Klavierstücke, published by Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig. Readers encountered a page dated 1865 that was related to a nocturne already in print since 1850. The simpler reworking had followed a separate path into publication.

Today it stands first among the Fünf Klavierstücke, S.192. The five pieces come from different years; their grouping in the catalogue does not mean that Liszt planned them as a unified cycle. For anyone tracing the second Liebestraum beyond the familiar nocturne, its position matters: No. 1 is the piece to look for, despite the different numbering found in older recording notes.

The story leaves us with two scores that can be placed side by side: the nocturne published in 1850 and the simpler treatment dated 1865. The second did not replace the first. It preserved another version of the same melody, made available through later editions alongside Liszt’s small piano pieces.

🎧 Listening Guide

From the introduction to the song. Rising groups of notes and sustained chordal pauses distinguish the opening. The principal melody introduces longer note values and more space between accompanying entries. The change clearly marks the point at which the first presentation of the song begins.

The new accompaniment at dolcissimo. After the first substantial pause, quick movement becomes more continuous and passes between the hands. The melody moves more slowly than the notes around it. Following that line helps distinguish the principal voice from its decoration, even without reading the score.

The growth in intensity at grandioso. Repeated chords thicken the sound as the pace becomes more active and the melody projects higher. The accented octaves of the following surge give the line a distinct downward direction. The climax is recognisable through these elements working together with the stronger dynamics.

The low melody at sotto voce. Towards the end, the principal line is heard in the piano’s lower range, accompanied by repeated chords. Its dark colour and subdued delivery distinguish this moment from the song’s earlier appearances.

The approach to the final chord. One last upward movement precedes the settling of the music. At calmato and smorzando, activity diminishes and the sound gradually fades, until E major is heard as the fulfilment of the journey. The close gains significance when heard in relation to the harmonic uncertainty of the opening.

🎶 Further Listening

  • Daniel Barenboim — Liszt: Liebesträume, Deutsche Grammophon, 1992. The piano recording selected for this article provides its principal listening reference. A useful focus is the continuity of the main melody as its accompaniment changes, together with the relationship between the expansive climax and the final withdrawal.
  • Leslie Howard — Liszt: The Complete Music for Solo Piano, Volume 19, Liebesträume & the Songbooks, Hyperion CDA66593, 1992. A programme devoted to piano transcriptions of songs offers a wider context for comparison. Hearing the work alongside the other two Liebesträume brings out the different ways in which Liszt treats a vocal melody at the keyboard.
  • Allan Clayton, tenor, and Julius Drake, piano — “Gestorben war ich”, S.308, on Liszt: The Complete Songs, Volume 5, Hyperion CDA68179, 2018. This is the original song rather than the piano version, S.541/2. Hearing the words makes it possible to relate the phrases to Uhland’s poem and to distinguish what the transcription preserves from what it expands.

📚 Further Reading

  • Ernst-Günter Heinemann, ed. — Franz Liszt, Liebesträume: 3 Notturnos, G. Henle Verlag, HN 634. The preface and critical comments discuss the parallel publication of the song and piano versions and the sources of the musical text. They offer a useful starting point for distinguishing the composer’s instructions from editorial intervention.
  • Susan Youens — Notes on “Gestorben war ich”, in the booklet for Liszt: The Complete Songs, Volume 5, Hyperion CDA68179, 2018. The connection she draws between the unfolding poem and the delayed establishment of the home key provides an illuminating approach to the original song.
  • Nicholas Cook — “Liszt’s Second Thoughts: ‘Liebestraum’ No. 2 and Its Relatives”, 19th-Century Music 12, no. 2 (1988), pp. 163–172. A study devoted specifically to the second nocturne and its related versions. It offers a specialist continuation for readers interested in comparing different treatments of the same material.

🔗 Related Works

  • Franz Liszt — Liebestraum No. 3 in A-flat major, S.541/3. A different poem and melody lead to a different organisation of the piano climax within the same collection.
  • Franz Liszt — Piano Piece No. 1 in E major, S.192/1. The later, simpler treatment of the same material offers the most direct comparison: the melodic relationship remains clear while the development and dynamic scale change.
  • Frédéric Chopin — Nocturne in D-flat major, Op. 27 No. 2. The singing melody and its decorated return offer a revealing parallel for the relationship between lyrical line and elaboration at the piano.
  • Felix Mendelssohn — Song without Words in E major, Op. 19b No. 1. Vocal thinking shapes a wholly instrumental work, inviting comparison between the creation of a “song without words” and the transcription of an existing Lied.
  • Robert Schumann — “Widmung”, Op. 25 No. 1. Love poetry, melodic delivery and harmonic expansion offer a complementary route into the Romantic world of intimate expression.

🎼 Closing Reflection

Some moments of happiness resist retelling: words give them an order they did not have while we were living them. Music can allow them more time, returning to a phrase, intensifying it, then letting it sound in a lower voice until the experience finds its own pace. The silence at the end still holds something of the intensity that came before.